Wow, wow, wow, you really nail it. Yes, people tend to offer trite (annoying) truisms and condolences, but I think most of them really do care and want to console, but just lack the words. Some say really awful things ("God picks only the best," it was her time to go, she died for some good reason, he's "in a better place now" - no, he's six feet under, or he's ashes, and no it's not a better place, etc etc).

Grieving is different for each of us, and your reticence is not uncommon:

Isn't death something you're supposed to process together? Something to rely on friends and family to help you cope with? I don't know. Maybe. I'm tempted to say everyone processes grief in their own way. For me, it was being normal with someone, cutting out the I'm sorry for your loss's and how you doing. I didn't want anyone to ask.

Some of us talk talk talk it out.
Some can't articulate it at all.
Some just want to MOVE ON and not be reminded and not have to be ever AWARE of the loss.

In grade school (1970s) we were assigned this poem:

Some people talk and talk
and never say a thing.
Some people look at you
and birds begin to sing.

Some people laugh and laugh
and yet you want to cry.
Some people touch your hand
and music fills the sky.
-- Charlotte Zolotow

The older I get, the more I appreciate that one.

I try not to get too bent out of shape by the condolences - especially those who say "She's with Jesus now."

We don't get to know what kind of life, if any, we live on The Other Side. Is there something? I think there must be. Ghosts, poltergeists, out of body experiences: science can verify none of it, but there's so much of it, who's to say that death is the end and no part of us lives on?

Anyway. Here I go, sounding like those annoying well-wishers. (One of them told me that thing about tears of grief: go ahead and cry; it's all a sign of how much you love the one you lost.)

Suffice to say, I love this post.