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?

I lost my dad at 16 and although i dont think it completely ruined my life, it certainly had an impact on it. Every life event has had a shadow over it. As a grown up i never got to know my dad as an adult. My life from child to adult has been much harder because of it.

So yes OP i agree

My mum became ill/brain damaged when I was 15 - but didn't lose her until I was 26. I think it made me very unsympathetic to other people’s problems for a long time - I’d be thinking whatever is happening, at least you’ve got a mum. I got on with it, passed exams etc though.
Now I’ve got kids - and I think I delayed having them till I was sure I wouldn’t be struck down by whatever she’d had. But now I’m past the age she was when she died and I’m enjoying being the mum I’d have liked to have. I think what I take from it is that life is fragile - it’s astonishing we manage to live with the confidence we do - and we need to make the very most of it while we can.

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?

Sorry to hear you are feeling so low OP.

I was 8 years old when my mother died. I don't feel that it has ruined my life but I would undoubtably have had a different life if she had lived.

I think I have recognised the disadvantages of it more in hindsight than at the time. As a child I just got on with it. My mum was an angry person and much of what I can remember is her being cross and punishing me. I wonder if she had stayed alive we would have developed a better relationship. I was quite depressed as a teen and really struggled with my emotions all the way into my late 20s. I didn't have therapy when she died and I think I was 27 before I saw any kind of a therapist. I believe I am undiagnosed ASD as well so I did have a lot to deal with and I wasn't very able to talk about things with anyone.

I am not an unhappy person now (in my early 50s) but it wasn't until my early 30s before I started to feel that life was OK. I don't know what I would have been like if she lived though. I didn't ever feel that my unhappiness and difficulties were because she had died but who can say.

I know someone who lost their Mum at the same age, and I would say it has ruined her life because it was the main thing that lead to the mental health issues that have never gone away, despite trying everything.

I lost my dad at 14. The sadness of missing a person I can deal with ( mostly). I can wish him well and remember him. But there is also the missing of a whole raft of support and love that was just taken away. Growing up without that scaffolding. Looking elsewhere - sometimes disastrously - for that guidance and unconditional love and approval that I needed.

I struggle with feelings of abandonment, and so much more. It’s been over 40 years. I try not to let it drag me down and I’ve had loads of counselling for all the crap that happened around that time and in the ensuing years, but if the person you really need to speak to and hug isn’t there, there will always be an unfillable gap, a yearning, a sadness. It waxes and wanes.

I hope you find a way to come to terms with her absence. Don’t beat yourself up for how you feel. Talking about it, talking about her, may help.

The bond can be so strong your heart breaks. 💔
I get a pain in my chest when I let me realise my DM is gone, most days I talk to her in my head, it works for me.
I often think of a pp I don't remember their username, they lost their DM young and described a memory of their DM at the schools fence, her warm hands through the fence, cupping her DD cheeks, the pp was heartbroken without her.
Grief is the price we pay for love.
I hope she has managed to recover from the loss.

I totally agree @Mischance
My mum also died when I was 14, it was Christmas Day. It nearly destroyed me in my later teenage years but I got through it and I know above everything that she would want me to remember her but to move on too, creating those memories for my children. I do have sad times, and anxious moments, especially around my kids and worrying about what would happen if I wasn't there for them, but honestly? I have found a way to live a fulfilled life without her.

The thing is, to say it ‘ruined your life’ means that there is an idea of a perfect life that you should have lived that you were somehow cheated out of.

But life is just life.

Without wanting to get into a race to the bottom, loads and loads of people (most people?) don’t end up living the life they dreamed of or imagined. So much of it is just down to blind luck.

I remember I had a real breakthrough when someone said to me: sometimes bad things just happen to good people.

Which doesn’t mean bad things should only happen to bad people. But it helped me snap out of the idea of ‘why me?’ What did I do to deserve it? All those self-pitying kind of thoughts that kept me powerless.

It’s arbitrary. Those are your cards - shitty as they are. Up to you how you play them.

@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?

Hi @Tempnamechange33 - I cannot give you anything but deep sympathy and empathy for how utterly shit and difficult this must have been and still is for you. It's probably unhelpful to say that it has probably made you stronger in ways you cannot even imagine (I'm only realising now how much stronger and fearless the domestic violence I faced as a teen that traumatised me has made me) but I think this is true. Cliched though I know. My mum would say let that pain envelop you in its love because it is also love. and it is also probably her love for you that you are feeling in yourself. Maybe think of what she would want for you. Have you ever done some kind of goodbye/letting go ritual for her? Sending thoughts and virtual hugs your way OP x

Loosing a parent in childhood/ teen is deemed trauma.

Some people cannot get past it even if they want to and it CAN affect life in every way. I found anti depressants the most helpful. They remove the emptiness.

There’s a really helpful group on fb called adults bereaved as children,

@Mischance

As a mother there is one thing that I know for sure and that is that, if I were to die, the one thing I would want my children to do is to move on. Blow me a kiss and think of me at all these milestones. You say you know you will never be happy, but seriously (and I am not being unkind here - I have recently been bereaved) if you were to die today the one thing - the only thing - you would want is for your children to be happy.

Do it for her.

Embrace the gap in your life - think of her fondly when happy things occur - when the children are splashing in the paddling pool, or getting a prize - make her a part of it all in your heart. This is what she would have wanted without a shadow of a doubt. Do not think how sad it is that she is not there (that is a given); but think how she would have loved it.

Being bereaved leaves a massive gap - it hurts - but we do have to find a way of living round that gap.

You can do it.

Beautiful post

I get it OP my mum died when I was 10 years old, in tragic circumstances. It is only in the last few years that I feel emotionally stable(I am in my 50s).

I only realised last year the connection as to why I always feel down in July, when it should be a happy month. This is the month my DM died.

You have to make peace with it OP and this just comes with age I'm afraid.

Sending you best wishes and love.

Hi op...my mum died when I was just 13. Yes I'd say in many ways it ruined my life, although my life now is far from awful. It definitely stopped me achieving my full potential

But I do agree you never fully recover from someone like that. Depression has dogged me on and off over the years although I'm fine at the moment. But there's a deep-seated feeling of sadness and insecurity that never quite leaves me. I'm always half-expecting the next catastrophe. I spend a lot of time think about mortality and worrying about anything happening to loved ones or me dying young and leaving DS without a mother. I'm very risk averse as a result

I think this is the perfect description of how it affects you lifelong. When l was a young adult l worked with 3 other women who’d also lost a parent early. We were very alike in outlook and philosophy.

So sad for you. I lost my mum at 47 and that was bad enough so it really is tragic to lose your mum at 14 and your feelings around that are entirely valid and to be expected

However .. speaking as a mum, as most of us on here are, I can say with an absolute certainty that your mum really really would not want your life to be ruined. She wouldn't want you to be carrying this depth of sorrow. Could you try approaching it, thoughts wise, in this way?

So she was pregnant with my (would have been) half brother.

I remember my dad (they were divorced and we were staying with him) coming in the room looking ashen and he said he had some really bad news. I'd never seen him look that serious. Me and my sister were panicking asking 'is it mum, is she ok, is she dead' he said 'no, no, god no. But the baby is' We were devastated. She was over 8 1/2 months gone. She had to give birth anyway obviously as too far along. So it was planned for a couple of days later, and she stayed in the hospital.

She wouldn't see anyone, she wouldn't talk to me on the phone as she was too upset. Sounds silly but I desperately wanted to ask her if she liked the new Texas song (In demand, video with Alan Rickman!) as we were both big Texas fans. I remember my nan saying 'she'll be ok, one day'.

Two (ish?) days later, my dad sits me and my sister down. And I just knew. From his face. And he said. This is the hardest thing I'm ever going to have to tell you. So he did. She had got out of bed to go to the toilet before she was going to have to give birth. And she died of a heart attack and Pulmonary embolism caused by a DVT.

I sat up all night with my lovely dog next to me. He was whimpering and wouldn't leave me side. He knew.

My sister didn't want to see her after, but I did. My dad said she might regret it so she came with me. She was stone cold and some blood was trickling out of her nose. My sister is just a year older than me. Us two, in there on our own with her. deciding whether to give her a final kiss or not. (we did) 14 and 15.

This is obviously such a personal story that anyone who knows me will know it's me but I don't care.

Thank you for everyone's responses, I wasn't expecting any! @Mischance i loved your words. Normally if someone told me to try and be happy in some shape or form i think sod off but the way you wrote it was lovely.

I KNOW she would want me to be happy. It's easier said than done though. I don't know what else to try. Can I say that I have the most amazing DH, I think he was sent to me to make up for my childhood! I have amazing DC, a nice house, good job, etc etc. I should be happy... It just feels like such a hole.

I am a couple of years off the age she was when she died. maybe when I pass that I will feel a bit better. I have severe health anxiety. I am always worried I have a blood clot. I am terrified of leaving my children the same way I was left.

Loosing a parent in childhood/ teen is deemed trauma

Some people cannot get past it even if they want to and it CAN affect life in every way. I found anti depressants the most helpful. They remove the emptiness

There’s a really helpful group on fb called adults bereaved as children

Exactly, it's not like I haven't tried. And no I know it's no race to the bottom etc of course but I have been told that this stage in adolescence is a very difficult time to lose your parent. It's a 'shaping' time. I am on that group thank you! I am about to go back on anti depressants even though I came off them a few years ago.

My mother lost her mother at 13. And had quite a turbulent life then until she
Married. Sort of sofa surfing with Relatives. No family Home. She found it very painful that nobody spoke about her mother or her death apart from one or two kind people. What this taught her was not to label things. She had so much love in her life, from an aunt, from a cousin, from a best friend and the best friends mother. And in time from her husband and inlaws. She decided she was lucky to have friendship and love in her life even if it wasnt from her first choice of person. She felt she had friends who had their family (perhaps dysfunctional) who didnt have the richness that she had around her. Even if her mother had not passed-there was no guarantees of the sort of relationship they would have had.

She did learn to live with it and be happy. But she has had times where the pain has been very raw again. On the birth of her children. And they year she was the same age as her mother when she died. But she is strong and amazing and learnt to just take the positive in life and grab hold of it. I think it had affected her relationship with me. I think she longs for the closeness she has missed and that adds a lot of pressure. Particular as i am autistic and introvert and dont connect with her in quite the way I think she would like. But she accepts me and i accept her. She taught me how to live the life we are given. And i thank her for that.

I know people are saying that there are no guarantees of how our relationship would have been or if she would have been there for those things I listed, but she was my best friend.

Whenever I talk about this with DH he says I can't think about what would have been because I wouldn't have met him or had the DC, which is true.

What makes me really sad is she was so young. And had so much life left to live. She must have been so sad and I hope she wasn't in too much pain when she died.

@MopaniTree I haven't had specific grief counselling, no. Unbelievably I didn't have any counselling at all after she died until I became an adult and sought it out myself. Pisses me off my dad never arranged anything like that.

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

Also, I forgot to say that if I’m completely honest with myself, for a long time I used my mum’s death as an excuse for why I felt like I could ‘opt out’ of certain aspects of life. Failed my module at uni? Well my mum is dead. Got fired from that waitress job? My mum died. Claiming JSA and can’t be arsed to leave the sofa? My mum died. Etc, etc

Eventually I just got sick of being a victim and decided to control the narrative instead of letting it control me

I sometimes do this. I don't know how to stop.

What I also think is awful is that when my mum died it was the 1990s. I wasn't allowed to talk about it. If I got upset my father would scream abuse at me. I had to go to school one day later. No teacher mentioned it. It was like I had to pretend it hadn't happened.

In my ds class a couple of children have lost parents...they have counselling in school and this isn't taboo at all. So much better nowadays.

I am very very sorry for your loss. I don’t have any experience and I feel very sad for you. This isn’t my story but the story of my half siblings (5 of them) who lost their mum during childbirth. She lost the baby and she died of sepsis. This is also a story of my own mum as she brought up my siblings. The youngest, my brother, who sadly also has died now (he was 42) was only 2 years old when my dad married my mum. My mum worked very hard to be a good mum to them and I know it wasn’t easy for them.

Just wanted to send you lots of love. ❤️❤️❤️