How did you cope when your mum/dad died?

[Autumnsunshine54]

My dads died and I dont feel like I'm coping very well. I dont have a partner and live alone so I'm on my own quite a lot but also dont feel like I want to see people. Does anyone have any tips for coping? Will access grief counselling but need to sort out masses of practical/financial stuff first post his death. Already on antidepressants.

God, what's with the wink? So you coped just fine, honestly just don't

Sorry for you OP, it's hard 😞

No, I have my mum but to be honest she is driving me absolutely mad. They'd been divorced for 25 years, he hated her and she's still competing with me for grief.

@Autumnsunshine54your mum sounds v similar to mine. My parents had been divorced for over 30 years & they were both remarried, happy & on good terms with each other but his death completely triggered her. I never thought of it as completing for grief but that was exactly how it felt. It was hard not to let it drive a wedge between us. I essentially had to be the parent which isn’t what I needed. I’m sorry you are going through this. I don’t know the answer and it’s not helpful but it’s just one step at a time.

No partner and I'm really feeling my long term single status at the moment to be honest. I have a very small number of other family but it all feels complicated/difficult while we grieve alongside each other.

I thought I'd taken it all in my stride when my mum died - I was upset, but because my dad and my brother didn't cope at all I was forced into being the strong, practical one who made the phone calls and did the admin. Which was fine until it really hit me about 8 months afterwards and I was forced to accept the grief. I can now talk about mum without being tearful and refer to her in the past tense, but every stop often I find myself wanting to phone her about something that would be inconsequential to anyone else, like "guess who I saw in Tesco", and it hurts.

I'm sorry for your loss, OP. My only advice is to accept all the feelings and ask for help in whatever shape you need.

Its a long road.

Once the practical stuff and sadmin were sorted, I started to not cope. Thought therapy would help but it didn't.

I got through the first 12 months and things started to feel a little easier. I didnt make any big decisions and focused on the basics because my sleeping and anxiety were bad for some time.

Sorry for your loss OP

My dad died in 2023 and mum in 2025

To be honest, although I was sad i just got on with it. I dont think i even cried at any point. Dad had been in hospital for a few months so was expected and mum was in a care home although well, and unexpected.

Both were in their 80s and had a long and happy life, a great marriage and me for a daughter 😅

On there other hand, my son died in 2020, and I will never get over it, even now almost 6 years on i still struggle every day and I always will.

In a way I think my son dying meant I coped better with dad and mum, because absolutely nothing could devastate me more than burying my son.

@Autumnsunshine54 , I’m so sorry for your loss. When my mum died I was looking after my dad who was in a very bad way, I wasn’t coping well at all really. When dad died three years later I could grieve for them both. Grief is very difficult and it feels like wading through treacle initially. It takes time but in the end you’re never in the place you were before. You come to a place where you accept your new normal and instead of every memory being painful they can give you comfort, even make you smile. Sometimes though, ten years on I can still feel so much pain. My mother told me many years ago that the price you pay for love is grief, how right she was but it does get better. Slowly, slowly you turn to the sun because that’s what those people we’ve lost would want us to do. Sending you a hug.

@Goldenboysmumim so very sorry for your loss. For any parent, losing a child is the most devastating loss there could ever be. A parent dying is the nayltural
order of life, even if it is terribly hard: one’s child - not so .

I’m very sorry for your loss op, my lovely dad died 6 months ago and it’s still very hard. I was signed off work for 9 weeks and on my return found it very difficult to have any kind of concentration span for a considerable time.

Day to day now is getting better and I no longer cry every day but not far off. I come from a very close family and even though I’m a grown adult with my own family, my dad was still very much “dad” and played a very active role in my life.

Loved and missed everyday.

I lost my Dad in 2023 three weeks after his cancer diagnosis. I didn't cope well at all. He was in his early 60's and I was so upset he didn't get to enjoy the retirement he deserved. I had a complete breakdown a few weeks after he passed. I miss him every single day and a day doesn't pass where I don't think of him. It is easier now but every now and then I do get upset still.

I'm so sorry. No real advice, but my dad died last weekend. My mum died a few years ago. I'm married with children but for various reasons my dad was a huge part of my life. It feels like I've had a limb chopped off.

Being left with the difficult parent is an aspect of grief you don't anticipate. It's slightly easier for me 2 years on but
I think about her every day still and it's still painful.

When my dad died, I was actually warned by some people that no one looks at the child. They just look at the grieving widow.

I live alone as well. And mum fell apart although I wouldn’t say she was doing the competitive grief thing.

How long has it been?

just editing to add - I did have good friends when dad died. Unfortunately, I don’t now so goodness knows what it will be like when mum goes.

I walked and walked and walked, walking helped me process the pain. I find it helped to not actually think too much of “getting over it”,
more getting used to the feeling of sadness so that it didn’t feel shocking any more.

I lost my dad 18 months ago, and initially I felt almost like I’d disassociated. There was “me” in front of people having conversations etc, and then invisible “me” crying on the floor next to us… or raging at well-meaning but upsetting comments etc. That took a few months to pass, from memory, as did picturing the body. My mum and I are getting through it together, although their marriage was difficult by the end under the strain of his illness - a spousal relationship will always differ from parent/child. No real advice, but OP and PPs you’re not alone. And having your own partner doesn’t always help. My grief has hugely impacted my marriage and I’m struggling to see a way through that, too.

I am sorry for your loss.

I can see why you would think it unhelpful but it’s how I coped too. I thought about it practically, yes it’s said my Dad never got to see his grandchildren grow up, but he did see his children grow and see grandchildren.

It is the natural way of things, it’s normal to miss them, sometimes feel guilt etc but I always brought it back to the fact that I was in my mid 30s when my father died and at that stage of my life, it’s not unexpected that something like that might happen

I keeping seeing men who are my Dads double - same build, clothing, little baseball cap, messenger bag over the shoulder . It gives me quite a jolt . The first time I nearly said "Dad what are you doing here " to a complete stranger !
He would've been a tad surprised .

This brought tears to my eyes - sending you a big hug.

This reasonates with me.

dad died 6 months ago. It was a shock, and broke my heart. It was breath taking for months.

id say now I still choke up every few days but I’m mainly got used to sadness. I know I’ll never be the same again. Still happy, still enjoy my children, my DH, but there’s a sadness to me now. A bit of me went with him.

he was a single dad with only me. It was only ever us, he was amazing and I’ll forever miss him

I work daily on gratitude. Literally every day I think how lucky I was to have him as my dad, and although he died young, it was quick, peaceful, and in his sleep without any suffering

My.mum died when she was in her early 60s. My DC were 1 and 4. They basically kept me going but it was just going through the motions , surviving 1 day at a time.
Exactly 6 months after she died both DC had norivrus and I had to wash out the car seats and deal with all the practicalities, looking after them and I suddenly realised I was doing it, without even thinking I wish I could call mum. That felt like a milestone.
There have still been times that caught me unaware at unexpected times but the first 6 months for me were the toughest

My dad died at the age of 77 of kidney failure. I found it as expected, devastating. I had a couple of weeks off work then went back to work. I was tearful for a year. It would suddenly hit me, a song on the radio, a photo etc.
my mum died at the age of 87 of dementia. She had been in a care home for 2 years and was unable to weight bear and was doubly incontinent. It was a release when she died, she was finally free.
I expected to be over her death quicker than I was over my father’s and intended to go back to work quite quickly.
However the day before I was due back to work, I had the worst migraine I’ve ever had. The intense pain lasted 3 days then a subsidiary pain for another 4 days. I saw my gp who said I was having a bereavement reaction. It was my body’s way of saying that I needed to just stop. I’d been running on adrenaline for years. Trying to keep everything spinning, working full time in a demanding management job, visiting my mum regularly, constantly checking finances to pay the care home fees etc. I ended up taking a longer time off sick from work after mum died.

Completely empathise with your third paragraph. Exactly that - there’s a sadness I have now. A spark has gone, and I can feel it - I do wonder if others notice. You’ve put that very well.

My dad died of cancer 11 years ago when I was in my late twenties, he was in his fifties.

I had a 4 month old baby at the time and in a way she saved me from the worst of it, she was like a little ray of sunshine for the whole family.

My mum has remarried and although her husband is a nice guy, the dynamic when we’re together as a family is very different and I miss my dad very much. I feel so sad that he never saw his first grandchild grow up and never met my other 2 children. He would have absolutely adored them and they would have adored him.

Talking about him makes me feel better. My kids know all about him - his love of numbers (which has skipped a generation and gone into my son!), his obsession with mountains, how funny he was and even his favourite animal (elephants). Me and my brother talk about him a lot together - we speculate what he would have made of Brexit, Trump, AI, identity politics etc - the world has changed so much in 11 years and he would have had OPINIONS - he loved a robust discussion and loved it even more when people challenged his way of thinking. I miss the way his eyes would light up if you made an argument he’d not thought of before.

We also talk about the less good stuff - he was really fatphobic for example and how difficult it is for us to shake free from some of the less than ideal values he installed in us.

Sometimes I remind myself of him - I catch myself saying one of his catchphrases for example - or I call my brother and he sounds just like him, which makes me either smile or sob depending on what mood I’m in. I also dream about him a lot which I find a comfort.

Definitely the rawness of the grief has gone. It’s left behind a dull ache which I’ve learnt to live with. I have so much joy in my life and most days my overwhelming feeling is gratitude. Someone described bereavement as creating a hole in your life - it never goes away and the hole is always there but other stuff grows around it. And the other stuff can be very beautiful and worthwhile.

Sending you so much love OP.