Dealing with a sudden death (my mum)

[Crunchymum]

She died yesterday, was gone by the time I got to her (about 45 mins after getting the call that paramedics were trying to revive her). Unexplained so it will require a post mortem.

I know there are counselling services etc but I'm just wanting to hear from people who have been in this position and how you feel after some time passes.

She text me at 9am and was dead by 11am. I know for her this was the best way but I don't feel like I'll ever be able to get my head round what happened?

I’m so sorry. I lost both of my parents suddenly, my dad several years ago and my mother several months ago. It is dreadful to feel so blindsided and unprepared, in addition to the grief that one experiences. In some ways it was a blessing for my parents. Neither of them would have wanted a prolonged illness. But for those of us left behind it has been so hard.

Please be kind to yourself in these difficult days.

So sorry for your loss

I lost my dad very suddenly 5 years ago. I spoke to him the evening before, said goodnight and told him I loved him. And for some reason I couldn't sleep, I had a horrible feeling I'd never speak to him again. I got a call at 6am from my brother saying dad had had a massive heart attack early hours.

My mum was in bits, I took everything over regarding the funeral. Went into organisation mode really, which helped her and also me. My mum has been desolate since we lost him, completely shut down after 50 years together.

Even 5 years later, it's like I'm taking about someone else's experience if that makes sense. I somehow still can't grasp it.

Deepest sympathies OP

God what a shock for you, so sorry. It will eventually be something you can live with, but the world may seem a different place for a while. I felt as though I was looking into my life through a distorted lens, like it wasn't real.
You may also be in actual clinical shock so medication may be needed or help in the short term. Please go to the doctor if so.

@Crunchymum, honestly, it gets better, but omg, it’s ridiculously hard at first. I got the call on the school trip I was leading, sudden unexpected death of my dad. I cried for days, but eventually, I stopped thinking about him all the time and I can now think about his death in a reasonably objective manner-just over a year later. I don’t think there’s any right or wrong, you just have to cope as best you can. I hope you’re looking after yourself, you need to eat and take care of your body and soul, be selfish if necessary. You need time to process.

Bouledeneige’s post has made me sob.

@Bouledeneige Vous m’avez fait pleurer comme un veau. 😢

I'm so sorry for your loss.
I lost my mum very suddenly five years ago. She was texting me earlier in the day fine and then I got a phone call from her at 7pm saying she was struggling to breathe. I called an ambulance and got there within five minutes but she didn't make it. She died from a pulmonary embolism and was only 66 and in pretty good health.
The first few weeks/months are a blur of tears and grief. It does slowly get easier to deal with but it still takes my breath away when I realise that she's gone forever.
Day to day I'm ok now and living my life as well as I can as she would have wished. Every few weeks or so I'll be reminded of my grief and I'll shed a few tears. I even forget that she's gone sometimes and for a split second think that I must call her about something and then I remember and am taken back to the day I lost her.
I became friends with a very elderly neighbour of mine (97) after her death and he still sheds a tear about his own mother who has been dead for nearly 50 years. The grief will always be there but it will get easier to deal with as time passes.

I am sorry for your loss. I went through the same thing eleven years. My dm was looking after my dd the evening before. At 11 am the next morning she was dead. We had to go through a post mortem and an inquest which took almost 2 years I think to be heard due to evidence from drug companies as she died from an accidental overdose of a powerful drug. It was in the papers. it was the most terrible time of my life but I had to carry on as I had four children under ten. in the initial weeks I just wanted to die myself but over time it did get better. I don't think you ever get over it but just learn to live with it really until one day it's not on your mind all the time engulfing every waking moment. look after yourself and get support if you can.

So sorry @Crunchymum, sending you love and hugs.x

Much love to you
My mum died suddenly in June. She hadn't answered her phone, and dh went over to her flat to see if she was ok. He called an ambulance, performed first aid (she was alive but unconscious).
When he called home after the ambulance had arrived, he said, 'you'll be able to go in to see her...as she is critical'. She had a sudden and massive cerebral haemorrhage.
It was very strange, we were shielding ds, and she had been shielding and it just seemed so wrong that the first time going out was to go into ICU, wearing full PPE, so I could hold the hand of my mum, who I hadn't seen for 10 weeks. I went in for an hour, she was in a coma, and they turned off the life support the next day.
The funeral was just me, as my sister is abroad and hasn't been able to get over. My dh sat in the car with ds, who has special needs, and wouldn't have coped and the dds, who wanted to stay outside. I cleared her flat on my own, as it was a rental. The whole thing feels like an awful dream, and I feel like I am on pause until my sister can come over.
We saw each other 2 or 3 times a week pre lockdown, my dds loved her a lot, and ds and her were incredibly close, he used to say she was his best friend.
I feel a mixture of shock, and just get these incredible waved of just feeling so so sad. I miss her terribly.

So sorry Crunchy. I lost my Mum in June but am in a different country and still don't think I've realised properly if that makes any sense.
to everyone.

@Crunchymum sorry for your loss . My dad died suddenly ( heart attack) 30 yrs ago this year and yes time helps a bit but I don’t think I will ever be truly at peace with it . My mum died in 2019 after a short but extremely distressing illness ( no thanks to the NHS) and I’m quite at peace about her death despite it only being 18 months ago .

I lost my Dad 10 years ago to a very sudden heart attack. He went to sleep and didn't wake up. There were some other circumstances that I won't go into as it would be outing that meant it was an awful time trying to arrange the funeral and get my mum (and Dad) back home.

I had counselling about 9 months later and it did help to some extent. I still occasionally get days when I get down or angry that he died so suddenly. You never get over the loss of any loved one. You just learn to deal and manage with it better. I liken it to a tree with a massive branch suddenly cut off. Slowly and over time the tree grows around where the branch was cut off but that branch never regrows.

Be kind and go easy on yourself. Some days you will be unbelievably sad, other days angry that it happened the way it did, and other days where you just want to forget it has happened and things to go back to how they were. Its all normal. Its all part of grieving and the price we pay for having great love in our lives.

I am so sorry for your loss.

My father passed away of a heart attack over a year ago out of the blue. I am in my twenties and found it so hard to process that he was actually gone. The main emotion for me was shock. I completely relate to the grandchildren thing as I'm correctly pregnant and it breaks my heart that my father won't be here for these moments BUT it is easier than I imagined a year ago. I know people say that it gets easier, but it really does.

Op I'm so sorry for your loss. It's a cliche but I do mean it. My DM was declared all clear of cancer but less than two months later, it had come back and she'd died of it, IME feelings will hit you in waves. You can't control it and you just have to ride with it. It's normal to feel angry. You're in the early stages.

So sorry for the sudden loss of your mum.

I lost my mum in a similar way,she was in hospital for tests.I visited her on the Saturday evening and she was fine.Got a phone call from the hospital the fol owing morning and when I got there she had died.Complete shock but like your mum how she would have wanted to go.The sense of loss never goes away but it does get easier as time goes on

So sorry for your loss @Crunchymum. It's the hardest thing I've gone through. Am going through.

My DM was in hospital, but expected to be moving to after care for a couple of weeks to get a bit stronger, then I was coming back to stay with her, to get her strong and well again. It was all set up. But then I awoke to the call from my sister that she was gone. No reason. The doctor said he could see no reason, but she wanted to go. She was ready. Sat up, had a cup of tea, then lay back down. To die.

I knew as soon as the phone rang. It took 24 hours to get there, on my own. I thought I might go mad. I pictured being arrested in line for airport security, as I could not bear to see the happy travellers all around me. I just wanted to sit down and wail.

For months I found myself thinking, at any interaction, 'I'm bereaved.'. It seemed impossible that it was not obvious and ridiculous to expect anything from me.

That passed, slowly. I functioned in that half fog. I would shut my mind if it veered in that direction. One day I heard her voice say my name with joy, and found i could smile, and treasure the memory. There are still hard days, but it is easier for the most part, this new normal.

Unless I speak to my sister. We always end up crying. That may be good for both of us.

Sending love and strength to all who mourn, and 💐

This happened to me with my husband. I was away for the day and spoke to him on the trip back about picking up something fur dinner, came home and he was dead (heart attack). 51. Children 4 and six.
But here we are 11 years later, kids are teens, we are happy. I have not been in a relationship since but I'm not lonely.
It is the natural order for our parents to die before us, and yes it may have been the best way for her to die suddenly. My own father lived for six weeks after his stroke, and it was an awful rollercoaster of emotion that I would not want to live through again.
Just be sure to cherish your family and friends as you never know what may be around the corner.

@Crunchymum

It absolutely gets easier, take care of yourself and grieve how YOU want to and not how other people say you should. After 12 years I am still seething at the absolute twat that rang me up to tell me I wasn’t upset enough that my Mum had died.

It’s not easy and the tiniest of things can and will ‘set you off’ but hang in there and remember the best bits.

Thank you once again, I am so sorry that so many of us have had to suffer this but it has been so helpful to know that my feelings are normal.

I think it is definitely her age (65) combined with the sheer suddenness if it all that has blown me away.

I've felt the grief-relief of losing someone after a horrible illness (grandma and grandfather) the acceptance-grief of a sudden passing from a much older relative (grandfather, they found him in his chair with the radio on and half a pint of bitter beside him) and I've felt the terrified-grief of someone being taken ill suddenly (other grandma who was on holiday but her children were able to get to her before she died and there was some level of notice) but I cannot categorise this or define it at all.

I got in a taxi knowing that CPR was being given, less than a 10 minute journey later fucking traffic I'm sobbing over her body in the living room of my family home.

Hi crunchymum. I am so sorry about your mum.
I too lost my lovely old ma out of the blue other than she was elderly. She was busy and mentally sharp and physically seemingly fine right to the end and I to had seen her and spoken to her days previously.
By the time I got to her house her body had already been taken to the undertaker and then started various coroners investigations. A cause of death was never established other than ‘old age’. I never did see her body to say a kind of ‘goodbye’.

You ask how to deal with this sudden unexpected death and if it gets easier? Everyone will react in their own way and nothing you feel at any time is ‘wrong’ or ‘odd’ etc it will just be how you feel.

For me that call I got to tell me (at work) was the biggest shock of my life. Not seeing her body and the drawn out inquest process made things tough in their own way. I think it has meant my grief has been kind of ‘shallower and more drawn out’ than if things had been different and I had been prepared. Shallower just in that my feeling of ‘disbelief’ was more acute than I think it might have been. I wonder if it has all taken longer to sink in for me ? (Been nearly two years now).

I can say that the fact she died in the ‘perfect’ way just as she and indeed I would wish to die is a lasting deep comfort to me. After the awful fog of shock and bewilderment died away a little that became a true comfort. I am literally comforted by this whenever I think about it. So many die very differently and she was spared all of that. At the moment this may feel like something you are just saying to yourselves but I hope soon it will properly sink in and bring you some lasting comfort as you come to terms with losing her.

I regularly think of her (just every day) and even talk to her sometimes even aloud (not in public!) I feel her all around and my memories and current thoughts about her really do support me. They will never stop.
I’m sending support to you and your family and especially your dad.

And of course support to all who have been similarly bereaved. It is so fucking tough but so are we.