To let my death get in the way of life....

[feedmegin]

I cannot enjoy my life because I’m too afraid of death.

I don’t think there is a day that goes by when I don’t think about death.

I wake in the middle of the night and suddenly become aware that one day, I just won’t be here.
I struggle to accept that my non existence is going to be eternal.
It literally petrifies me.

I try to imagine what it’s going to feel like but it just sends me into panic when I try.

It’s making me feel really miserable and I’m struggling to find enjoyment in life because, well what’s the point if we’re just going to die.

I feel like I’m just waiting for the day that darkness will be my forever. 😭

I’ve felt like this for years now and it’s not going away.

I lost my friend vert suddenly 12 years ago, and I think this triggered my fear.

I have panic attacks if I have to go to funerals and I couldn’t ever imagine seeing someone dead.

I don’t know how I’m ever going to enjoy life because what is there to enjoy when death is just there waiting to take us.

Go to YouTube. Find the channel of Peter Fenwick. Lots of good stuff there. He also writes books.

You could sign up for the app 'WeCroak', which reminds you five times a day that you're going to die - seems to help.

Before you were born, you knew nothing. It was fine. After death might be the same.

If the amount of matter in the universe never changes, you will always be here, even if in a different form.

You have anxiety that is gripping your life. Your problem is not the existence of death, the problem is that you are having mental health issues.

Sorry to be blunt, but you have a clear choice between getting the medical treatment you desperately need or living a half life.

I just struggle to understand that something can help me with this fear especially as they can’t take death away.

I’m the same and it’s worse since I’ve come off Sertraline. I also worry about getting old and infirm.

Thing is though most people don’t feel paralysed by this so there is something going on with you (us) that isn’t with most people. If most people don’t feel like this (to the extent it’s ruining their lives) then it must be fixable.

Before we were born we did not exist and we weren’t aware of the fact. That non existence stretches back for infinity. So we are returning to our natural state of non existence and non awareness. We’re all going to the same place together.
What is existence? Why does anything exist anyway?

I think if I get much worse I’m going to have to go back on the Sertraline and that’s probably what I would recommend for you. It stops these sorts of anxious, obsessive, intrusive, negative, circular thoughts.

I have a fear of it too, but I can't pinpoint where from and it had stopped affecting me for years it was bad as a young teen and lately it's back last night I had to stop thinking about it . I've seen lots of bodies laid out ,it's not that at all. It's the thought of the just nothing when I'm gone that scares me .

I’m just not sure how that will help. Death is still going to be there and I can’t tolerate that

@feedmegin Therapy and/or meds will help you see it in a way that's less uncomfortable. Most people know death is a thing but we aren't walking around in horror unless we've just experienced something like a diagnosis or bereavement.

Treatment could lessen the intensity of the feelings and make it more easy to manage them.

I just struggle to understand that something can help me with this fear especially as they can’t take death away.

Can you understand that death is a feature of everyone's life, but most people don't struggle with it the way you do. Counselling isn't to sort the death bit out (obviously!), it's to sort the you bit out, so you respond the way most people do.

I suppose similar to having an eating disorder and thinking counselling can't help because you always have to eat.

You seem very focused on 'being dead as an experience', what it's going to 'feel like', darkness being your 'forever'. As if you're going to experience floating about in the dark for years and years. That's quite an assumption.

The only experience you definitely have, the only time you will ever experience, is now, while you're alive.

Take it or leave it. You can live this life, or you can sit still and age passively. Time will pass and life end either way.

Practically, you can be as prepared as possible for death; have your will, insurance and all important financial documents in one easy-to-find place, so your executor can execute your wishes easily and accurately. Keep your possessions reasonably tidy, so easy to sort out. That lifts some practical anxiety. You can relax about what would happen on earth, after you're gone.

For the rest, I agree with pp that you need counselling. And to go into it with an open mind. You come across as very confident that you know how things are, that your very narrow perspective is totally correct and all there is. You're stuck in a trap of your own making and, because you're only you, you cannot see a way out of it. Someone else, with some different perspectives, interpretation and ideas that you've never yet had, will be able to help with that.

@DianaT1969

Not to belittle your fears and I second that you should try CBT, but I find that quote: 'I didn't exist for millions of years before I was born - and it didn't inconvenience me at all' very reassuring. [I'm probably mis-quoting slightly, but the meaning is there].

I was talking to a friend about that quote the other day. I find it really interesting that she fears death, despite being a Buddhist, while I’m not remotely bothered by it and I have no faith.

You need some therapy @WineInTheWillows. Your one and only life is being ruined by your fear, it’s a kind of living death. Please get some help. 💐

Of course no one can take death away. What did you want from this post if not advice on how to deal with your fear?

Because CBT, or possibly medication will really help you get to a point where you can live with it, manage it and actually enjoy the life you have.

You need to take that first step and give it a go and stop resisting with the “death will always be there” line.

I have this fear to a lesser extent, but there are definitely days when it's persistently on my mind and life feels really pointless. I sometimes even think of the fact my children will also just be nothing one day, it's awful.

I have finally thought of one small, weird comfort though recently. Being sleep deprived with little kids, there is nothing I love more than to be blissfully asleep. You know that feeling when you're really sleepy and you get to have a lie-in, you wake up and then happily drift off again. Would death be much different? I mean, I love being asleep, so maybe I'd love being dead too. Hopefully when I'm tired after a long busy life. fact that you never wake up is a bit of a bummer, but I won't be there to notice anyway... It's hard to imagine but I do find the sleep analogy a comfort.

I don’t have a fear about myself dying- I won’t know anything about it after I’m gone so why would I be worried? It’s other people dying that terrifies me.
My mum died young and very suddenly when I was an older child. Here one day, gone the next.
Since then I’ve never got over the fear that someone I love more than anything can just walk out one day and you never see them again.
That to me is terrifying- it’s the ones left behind that have to bear it, not you.
Enjoy every day. The point of being here is to just live our life every day and enjoy it. If you have DC, your legacy will live on and on through the generations via them and their children.
Can you specifically pin point which part about dying you are so afraid of?

OP, I used to be resistant as you are to the idea that I could feel any differently.

How would I just stop being aware of the thousands of different ways I could die in a car accident when being in a car, at the mercy of other people's judgment and the weather and children throwing things off motorway bridges and my own car not suddenly breaking or a tyre exploding, was so obviously incredibly dangerous and an accident waiting to happen at any second?

Like you, this was triggered by something, a car crash. Our brains take the information we give them and sometimes they decide to signal boost the wrong thing.

Some intensive CBT later, I am no longer consumed by the idea that it's dangerous to drive. It doesn't mean it's not - there are still dangers on the road, like death will still continue to exist if you get help - but its existence doesn't rule my entire life.

Get some help. You don't have to feel like this, I promise.

Watch or read the many accounts of near death experiences that are now out there. You may find them very reassuring. Certainly changed my stance on things.

I’ve been housebound and often needing to be in bed for almost 10 years. I had a very young child at the time and couldn’t look after her. I had the first of a series of major surgeries in 2018 and I genuinely didn’t care if I lived or died. My estate was in order. Being that ill tends to cure you of the fear of death for living but never truly recovering is a double edged sword. I have a fear of dying violently. But death. No.

This has obviously aged me prematurely in terms of what I’m able to do, I’m disabled and so forth, have less energy than some 80 year olds. As we age, I think our anxieties are reduced.

I’ve always felt like this too OP. But it’s really ramped up since having DD(1yo) - and ramped up even more since deciding we want another baby. My pregnancy was complicated and I know that I’ll be classed as higher risk with the next one- I am terrified of dying anyway but more so during birth and leaving behind DD, DH and potentially a newborn who we long have even met me. I can’t deal with that

I get this when my anxiety levels are high. Mostly it’s at the back of my mind, so I know when I have started fixating on death that I am in an anxious state.
Anxiety is a tricky beggar and doesn’t manifest (for me) as that’s a scary event, so I am anxious. It sends me all over the place and has me thinking all kind of strange thoughts about future events. Counselling has helped me to identify these unhelpful thinking patterns.
Medication ( although I was scared to take tablets) can also help.

[quote SciFiScream]@WineInTheWillows

Argh that last sentence is freaky to me. Part of my fear is the "not existing" part.

The concept of infinity, time and space tie into my fear too.

I'm taking deep breaths now...[/quote]
Me too! The annihilation of self.
I think there's a psychological explanation for it though, something to do with primitive experiences as an infant.

I have no idea whether this will help you or not, but here goes. I am a Christian and come to this from a Biblical point of view.
Today my Bible reading was John 12 which has the verse: ‘unless a grain falls into the earth and dies, it cannot bear fruit’. So that means that death is necessary for the new life that we have no idea about. An acorn cannot become an oak tree, until it is first buried in the ground to die. So death is not the end, but the beginning of a new life. In the same way a baby has no idea of what life is like after delivery, so we have no idea what life will be like after our earthly death.

To a caterpillar it may seem the end, but the butterfly is waiting to emerge.
So many examples of growing into a new life through what may seem a pointless death.

Oddly, the thing that helped me was realising what a state of terror we would be in if we didn't die except in cases of accidents etc. We would be unable to take any sort of risk because we would have immortal life to lose.

In a way, the fact that we are all going to die anyway makes it possible to face the everyday risks of life with some equanimity.

Hi OP

Is this the only time you've been consumed by a fear of something? Just asking because intrusive thoughts and mental compulsions can be a symptom of OCD.

If it's always been specifically a focussed fear of death, could I recommend the book "Staring at the Sun" by Irvin D Yalom. It deals with fear of death/existential fear and you may find it helpful in reframing how you view death.

I try to imagine what it’s going to feel like but it just sends me into panic when I try.

I don't know if this helps, but it's what I told my son when he first 'got' death and was really worried about what it would 'be like'. We talked about what it was like before he was born - was he aware of waiting to be born? Was he sad that he wasn't born yet? Was he worried about being born? No - he simply didn't exist and I believe that's what death is like - a return to that neutral state of non-existence.

It helped him and gave him a bit of space from worrying about that aspect of existence.

I'm so sorry that you are struggling - it sounds hard, so please believe that you deserve better and that someone with training and experience might be able to help you. People with chronic pain can be helped to manage it even if it can't be cured - have faith that there is a better way for you too.

I went through a stage of being absolutely petrified. I watched casualty when I was about 11 and up until that point no one had died only in the last couple years and I’m 36 I’ve lost 3 of my grandparents, Back to the point in this episode someone died of an asthma attack, I had asthma, from that point I was terrified, family kept telling me not to be silly, even as I got older it still bothered me, the nothingness and empty made me feel physically sick how can I just not be any more, I had counselling but it still sat in back of my mind. I joined the police and one of the first things we did was go to an autopsy, I faced it death there and then one person stayed with me and made me realise actually it’s not that bad they looked so peaceful, I faced it a lot more in my time in the police, it became part of my job, of course the grief and upset doesn’t get any better when you are speaking to the families of loved ones, but I learnt that no matter what I do in my life I can’t stop this, it’s the one thing we are guaranteed, how we arrive there we will never know, I lost many sleepless nights, I used to lay there crying, I can’t change this, I could change debt, my relationship, my job, this I can not, once I realised this I just thought fuck it I’m not wasting my life worrying about something that’s written on my cards, I’m not going to know when it happens luckily, just hope it’s peaceful and not doing something stupid with my arse on show or something that will be remembered on the net for all eternity.

It’s hard and horrible and sometimes I still get the wave of panic but I just think of something else like Hugh Jackman or some other celebrity that’s favour of the month feeding me chocolates and it’s ok.

Saying whats the point of living when you will die, is like saying you can't enjoy a meal because your plate will be empty soon, or a film because it will be over soon, bet you enjoy things like that? Life is the same.

Had you known your friend who died since you were little?

I could have written your post OP. I've had loads of therapy and while it helped at the time, the fear keeps coming back.

The only thing I truly find comfort in is, if we're lucky, by the time it rolls around you will be so out of your mind of sedation you genuinely won't care. I know that's hard to imagine but those drugs are powerful When my DM was dying she was on enough medazolam to knock out a rhino. I've had a tiny bit now and then for medical procedures and honestly I wouldn't have cared if the building around me was on fire. It's bloody lovely stuff.