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Notes -
Sorry for your loss, firstly.
Second: yes, you're overthinking it. But here's a reassuring (under-compressed) metaphor - recreational drugs differ in how fucked up you actually are versus how fucked up you feel. Some match closely (eg booze), others don't.
The first and only time I ever used a strong opioid off-label, I was surprised by how sober I felt internally versus how intoxicated those around me perceived me to be. I thought I had been essentially fine, until my wife helpfully explained in mortifying detail after how completely out of it I'd been.
This is pretty much how my experience of close bereavement went. In the days and weeks immediately afterward, I thought guiltily that I was feeling less bad than I ought to. I felt bad about indecent flashes of feeling okay.
And the funny thing is of course, with the benefit of almost a decade's hindsight, I had been a mess. I really was impacted well over the minimum decent bereavement threshold. I was by no means at all some indifferent icicle, though a diary I kept at the time is (almost) funny in how much I kept returning to that question "I'm not grieving enough, am I, why not, what's this thorn in the flesh, etc".
My experience was that it took at least 6 months before I could do my job competently and about 2 years to where I was generally at baseline. And still a decade on I think of that family member no less than 4ish times a day, often more.
And importantly, I really just had no insight into how affected I was at the time
That's a good point regarding drugs. I don't know how much of a mess I might seem to others though. She died on saturday. I was back to work on monday, and I'm only planning on taking time off in so much as it would help for administrative tasks that result from her death. I loved my mother a lot, but I feel no impairment, no need to take a breather. Maybe it's a family trait, neither of my parents families are very performatively emotional. Within hours of it happening, my brother and I were calmly and casually discussing the logistics of the funeral, inheritance, etc... The only moments when I get choked up thinking about it is when I put myself into some else's shoes. Maybe it's also having internalized enough stoic philosophy that dampened my emotions. I don't know.
I think your reaction is pretty normal. When my dad died my family focused on logistics of internment, and my primary task was sorting out where he was on the taxes and getting an estimated return filed (it was close to the regular filing due date). I got 3 work days bereavement and while I used them all, it was mostly because of travel to/from my folks house. I expect it'll be similar when my mom dies.
On the other hand, I think if my husband pre-deceased me, I would need more than 3 days to figure out how to manage. And if my daughter pre-deceased me I am not sure I would ever really be functional again. I wonder if my dad had died while I still lived in his home if I would have been less emotionally pragmatic than I was.
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Nominated for AAQC.
I keep thinking of this observation I once saw that when you're drunk, you don't realise how drunk you are (but it's instantly obvious to everyone else), but when you're high on weed, you become paranoid that everyone around you will notice (but in reality most people don't).
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