I can’t quite articulate my question so bear with me.
When someone you know fairly well dies unexpectedly, like in a car accident, how do you react?
I tend to be shocked at first, then (relative to most people) get used to the idea, and then feel bad for their family, usually in terms of minutes or hours. I make a point not to feel sorry for myself- I’ll grieve, but not wallow in it, and I also don’t really worry about the how or why or how unfair it is, since it’s a done deal at that point. I generally try and dwell on it as little as I can.
It does vary with their closeness to me- a close family member will hit me a lot harder than someone I met once, of course. My grandparents’ deaths were a pretty big deal to me- they didn’t put me into a fit of depression, but it took me a while to get used to the idea.
I always feel a little guilty because compared to what I see in others, I feel like I’m coming across kind of flip or unconcerned about it, because I’m not always particularly morose, depressed or anything after it happens. I wonder if it’s somehow sociopathic- most people seem to get hit a lot harder by it than I do, and I don’t know if that means that I’m some sort of nut, or if I’m particularly well adjusted.
Lack of guilt and lack of concern for the feelings of others come close to being the essence of a sociopath, so what you’ve said here alone suggests you’re unlikely to be a sociopath.
I have experienced a similar reaction. I don’t think it’s sociopathic. As mentioned above, the fact that you are concerned about it indicates that you aren’t sociopathic. Sociopaths don’t care.
I’m rarely more focused or funnier than in crisis mode. Some may see it as annoying but trust me, it’s way better than screaming and being hysterical, and you aren’t in denial so much as you’re tabling the emotional part til an unspecified time in the future (probably an intensely inconvenient and public one) so that you can deal with necessary practicalities in the present.
In fact, sociopaths frequently revel in their sociopathy. The o.p. clearly isn’t doing this. It is possible that he may lack normal empathy, but even that is not clear; it may well be that he is just emotionally imperturbable to normal events that some people regard as traumatic.
FWIW, the DSM doesn’t use the term “sociopathy”… they call it Antisocial Personality Disorder. It has seven components (paraphrased here):
[ol]
[li]failure to conform to social norms [/li][li]deception and lying[/li][li]impulsiveness[/li][li]irritability and aggressiveness[/li][li]reckless disregard for safety[/li][li]consistent irresponsibility[/li][li]lack of remorse[/li][/ol]
The reason I brought this up is because a friend of mine was actually killed last night in an accident when a drunk driver going the wrong way on a one-way street hit his Vespa.
Granted, I hadn’t seen or talked with him in quite a while, but I’m definitely sorry to see him gone. I’m just not reacting quite as drastically as other friends of ours- it’s almost like they haven’t thought about the possibility of random death happening to our friends or even ourselves.
I wonder if I have a more rational way of dealing with grief than others do.
And yeah, I’m pretty calm in crises, so maybe you’re right.
Everyone grieves in different ways–and for different people. Whatever you do is natural for you and keep doing it if it works for you. To try and express emotion that that is either not there or in sufficient quantity just looks faked. The biggest issues with grief is on the front end: denial–and the back end: unable to let it go. Sounds like your group of friends are having front-end issues. If you feel you are not processing grief appropriately then you may want to consider a counselor that can help you learn to process it.
I have lost some good friends over the years and no matter how good or bad, expected or unexpected the death was, it fucking hurt and takes a good long time to fill in the hole in my soul. But they all hurt differently and some way more than others. Good luck to you.
Are these friends around your age? Pushing 40 (sorry, I peaked at your profile) is awfully late in life to first be learning this, but maybe they’ve led fortunate lives. I had a close friend die when I was in high school, so the thought that my close friends, people my own age, could die without warning has been part of my life for a long time.
I feel much the same way. Sure, I grieve and cry a bit when it’s a loved one who’s passed. Also, when I can see/feel the pain of a friend who has lost someone close, I can become moved to tears. But I’m able to put it away quickly and move along (out of sight and all). I’ve also wondered if I’m just a hard-ass, but I know better. Death is as much a part of life as anything else, and I think that realization helps make death easier for me to accept.
To go one step farther, I can become tired with someone who continues to grieve and cry for months and years after such an event. I never let them know this, but will sometimes try to comfort them by rationalizing and saying things like I’ve said above (…part of life, …no guarantees, etc). IME, this is rarely taken as intended and often backfires. With that in-mind, I’ve learned to just nod and say I understand their pain. And I do, I just don’t understand how it can go on for so long. As dbx820 said, everyone handles it differently.
Note also that the closest relative he lost was a grand parent (and depending on the family, you might not be extremely close to your grand parents). Amongst all the persons I knew or was related to who died, I didn’t feel much more than the OP in many cases. Yes, I liked old great aunt X, but I wasn’t deeply shocked by her death, even though a bit sad. Nothing to do with the death of someone you’re very close to and love.
I spent a good chunk of time worrying that there was something horribly wrong with me because I wasn’t more distraught over my mom’s death when I was in high school. I cried once, and then basically moved on. I felt like it should have had a bigger impact, but I basically just did my normal thing and it didn’t really bother me.
I’ve gotten over it. I’ve had other emotional losses, realized I’m capable of the full range of human emotion. I loved my mom, and my life would certainly be different if she were still around, but I’d made my peace with her death before it happened.
To echo some others above, I’m also much the same way. Events can be, and are, sad but I don’t dwell on the pain. However, I have yet to lose a parent, so there may be a difference. Both parents are in relatively poor health already, so I’ve considered the possibility, and I don’t anticipate reacting much differently.
To be honest, most of us are just faking it. We’re trying to sympathize with the family to help comfort them. For the most part, people aren’t any more sad about an acquaintance’s passing than they are when that person moves out of town, never to be seen again.
The close relatives are always “Ohhh, this is tragic!” and everyone else is saying “there, there” and thinking “Do we have milk at home?”
Longer answer: There’s a huge difference (IMO) between the loss of a “casual” friend (someone you haven’t spoken to in a while for example,) and losing a close friend or family member. The expressions and feelings of grief are usually proportional to the closeness of the person lost. I grieved far more deeply for my father and sister than for that guy in my high school homeroom. It’s normal.