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Original poster

To be petrified of death

119 replies

mumofthreesmallmen3 · 10/12/2022 12:32

I don't know if this belongs in aibu, I seem to have got a real thing/maybe towards a phobia type of thing about dying, I know I will die at some point but it's becoming a issue, keeping me up at night panicky and taking a lot of my thoughts, I feel like I don't understand ( I do) that everything will be normal one minute then it will change and I'll know nothing more, I won't see anyone again or do anything again when that happens, I obviously do understand this WILL happen but I'm having so much anxiety around it, I'm in 30s so its 'probably' not even soon if nothing happens/illness etc but it's really domineering my thoughts for last couple of months and getting worse, I think ( and hope) when it happens I just won't know anything about it but I find it overwhelming to think everything is gone in that moment, I'll never know anything again, if my brain ceases to work then I'll never have the capacity to know, for example, what my kids upto, it sounds so silly but I just struggling to comprehend it will just be blackness, like under general anaesthesic but don't come back around, I'm not religious really so don't have faith to fall back on or think about, does anyone else think it's crazy and scary that one minute in the future you'll just be no more and you don't know when, I just find it hard to comprehend and wonder if I'm the only one

OP posts:
Puffalicious · 10/12/2022 12:33

Post in MH, you'll get good advice there.

RedHelenB · 10/12/2022 12:33

If its any consolation the older you get the less you care about dying.

pinkstinks · 10/12/2022 12:33

You are not alone.
Has something happened recently to trigger these feelings so you think?
I have suffered a loss so it feels more present at the moment… it’s too much to comprehend x

thenightsky · 10/12/2022 12:38

RedHelenB · 10/12/2022 12:33

If its any consolation the older you get the less you care about dying.

Not in my case. Now I've hit my 60s I lay awake at night fretting and getting upset at the thought I've probably only got 20 years left Sad

RememberedForAllTheWrongReasons · 10/12/2022 12:39

I have the fear op, but I do have anxiety in general.

I also deal with a lot of death notices, people who I’ve seen year after year and then I get the notification that they have died.
I think “That will be me one day” and It stops me in my tracks.
I am actually more terrified of becoming infirm before I die. I don’t want to have to be in a home with carers wiping my bum like my dear GP’s. That’s a fate worse than death imo. I get distraught at the thought I won’t be here for DC though.

JoyBeorge · 10/12/2022 12:40

I think a lot is fear of the unknown. It's the one think we can't change.

VioletLemon · 10/12/2022 12:40

I can identify 100%. It's become quite a problem for me too.

Bluebellbike · 10/12/2022 12:44

RedHelenB · 10/12/2022 12:33

If its any consolation the older you get the less you care about dying.

Definitely this. When I was young I was terrified of dying. I am in my 60s now and many family members have died. As my children get older (now 35 and 26) I know they will manage without me. I have had a full and happy life. At my age I only consider how I want to die. I have completed an Advance Decision so family and medical staff will know what I want/don't want. I did this after witnessing a close friend's rapid illness and death a year ago. We fortunately had time in the last week or so to ask them what they wanted.
I would be more scared about dying with nobody knowing what I want at the end. It is a comfort to know that it will be right.

linziere · 10/12/2022 12:49

This is me. My panic attacks about this have been horrendous over the years, but I was certainly in primary school when my fear of death started and I'm 34 now.

I need to be on meds to control the panic. I've gone from where I couldn't work as I spent the whole day panicking about it to where it can only come up once a day or so but that's because thanks to the meds when the thoughts do crop up I can move past them.

Original poster
mumofthreesmallmen3 · 10/12/2022 12:52

I do have anxiety at times about different things, this feels different, like I know I will die but I feel like I don't really understand,even though I do, if that makes sense? It just seems so mad. It may stem from my dad passed away a year ago, and he did have heart problems but not recent heart problems and he was absolutely normal seconds before he collapsed and I think maybe I haven't got my head around being ok right now but standing up 2 seconds later, collapsing and dying, it just seems so insane really. I guess when my brain doesn't work I won't know anything so therefore I won't care because I don't know so I'm wasting time worrying so much,I'm waffling but why am I worrying so much because when it happens I won't even know will I

OP posts:
Brightstarowl · 10/12/2022 12:57

I hear you.

The thing that helps me is telling myself I'll be going back to the place I was before conception. 💐

AclowncalledAlice · 10/12/2022 13:00

RedHelenB · 10/12/2022 12:33

If its any consolation the older you get the less you care about dying.

Not me..in fact I've got worse.

I totally get what you are saying OP. This time of year seems to be worse for me. On a bad day I feel like I'm constantly in a Final Destination film. It's something I'm working on but it's going to take a bit of time. I don't think being with my dad when he took his last breath helped. With hindsight I should have left the room when it was obvious the end was near.

LaLuz7 · 10/12/2022 13:04

The way I see it after death you return to the same state of non-existance you were in before you were born.

The nothingness feels horrific to you now, but when you die there won't be any "you" to experience it or have any kind of feeling about the situation. There can't be any pain or regret because there is no one to experience it anymore. Why fear something you will never perceive? I find the idea quite refreshing and peaceful.

ClangingBell · 10/12/2022 13:04

I came very close to dying suddenly a few years ago and I can remember how absolutely peaceful it felt. I feel quite calm about it now because it seemed to be absolutely fine.

Southland02 · 10/12/2022 13:06

No advice op as I feel exactly the same and it’s become worse since I became a mum a few months ago. Now I’m terrified at the thought of not seeing my daughter grow up, or her not having a mum. I’m terrified about the actual event too, just all of it. Grim, horrible, incomprehensible.

I think I’m going to have to go on meds for anxiety as it’s off the scale most days now, the evenings are the worse, the doom feelings tend to kick in around 6pm now, worse still because I’m up in the night with the baby so have time to sit, alone in the early hours of the morning and think about it all the more.

I envy people that don’t fear death, very brave.

zingally · 10/12/2022 13:07

I think the only consolation you have in being dead, is that you don't know your dead.
You're not lying there - dead - thinking "well, this is really fucking annoying and sad."

My dad died completely unexpectedly at 62 - just didn't wake up one morning. He came from a family of long-lifers, and had occasionally talked about how annoying it would be to die "young". So I know he'd have been annoyed to go still relatively young. But the consolation the family left behind have is that HE doesn't know he's dead. There wasn't some slow, lingering decline in a hospital bed, which he'd have hated. He was off like a light switch. Hard for us, but probably the best way to go, all things considered.

Original poster
mumofthreesmallmen3 · 10/12/2022 13:07

I've heard that saying before about conception, and you wasn't scared then so your just going back to that really, but I think I wasn't scared because I wasn't born then! Maybe time before birth actually was ok,but I don't know because I don't remember,I didn't have a fully functioning brain did I with capacity to have memories, so maybe it was equally as scary lol 🤷 when I was young kid I always thought people who died they just sat and watched everything,so the realisation that I won't know certain things, like if my son gets a good job, gets married, all these different things, I wouldn't know because I'd basically just be asleep forever

OP posts:
Dorsetdingle77 · 10/12/2022 13:09

I used to be afraid of dying but I'm not anymore. I'm in my 40's now and I just think that we spent all of eternity as part of the cosmos, just energy, part of nature. That's all we 'knew' and that's what we'll go back to. It's the living part that's scary! Knowing about pain, heartbreak, wars, disease etc. Obviously there's wonderful things in life too and that's the part that we're scared of leaving but eventually the people we love will join us back out in the universe. I dont believe in heaven, I actually think it would be horrible to watch over our loved ones without being able to love and support then but I quite like the idea of the eternal peace that will come from death.

Dorsetdingle77 · 10/12/2022 13:12

mumofthreesmallmen3 · 10/12/2022 13:07

I've heard that saying before about conception, and you wasn't scared then so your just going back to that really, but I think I wasn't scared because I wasn't born then! Maybe time before birth actually was ok,but I don't know because I don't remember,I didn't have a fully functioning brain did I with capacity to have memories, so maybe it was equally as scary lol 🤷 when I was young kid I always thought people who died they just sat and watched everything,so the realisation that I won't know certain things, like if my son gets a good job, gets married, all these different things, I wouldn't know because I'd basically just be asleep forever

It doesn't really sound like you're scared of death as such more of missing your loved ones and that's perfectly understandable. Would you be afraid of death if you had no family/friends?

OneTC · 10/12/2022 13:13

RedHelenB · 10/12/2022 12:33

If its any consolation the older you get the less you care about dying.

I don't think that's true at all

shellian · 10/12/2022 13:14

Oh OP. I feel you! I have too experienced this to the point I got depressed and had panic attacks over it, thinking that one day there will be no more me. I also have a 7 year old with autism and often wonder what will happen to him as he is totally dependant on me. This may sound silly but it was a line out of a westlife song that made me feel slightly better and line was ”And the soul afraid of dying that never learns to live” . That line made me realise that I am wasting the time I do have here worrying about death and I need to start enjoying the days I have and every moment in it as I am worrying about something that I can’t change. That along with anti depressants has changed my life and I enjoy experiences. I still have the odd moment but I embrace life now. I hope you find some coping strategies that work for you.

Somethingsnappy · 10/12/2022 13:21

On previous threads like this, posters have highly recommended a book called Staring at the Sun, by Irvin D. Yalom, about coming to terms with death. Apparently it's fantastic.

HarlanPepper · 10/12/2022 13:25

LaLuz7 · 10/12/2022 13:04

The way I see it after death you return to the same state of non-existance you were in before you were born.

The nothingness feels horrific to you now, but when you die there won't be any "you" to experience it or have any kind of feeling about the situation. There can't be any pain or regret because there is no one to experience it anymore. Why fear something you will never perceive? I find the idea quite refreshing and peaceful.

I hear this kind of reasoning a lot and although it's well meant, for people who fear death in the way the OP describes, it does rather miss the point. It's that very annihilation that is so frightening, rather than whatever it might feel like. As Larkin wrote:

"This is a special way of being afraid
No trick dispels. Religion used to try,
That vast moth-eaten musical brocade
Created to pretend we never die,
And specious stuff that says No rational being
Can fear a thing it will not feel, not seeing
That this is what we fear—no sight, no sound,
No touch or taste or smell, nothing to think with,
Nothing to love or link with,
The anaesthetic from which none come round."

Original poster
mumofthreesmallmen3 · 10/12/2022 13:28

Dorsetdingle77 · 10/12/2022 13:12

It doesn't really sound like you're scared of death as such more of missing your loved ones and that's perfectly understandable. Would you be afraid of death if you had no family/friends?

Show quote history

Good point, if I had absolutely no one then I probably wouldn't care, I don't really see much point in living if you really do have no one? But also death is scary itself, what does it feel like, do we know, does it hurt,does anything happen? So many questions. I do get scared that I won't know everything about the kids life, I'm hopeful they'll outlive me so I obviously won't know everything but I want to know everything! Its just become quite bad again the anxiety of it all and I feel I don't fully understand

OP posts:
Scurryfunge12 · 10/12/2022 13:29

It’s natural to fear death, if it wasn’t, we’d have no incentive to keep out of danger’s way. It’s instinct to want to stay alive. I used to fear death and part of me still has that natural fear, but the most scary parts are how it will feel to be dying? Do you know you’re dying? I think the idea of being dead sounds liberating. No more worries, no more responsibility or being overwhelmed by life.