My father died a couple of years ago and my Stepmother, who’s been in my life since I was in primary school, is still struggling a lot. She doesn’t have children of her own and lives by herself.
She’s quite a needy and anxious person. Before lockdown she was relying heavily on friends for emotional support and had become almost child-like with a kind of need to be looked after. Not so much on a practical level, more in an emotional sense.
Clearly lockdown has been tough for her and she has been pretty isolated overall.
I live abroad and speak to her most days by Skype and had thought she was doing well but she’s really not. It’s like she’s reached her quota of energy and now needs someone else to prop her up a bit.
But I don’t even think he friends or family can give the support she needs. She needs a husband, she needs my dad. It’s so heartbreaking to think of her on her own, and now is not the time where she can develop new hobbies or distract herself from her grief.
I feel terribly helpless and guilty for not being there but also a bit burdened by it all as I can’t do much from this distance, lockdown or not.
Not sure why I’m posting really. There’s no magical answers 