My mum is dying and I can't just carry on as normal.

[JenniferYellowHat1980]

I don't know where to post this. I'm not bereaved yet but I will be - and my feeling is that it's going to be quite soon. The love I feel for my mum is on a par with the way I feel about my DCs. There's nothing else like it. I don't have really close friends who I can talk to about this. My DH is being great and is a massive support.

What is really worrying me is work. I'm a teacher so on holiday at the moment, but I've asked about compassionate leave and I'm allowed just five days. Five days doesn't begin to do justice to my mum. I'm her next of kin (she is in a relationship but doesn't love with her partner). I need to be there to care for her. I can't just get over her and get back to work in a week or anything close to that. My job is a struggle with some really challenging behaviour and I will lose my shit if I try.

How do people cope with society's attitude that a parent's death is something to just compartmentalise while you meet your working commitments? I just don't feel I'm up to the two.

Sorry for the self centred post. I have no-one really who can help me with this. It's been a distressing few days watching my DM fade - she was so capable and strong and now she just sleeps.

Thank you so much for all the replies. Things have been chaotic since I started this thread - mum has been hospitalised with, at best, severe pneumonia. The good thing is that we were at a national centre of excellence at the time - she was being scanned prior to a drug trial - so she's getting the very best treatment and hopefully she can get over it. The worst of it though, is that it's a 9 hour round trip from where we both live, so I'm struggling to get there regularly.

I went into work yesterday but just couldn't begin to think about where to start. The workload is massive but it's students' behaviour and my response to it that I'm more concerned about. I'm off for a week in the first instance, and have actually given notice to resign at Easter. The job itself is something that's making me really unhappy at the moment for the reasons mentioned above. Of course my difficulty is, what do I do between now and then? If I could simply leave with a month's notice it would be easier but I'm trapped.

I also don't know if I'm jumping the gun. Despite her recent performance status being 3 at best, and now worse, my DM fully expects to recover and get on the drug trial she was being screened for. Maybe I'm underestimating the time she has left but she is really poorly. She'll have been in hospital for at least 10 days when she's discharged, but more likely two weeks.

So sorry you are going through this. My mum died 2 months ago and she was incredibly special to me and I have not coped well. She had a terminal diagnosis and when she was admitted to hospital it was the week before half term (I also work in a school). There was no way I could work, I was all over the place so I called work and explained I couldn't come in and said I would happily take it as unpaid and that I felt unsafe to work. They paid me. I then had half term and my mum died the first week back after half term. I handed in my notice as I couldn't cope and a million other things - but they did offer me paid leave until end of Nov and then unpaid till Christmas. So, you could find yourself supported? I know I was lucky with my school.

But I couldn't care less about work at the moment

Sorry - just properly read your last post. What you do now is go to GP and get signed off until you leave.

PPS. You will never regret spending time with her - even if she has longer left. My experience was a v rapid decline and we were shocked by the speed. We never thought it would happen like that. So you never know what will happen x

I'm so sorry op.
When my Mum died ( I was 22) I got one day off work to attend the funeral 200 miles away, and was expected to be back the next day .
And like a fool I went to work.
I was a retail manager and I don't know how I did it.
I resigned 3 months later and had six months off with stress.

Ia am sorry to hear about your Mum. You sound like you are doing amazingly well to cope.

My experience is that my Mum was given six months to live in her early fifties, and lived a further twenty months. Three months in hospital, followed by five weeks in a hospice, and fifteen days after the first 'come now, she's going' call. There were six of those in total before the last four day vigil.

I'm not sure how employment can really cope with something so unpredictable. My DH took three days of unpaid leave at the end, and I used a combination of unpaid leave and holiday, with two weeks of holiday after her death as sole executor of the will with a house and family to sort out, funeral to arrange etc.

My only tip would be to try and figure out what you want and need, write it down, and take it along with a determination to make it happen, somehow, speak to colleagues if that will help . Good luck.

My mother died last year, only seven weeks after diagnosis with advanced cancer of the pancreas. The time between her diagnosis and death was really hard and complicated by the fact that you just don't know how long they have left. With hindsight, I wish I had spent even more time with her than I did but at the time I didn't know whether I had two, four or six months of abandoning my family ahead of me. I also found it incredibly stressful being with my parents and needed time off to breathe and eat and stuff like that.

Filbert, it's comforting to feel that my response is normal. I hope life starts to get back on an even keel with you soon. You know what I can't get my head around? I'm 38. My mum has just turned 60. I potentially have more than 40 years on this earth without the most significant person in my life. I will never get over her.

Savage, that's awful. Apart from anything else it's an abuse of power over someone so young and compliant.

Yes that's the other thing. I have two small children who need me. Luckily mum and I love within a 10 minute drive of each other so when she's home that's won't be so much of an issue when I finish work. But combined with FT teaching I haven't been fulfilling any of my commitments well. My DH never gets a look in.

As far as what I want, well it's made me realise that my family is far more important to me than my career.

OP. I was in a similar position to you with my dad who died a few years ago. I'm a police officer and looking back I should have taken the time off with stress. I didn't I took unpaid leave (not sure if this is an option for you). I didn't want to pretend that everything was OK or normal and I wanted to spend all my time with my dad before his inevitable death. I took 3 months off IIRC leading up
To his death and I have never regretted that. You should go off with stress. I have friends who are teachers in RL who Have been off with stress (generally work related) for months at a time. Good luck and my thoughts are with you.

I know how you feel. I'm 30 and I can't imagine the rest of my life now - it feels like such a short space of time to have with her in the grand scheme of life.

I lost my mum at 24. She met one of my children but not the other. It is awful whatever stage of life you are in but it really makes you value the things you have.

I remember taking such pleasure in the fact that I could walk up the street in the weeks following my mums death. I enjoyed the movement of every muscle. Thinking about her will always inspire that in me.

That's a good thought, PurpleTraitor. I walked for miles in the countryside by my house today. I sent her lots of pictures so she could imagine coming with me. I can imagine taking them for her even after she's gone.

I left my 11 yr job when i was told compassionate leave was 2 /3 days.Like you my parents are my "friends" in a way and with both of them battling cancer it has been hard,I have kept 3 weeks hols and while dad declines and admits he didnt think he would make xmas i find work helpful in distracting me.Sometimes split shifts and long hrs are too much though.When he gets worse i will get signed off on stat sick pay so falling back on saving tbh,at least my new colleagues are ppolite and dont say things like your parents are old and going to die anyway" like my last boss did,Cancer is cruel and other illnesses too and watching our loved ones suffer takes its toll,Sorry to all of you who have experienced this,Personally ive no idea how i will cope. xx

Dear Jennifer yellow Good luck to you x
-I'm so hopeful you and mum will fulfill much time together making magic memories.
Its unfair, how you have had to worry about work, you've taken the best option I think (your career will always be there to pickup,and should not jeopodise precious time we may have left with our loved ones)

Its too late, in my sitation, , as my dad died(just before Christmas) after spending 6 weeks in hospital- I didn't get any compassionate leave ( as a civil servant). Wish I could turn back the clock, I would have walked out of the job.
I'm hurting so much now time is so precious!

Jennifer,

I'm normally more of a lurker but felt I had to respond. I'm a teacher too and was in a scarily similar situation last year. My mum and I were as close as you and yours sound, I'm the only daughter,next of kin, she was my best friend, etc. I had never even taken one sick day in ten years of teaching, but on the day of the terminal diagnosis I knew I couldn't keep going. The doctors gave me a sick line with no queries, they were so kind and understanding and put "family illness" as the reason. The first day I went to see them they could clearly see I was in no fit state to be working.

That gave me the opportunity to spend the last 3 months of my mums life with her, and to be able to help her as much as I could, and I will be forever grateful to have had that time with her. School and your class will keep going but this is a very special and important time for you and your mum. You sound very committed to your job, as am I, and before it I could never have imagined just "stopping" work wise but I had to, and will be eternally glad that I did. Now I'm back and was able to pick up.

Please, take time off for your mum. Nothing else matters like this. Make memories, tell her you love her as much as you can, do everything you can to keep her comfortable and as content as possible. I don't know if this will help (and I hope I'm not being too forthright in saying it, but the feeling I had was that "mammy took me into this world, and it's only fair that I am there for her as she leaves it").

My thoughts are with you, you sound like the most wonderful daughter. These are incredibly precious times. Being there for your mum is what counts.

I am in a very similar situation with my mum at the moment was just going to ask if I can take some time off unpaid whilst I try and work out what care she needs. It's so difficult not knowing how long it will last, and I have been having panic attacks just thinking about it. Some of the posts here have been full of such wonderful advice, and have made me realise how important it is for me to do what feels right. Will be thinking of you OP. X