To ask why your parents dying is so catastrophically awful

[NCdoinggriefwrong]

obv talking about parents who die of natural causes and who are elderly…(not those who die with young kids or at age 50 etc - am talking the 75+ cohort)

Have NCed for this as think I might be U.

my DH’s father has Parkinson’s alongside what is increasingly looks like dementia and is dying. He was diagnosed at 81 and is now 86 and obviously declining. My DH has been in an absolute tailspin about this on an ongoing basis, which at some level I understand but I also sort of think he needs to manage a bit better and pull
himself together - he’s had 5 years to get used to the idea his dad has a progressive disease, he knows it’s only going in one direction, and at the end of the day, his dad is 86, how long do people really live?

and it got me thinking (and searching MN threads) about why people are so devastated when their parents die. I have a fabulous relationship with my parents and ofc I will grieve them and miss them when they’re gone (dad in his 80s, mum in her 70s). But I can’t imagine falling apart because my parents do something utterly foreseeable and get old
and die. I’ve been through my parents’ funeral wishes and probate stuff etc with them and we’ve acknowledged they won’t be around forever and are just enjoying the time we do have.

Am I a horrible person and utterly cold fish? I feel like I’m missing something major. FYI I am a compleyely
empathetic person irl so it’s not that I am an emotionless robot in my day to day life. I just don’t understand why a parent dying is anything other than expected and, well, just sad.

My amazing, lovely, wonderful dear dad is facing a life saving surgery within the next week. It is really up in the air as to whether he will survive. My heart is breaking at the thought of losing him. I find your comments very hard to understand. My dad is my hero. Will I carry on? Yes, because I have to. He would not want me to sit in sadness for the rest of my life. The anticipatory grief is horrendous and I think you need to be kinder to your DH about this.

You really have NO idea.

And your thinking about older people is verging on the inhuman. A person is a person is a person, whether they are 21 or 51 or 81. They are still them, to themselves, if not to unempathetic daughters in law ...

People are still of value, no matter what age, and this is what your DH feels about his father. You can only hope this, when you get old, that others don't think like you -

"Oh, @NCdoinggriefwrong is 86, so really, how much longer has she got? what does it matter how I feel about her?".

I do wish I hadn't read this. I should have stopped when I read the title.

To be honest, I couldn't have imagined how I'd feel before it happened.

My dad died 6 weeks ago, it was sudden and was early 70's (so earlier than you're saying) but it is absolutely horrendous. It feels awful. I think about him all the time. I relive the horror of it all and miss him so much.

I could never have imagined I'd feel like this. You can't until it happens.

I think I get where you’re coming from - not that it’s not incredibly sad, in fact you’ve said it’s sad, but it’s not an actual tragedy. To some it seems to come as a surprise that their parents are mortal at all, like they have no right to die. Some people are the same with their own mortality too. It doesn’t seem healthy to me either, and I say this as someone who has lost a parent and who is going to lose another soon, both to degenerative diseases which took years to progress.

If every family was as matter-of-fact as your parents seem to have been, then maybe seeing death as a sad but inevitable event would be more common. Unfortunately that’s not everyone’s experience, and it’s one of many taboos in our culture that are convenient in the short term, and screw people up in the long term by making inevitable parts of life far worse and more shocking than they have to be. When we don’t talk to family and others about sickness and death, don’t acknowledge way before time that we will probably outlive the generation above, and never see a dying person until it’s our own mum or dad, the trauma of all that makes bereavement so much worse. Perhaps that’s what you’re seeing in others that you don’t recognise in your own feelings?

@Couldyounot, I am so so sorry for your loss. That sounds unbelievably traumatic. Take care

Grieving is fine. Falling apart is not.

Get a grip.

@Worrywart70 sending you much love x

What a selfish and inconsiderate post from some one who is yet to lose a parent !!!!! This is as good as a man telling a woman that childbirth isn't painful !!!

All I can say is when you actually have to face this you will understand.

The only analogy I can think of is when someone is having a baby: you know you are having it, you prepare for having it but ultimately you have no idea. (Saying this as someone who always thought it was bs when people said you won’t understand xyz until you have a kid)

Unbelievable.

Agreed. Not everyone loves their parents, so each person's experience is different. Perhaps it is intimations of one's own mortality? I have certainly known people be very relieved when their elderly and sick parent dies.

I don’t think yabu BUT understand the flaming…

Both my parents worked within two days of their parents dying. my father worked on the day his mother died. They took time off for the funeral and some planning but “got on with it”. I (and they) have been incredibly lucky in that my grandparents died suddenly and unexpectedly but at an age that was considered a decent innings. so the sort of good death people want.

I fully expect that if I was in a similar situation I’d react similarly (although with three lots of cancer between the two of them before they hit 70 I may not be as “lucky”). Count me a cold fish. But I’ve been to far too many funerals where the surviving parents have been mourning their child and whatever my grief will be when my parents go, it will be nothing compared to the grief of a mourning parent. There is a natural order of life and if I’m lucky enough to experience it that way, so be it.

Am I a horrible person and utterly cold fish?

100% you are.

My mother died 2 years ago aged 81 after several years of poor physical health and increasing frailty. She remained mentally as sharp as ever though and we were exceptionally close.

I was devastated at her death and am still grieving her; profoundly so. I am definitely functional; holding down a demanding job and ensuring I support my DF and my 3 children who were also similarly devastated at her loss. But honestly sometimes, quietly, I just feel such despair. And the thought of living the remainder of my life never seeing her again or hearing her voice sometimes just overwhelms me.

I always knew that I would be hugely affected by the death of my parents. And I have been.

I’m quite surprised that you feel as you feel. I genuinely hope that when it does happen to you, you are not taken by surprise with how you feel.

@MansfieldLark thank you, that's kind 💐

One of my parents died in their early 50s so I sort of agree with you. I can't see how losing a parent who has lived a full lifespan and seen you into adulthood can compare to this at all.

Right back at you.

But grief isn't logical.

I didn't grieve my dad at all - yes he was 88 and it was a reasonably natural death after a stroke, but we had a difficult relationship at times and his death at that time just didn't devastate me.

My mother is extremely impaired after a big stroke and will die soon, and I will genuinely rejoice for her that she is at peace, but I will also likely grieve terribly because she was such a wonderful mother. Losing a parent you feel like that about is effectively losing a version of your own life that nobody else knows, and it hurts so much.

Please try to listen to your dh. A lot of marriages get into bad trouble after the death of a parent if the other partner doesn't understand.

Likewise @Beepbeepoutoftheway . I'm out.

I too have thought about this. Dh's mum died. She was lovely. My mum

, late 70 's, and I have talked about when she dies many times. I will miss her because she's amazing, best mum ever. But dying is expected.

I should have added to my post above, like others have said it was a relief also in many ways when my dad went. He had been bed bound for the last 9 months of his life, and he was such an active man. His lungs were failing and barely working and he had zero quality of life. He wanted to go. When I saw him in the chapel of rest wearing the clothes we picked out it really hit home to me that I’d not seen him dressed in so long. That wasn’t the life he wanted to live. I mourned his loss but I was relieved he was gone, as he was no longer suffering. I wish he had never had the lung disease that inpacted his whole life, but he was luckier than many living to 73. I know he would want me to remember him with a smile, and enjoy my life, and that’s what I do

OP I've lost both parents now, who I loved very much, but I do some extent agree with you although I think you're maybe underestimating how it can shake your foundations at any age. Ultimately we'd all keep our loved ones with us forever if we could.

Why do we bother to grieve anyone ? We all come into this earth with the view that death is inevitable and we aren't immortal so should we just all drop the grieving nonsense and get on with death ?

This thread is not awful. It's a Mn discussion and that's fine.

YABU. Your parents are still alive. I lost my df 6 years ago and dm last year. Yes, they both reached the ripe age of 80, but it still hurt.

You have no fucking idea what’s coming!