To not get over losing loved ones as easily as others?

[Beautifulweeds]

I've always been over sensitive, even accidentally stepping on a spider, I feel awful, just the way I am. I've realised I'm an empath, so totally take in anyone feeling sad or hurt. If a stranger is crying I will help them, no matter what others say.

So my AIBU is for everyone else not to understand how grief affects me so much. I know I dwell, beat myself up about what I should have done more. I do get on with life, work etc but I cry so much and feel so much pain and heartache.

It's like I function but then when I don't have to I break down. I've lost quite a few loved ones, including my Dad 3 years ago, who I'm still coming to terms with, and recently by BFF of over 40 years a few months ago. I think about her all the time, can't let go, no one else can I talk to like with her, my soulmate.

With every loss I feel the emptiness in my heart grow that bit more and know getting older comes with so much trauma.

Yet I'm still me, bubbly, my personality, but it's an effort to do this. I do turn to alcohol too much, plus I smoke, guess I'm kinda thinking this is my way to go amd convincing myself I enjoy it.

So sorry for the long post and thank you if you've taken the time to time to read about my miserable mind.

Being at the bedside of your nearest and dearest watching them die is excruciating and the fear is I can't do this for my other loved ones because it's too heartbreaking 💔 and going in a downward cycle means I can avoid this.

Again, sorry, just pouring my heart out. Xxx

Yes. I have a couple of friends who I would genuinely describe as empaths but ya know... Being actually empathetic... They either comforted the person going through the trauma/upset or they made themselves scarce to have a wee cry in the bathroom or something.

Not rolling about on the the floor crying because MY dad had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer and claiming it's because she's so empathic and just 'feels my pain so hard'. Where's the empathy for me for fucksake. She was sobbing on me all night.

I evicted this lodger/former friend very shortly after she did this - it had been four years of massive drama and this just crossed the line! For a self declared empath she had zero self awareness or social skills, everything was about her 😬

My best friend's ex-mother in law sobbed performatively at my friend's dad's funeral declaring loudly 'that could have been me' 🙄She made the whole thing about her so in my opinion empaths and their deep feelings can FATWO.

I lost a close friend 3 months ago and it’s been so tough. We spent a lot of time together and every Sunday I cry when driving to the dog field we both went to every week. Driving past her house is so tough, and help clear her flat has been incredibly painful (and cathartic at times). I’ve struggled more than when I lost my dad and I feel awful saying that, but was someone I spent a lot of time with (my dad was 250 miles away so not involved in my daily life).

Also some people do get over it quicker. I feel like i’m far more resilient than my mother for example. I can cope with a lot more and still carry on. My close friend has struggled massively with the loss of her mother, but I think as she was so close to her.

I have learned to live with my DD dying and have had a couple of friends die very young in their early fifties. One of DH friends died when they were both just 38.

If people are older they have had their innings and though it’s sad it is the natural order of things. I adored my Dad but he made 84, it’s enough years.

My SIL made her Fathers death all about her, nobody else was as upset as her because they didn’t show it like her. I stopped telling people I had a child die because of their totally over the top reactions. Fortunately I have met people who will just say I’m sorry that must be so difficult instead of performative bewailing.

@GreyCarpet thats would be my SiL who I would describe if pressed as emotionally and socially immature.

I've never lost to anyone todate, but I think about it a lot, because my mum is elderly, and I adore her, and I've seen how badly it affected by Dh and my best friend. I know I'll take it very badly.

This.

i have never been to visit where my mum and dads ashes were scattered because that’s not where they are, the concept of gathering at a graveside on a specific day is meaningless to me. I think about them both often, I will be doing something innocuous and a memory will suddenly hit, I don’t feel the need to share that with anyone, it’s mine and sometimes I’ll have the time and opportunity to sit with those memories and enjoy remembering the good times we had, more often I will be doing something else and I’ll have to move on from it and continue with living my life.

You talk about medication for your OCD and Depression OP but what therapy are you having? You need to find strategies that allow you to understand that living in your grief prevents you from appreciating and enjoying the life you are actually living and that provide you mechanisms to recognise it but not get lost in it.

Sorry for your losses, OP.

YABU to assume that others get over it more easily than you do.

I lost ds 25 to suicide 8 months ago. You'd never think to look at me. But every day I have a " moment" ...it could be an inability to breathe, tears at 3 am , a feeling of anger...but you'd never know.
I'm positive, cheery at work, I go out and socialise, I plan holidays and trips. But my grief will never go away...but don't want to be known as the mother with the dead son.

But she also mentions others not understanding her grief so maybe it's more about that? Although I doubt she'll be back to clarify after the massive pile on because she dared to call herself an "empath"-another word MNers find offensive, to add to a very long list! Who knew?

I think she means she's turned to unhealthy coping methods and she sees others are coping in a more healthy way? I think that's what she means rather than trying to dismiss others' grief. No wonder no one knows what anyone else is feeling if we're not supposed to ever talk about it.

So sorry, OP. 3 years is still early days. My mum and dad both died in their early 60’s, 2 years apart. Also lost my closest friend at 50 a few years ago. It took me over a decade to feel true happiness again after my parents died. 💐

Of course people can talk about their grief. The difference is making everything about them. My (self described as an empath) former housemate who wept on the floor when my dad was diagnosed with cancer also made a massive scene at a mutual friend's funeral - he was only 30 and died by suicide leaving his fiancée and obviously family behind (fiancée is also a mutual friend). It was definitely performative.

Another person I know who describes themselves regularly as an empath was SO dramatic at my BIL's funeral. Ignoring my pregnant, bereaved sister while she (the 'empath') sobbed loudly. To me that's the opposite of empathy.

I honestly have never come across an 'empath' who isn't actually just narcissistic and attention seeking.

Pretty much everyone has empathy. It just doesn't need to be shown in exactly the same way for it to count!

@Andoutcomethewolves well that's very strange behaviour from your former housemate. I don't know anyone like that, or would ever act like that myself. I suppose I can see why you'd raise an eyebrow at someone calling themselves an "empath" after that. Hopefully that's not the sort of thing OP means. It's hard to know without her coming back to elaborate more.

Being dramatic and wailing loudly even though there are people much closer to the person than them is definitely a weird thing to do.