To think losing my mother at 14 has ruined my life

[Tempnamechange33]

It's affected every single thing since. I think that day she died, my life was irreparably damaged.

She wasn't around when I bought my first bra.
She wasn't there when i did my GCSE's.
She wasn't around when I had my first kiss.
She never met my husband.
She wasn't at my wedding.
She wasn't there when I had DC... and so on.

Thinking about everything I have had to do without her pains me.

She died along with my baby brother.

I've had countless rounds of talk therapy, CBT, EMDR, hypnotherapy.

I KNOW I'll never be happy. There will always be a hole. Suffering a trauma like that at that age has to forever fuck you up right?

Anyone else who lost a mother as a teen. Are you ok? Has it completely shaped your life and who you are like it has me?

@Athenajm80 my memory is exactly the same, my mother just isn't there when logically I know she must have been there. So if I think about travelling on holiday, the front seat is always empty when it wouldn't have been. I can look at photos but the memories they bring all have my mother missing. Dsis who was eleven when she died has no memory at all of dm in fact she has no memory of her childhood at all.

@Tempnamechange33 My children are now adults and I feel like I am winging it all the time because I didn't have a mother as an adult. I can't bear them to be unhappy, I will do whatever it takes to make them happy so I treat them often, I do them an awful lot of favours and will drop everything to help them.
I was so sad that dm didn't get to be Granny to my children, I'm now a Granny myself and it compounds the sadness because not only did she not have the joys of being Granny I also didn't have the support that I give freely to my children that makes being parent to young children so much easier.

Whenever l think of my father, l can only think of him from a little girl’s mind. I only knew him a little bit. So when l do think about him, I’m immediately a child again.

I lost my mum at 18.
My friend told me years later that I went off the rails (I'm not sure I did )
I do know I spent a long time looking for a replacement mum. In partners , in friends , in my sister.
I went looking for my mother. But found .....myself.
I learnt what I needed to learn, and that was how to mother myself and that I was quite good at it.
This took many years, but the hole ....is no longer there.

I think that what happens in the few years after is probably what shapes you and how those around you support you. If you are not supported then you have to seek the help from others like therapists and then you are dependant on finding the right one.

I lost my mum when I was 9 and my dad decided he didn't want to wallow in grief so he packed his emotions up in a box and remarried a year later. This meant that he didn't talk to me much about my mum and so I learnt that you don't talk about your feelings.

I've reached a critical point in the last two years or more resulting in me having therapy where I've realised I have anxiety. It has made me make bad choices over the last 35+ and I can't believe I've only sought help now at the age of 41. I'm hoping I can sort myself out but I've realised that unfortunately it's going to take a lot of work and is going to be hard for a while. I'm lucky that my husband has been supporting of the therapy and I like my therapist. I did see a counsellor when I had PND and she wasn't helpful at all. I'm now seeing a Clinical Psychologist and she is much more prescriptive, she helped me understand why I feel I do and is helping me to find ways to cope and work on my goals and how to get to where I want to be. I wonder if perhaps you just haven't found the right therapist yet? Finding the right properly qualified person is hard, I know.

I forgot to say...someone on here recommended the book Motherless Mothers by Hope Edelmann which I read during lockdown and a lot of it resonated with me. I really wished I'd read it earlier on in life and would definitely recommend it.

My mum & dad died one month apart just a month before I was 13.
I refused to let it define who I was for my whole life, everyone knew us as the kids who’s parents died locally, I think it’s easy to get caught up in the whole victim role or Awhh that poor girl blah blah blah.
The victims are them who lost their lives, they didn’t get to see us grow up, get married, see their grandchildren growing up. While we’re still here they live on, I can see people Iv not seen for years and they say oh wow it’s like looking at your mum.

Im now 2 years older than she was when she died and that was a strange feeling turning her she, she was 36 and so young it was tragic the whole situation was.

It affected us all differently but I wouldn’t say it ruined any of our lives, I think it has to go on, why waste life wondering what could have been? It’s not going to be that way but how lucky are we to have made it this far with our own children?

I played on it at school to get out of trouble but the victim way wasn’t for me, just have to get on with it and not dwell on things, I think grieving has become glorified with the rise of social media it’s getting too much now and very attention seeking.

Everyone’s gotta back story something tragic but that can’t be our whole life personality trait.

You sound traumatised still and need some trauma therapy.

@HelloFrostyMorning Thank you. I thought I was just miserable. We all know that our DM's would want this but the reality is complex, especially if suicide is involved.

@crazycatladyx

This terrifies me.

I have inoperable cancer and there's every chance that my children will lose me before they're adults.

Is there anything your mom could have done to make it easier? I just want my children to be ok

I'm sorry that you're in this unimaginable position.

If you haven't, Winston's Wish is a charity dealing with childhood bereavement... There is also information for parents who are in a similar position to you.

PS @crazycatladyx
Really hope you live a very, very, long rich life

Here's some of info from WW... There's loads of info there on the site

www.winstonswish.org/prepare-children-death-of-parent/#:~:text=Our%20team%20can%20give%20you,or%20use%20our%20online%20chat.

OP, my huge sympathies and big hugs. My best advice to you would be to get as much help as you can to cope with this. You will never get over it, but you will learn to live with it a little better. My mum died 38 years ago when I was 20, after 8 years fighting cancer, and I still miss her every day. All I have ever wanted since then was a home, a family, and for them to be happy, healthy & safe. I can relate to so many of the comments above - the fear of leaving my children, the constant waiting for disaster to strike, the compulsion to constantly build memories for my children to remember just in case, the desire to do everything I could for them, and never let anything negative happen to them, so that they would never have as traumatic a childhood as I did. And now? My son has met and married someone who felt smothered by my approach and threatened by our close relationship, and she has pulled him away from us and all his friends & family, and now I have created the very thing I have spent my whole adult life working to avoid. My father turned down the offer of counselling for us at the time, and I so wish I had spoken up and asked for some. It would have saved so much heartache since, if I had understood more about how it would affect me.

TartanBaker my heart goes out to you. These things resonate through the generations. We do what we think best and doubt ourselves when things get difficult.

But you say his partner has pulled your son away from friends as well as family… I’m not seeing what you are seeing. Its not necessarily you! I hope they both find their way back to you in time.

Reading this thread has been incredibly sad and i am so sorry for what everyone has gone through. It has also been very helpful, a lot of the things i have done in my life, like looking for father figures, Not planning a future etc are all things i have done. I feel less alone in this now and am making more sense of it.

@16OnaBegonia lots of love to you and your daughter. I do not know from your post if you and her dad were still together, either way it is such an alien and surreal place to be as a partner/child . Six months is nothing- particularly if it is someone who lived in your household and the whole fabric of day-to-day being changed against your will. Not sure if I can be of any help but feel free to PM. X

I’ve found this thread unbelievably helpful. People articulating the feelings that are common to us all. I keep re reading it and going
Feel alone yep
Empty inside yep
Anxiety yep
Depression yep
Low self esteem yep
Overcompensate with own dc yep
Keep distance yep
Scared of something terrible happening yep.

Thank you to all the people who posted and supported each other and were so open and honest. And to the op.

I hope some of us feel some sort of peace,

@Darker

TartanBaker my heart goes out to you. These things resonate through the generations. We do what we think best and doubt ourselves when things get difficult.

But you say his partner has pulled your son away from friends as well as family… I’m not seeing what you are seeing. Its not necessarily you! I hope they both find their way back to you in time.

Thank you so much Darker. This thread has reminded me that there are many of us in the same boat, & that the way it has affected me is maybe not so unusual…

I agree, though for different reasons.

I was 6 when my dad died. I've never grieved or missed him: I barely remember him so take the view of how can I miss what I did not know?

However the impact it had on my family has caused great damage. My mother was not able to deal with my sister and took the line of least resistance. Still does. She doesn't have to energy to deal with me too so has, for years, totally blanked my emotions. For years I assumed I'd be treated with the same 'respect' as my sister, but it never happened.

I've distanced myself from her, and she has no idea why. At least when she dies I never have to deal with my sister again.

Elegantly - similar story here. It all played out for decades.

When my dad died when i was 16, i didn't just lose him, it changed my mother forever, it changed my brother forever, it changed my sister forever.

I really struggle now as an adult, when others lose a parent which i know is very difficult and tragic, but losing a parent as an adult Is completely different to losing a parent as a child.

Only just seen this thread, so sorry.

I lost my mum when I was 17. She had a terminal illness and was ill for 4 years before this, so the loss started earlier. Im now in my 50s and think about her every day. Like you there are major milestones that have passed in my life that I wish she had been part of and experienced.

Its shaped the job I do, the relationships I have and the friends that I have. I think you are being perfectly reasonable to feel the loss, but you have to learn to live with it and not let it become a dominating factor. Easier said that done.

I wish you well.

Take care

I lost my mother suddenly at 14 too... Probably didn't grieve properly and following my dad's mindset tried to "get on with it". I did drink a bit at 16 which was out of hand but managed to get a grip in time for exams and made it to uni, etc. and now have child of my own, job, etc. Very happy I do have siblings however and it has affected all of them in a deeper way I would say with some more serious issues than others (won't go into it here). It is hard and it really does feel like such an injustice that DM has missed out on birthday's, graduation, giving birth etc but I always tell myself others have it worse and try to not let myself focus on it. It's really power of the mind, focus on the future. I have happy memories and a great family which is all I can ask for. In my mind there are others who have it way worse, lost children, abuse, etc. It's all perspective. So sorry you're feeling it so badly xx

My mum died when I was 23 and my sister was 13.
She is the strongest person I know. I think she decided that she would not depend on anyone. She divorced her abusive husband and brought up two children on her own. She has a good career, owns a house and relationships are on her terms. She just moved forward and refuses to dwell on the losses and bad times.
I wish she could be kinder to herself and let the people who love her help but I also admire how she has decided not to let losing mum so young colour her life.
This is the only life we get. Your mum would want you to be happy. Try to find one good thing in every day and enjoy it for your mum.

@crazycatladyx

This terrifies me.

I have inoperable cancer and there's every chance that my children will lose me before they're adults.

Is there anything your mom could have done to make it easier? I just want my children to be ok

@crazycatladyx I am so sorry you're in this situation. What a brave question to ask. I also lost my mother at 14 but very suddenly, and although nothing could make it easier it would have really helped to have been able to discuss it before and ask all the questions I don't have answers to now. Silly things like stories from growing up, what your own mother was like, how you felt having children, boyfriend stories, etc. Perhaps you could write it all down, a huge story of your life. A big diary. That would be an amazing gift to have now. I hope that helps in some way. Love and strength to you xx

I lost my dad at 13. It has shaped my life but it hasn't ruined it. Yes, he has missed so many things but I'm very happily married with a son and a job I enjoy and friends. He is a memory now. Life would have been different had he been here, but he isn't.

I did have some grief counselling at 16 which did help, though it was a bit late. It does give me pause for thought that I'm almost the same age as he was when he died though.

@crazycatladyx

This terrifies me.

I have inoperable cancer and there's every chance that my children will lose me before they're adults.

Is there anything your mom could have done to make it easier? I just want my children to be ok

If I may I'll give some advice for your (I'll presume) DH. Sorry if this is too harsh, though.

• grieve, and grieve openly. Let your children see you cry, and allow them to cry with you. Don't let them feel they can't show emotion for fear of upsetting you.

-talk about crazycatladyx, truthfully. She is neither a Saint nor a sinner, don't let her be remembered as either. Let the children's memories count.

• your children are not too young for counselling. They are not too young to be bothered. Look into it (speak to Winston's Wish), and get some for yourself as well.

• however much you think you're hiding your grief your children know. And depression, if it comes to that. Get help. Getting help for yourself is getting help for your children. Tablets, if necessary.

• the child who seems unbothered is still hurting. Don't ignore them. And don't dismiss any shows of emotion either.

• don't dismiss the idea of moving on. Crazycatlady will always be a part of your life, but there is room for more.

• similarly, don't let your children hold you back. They'll soon be adults, with their own lives.

All the best, @crazycatladyx. I hope there are many bright years ahead of you xxx