For Anyone Needing Support After Losing A Parent. Very Supportive Thread

[Mummylin]

Luckily I was keeping my eye on the thread so it would of been ok. Hopefully this new thread will once again bring comfort to newly bereaved.
To the newest posters, I wish you all the best in the coming weeks / months.
And to the longer term posters, thankyou for being such a support to each other. 💐

*will this get any better

Please forgive me for asking, did you know if you wanted to see your loved one in the Chapel of rest? I thought I'd instantly know but just as I think I've decided I wobble. I sincerely apologise if I offend anyone, I really don't mean to.

@ivymummy oh bless you that's so tough it's not silly at all, she was your mum. There is no stronger bond.

@Coronation I have often thought that I had my first baby 6 weeks after my first baby , why couldn't mum of just stayed and met her. I know it doesn't work like that. I cry every day multiple times it's only been 10 months for me but I often think my baby deserves a happier mum but I adore her and this is life unfortunately and she's lost her grandma too

I saw my father, and 14 years later, that memory still haunts me very often. I think that unless you are very brave and strong, it is something that I do not recommend

@mrssunshinexxx . That sounds so heartbreaking! It is so unfair. We should have our mums around, helping us out with the babies. Discussing everything with them, asking them for advice... I guess 10 months is still too soon. I doubt it will ever get any better for me. I still miss my dad every day and it's been really long. He was our rock

It is so wrong and unfair and cruel then you see actual scum bags walking the earth it makes me wonder what's the point to any of it. @Coronation

@Shockedandspeechless I went to see my mum I think Because of covid and I hadn't seen her for 5 weeks properly or been able to touch her or hug/ kiss that's why I went. It life had been normal and I had seen her the day or so before or we would of all gone to hospital with her when she had her stroke and sat by her bed I probably wouldn't of gone to the chapel or Rest. I don't regret going she looked as much like my lovely mum as she possibly could and she was dressed in the dress she wore at my wedding. Makes me cry even typing this. I thought I would be able to go over straight away and hug and kiss her but I really freaked out. I would definitely describe it as traumatic and I suppose when I first think of her it's the image of her laying there dead and cold in a coffin not her full of life and the thousands of memories I do have but maybe over time when I think of her it will be different

I didn't see my mum at the chapel of rest as I was there for the 4 hideous days of her passing away and she looked so far removed from my mum she was so thin she was terrifying. I resent people acting like hooray after restrictions are lifted life is going back to normal, I feel so alone already watching people hang out with their family's is going to cut me deep. It's been 6 months and can't imagine ever feeling truly happy again.

@Coronation I'm mid 30s and it was the same illnesses for my parents, but the other way round.

My dad had dementia. It started nearly 10 years ago but progressed quite slowly. He didn't know who I was for his last 4 or 5 years. He died from covid in April.

My mum recently died from a brain tumour but she also had mental health problems which got worse as dad's dementia progressed. She wasn't quite herself for years. I feel like I was more of a parent to them over the last 10 years.

It's so hard seeing my friends with both parents still healthy. You really feel how much you've missed out on. My fiancee still has a grandparent in decent health.

It is too young and I feel cheated tbh. I feel for you even more losing a parent at 16.

@ivymummy I'm sorry you're part of this club too. I don't know anyone else in 'real life' who has lost both parents by this age, it can feel very isolating. I'm glad we have this thread.

Thank you ladies for your advice. @mrssunshinexxx I'm so sorry I made you cry. @coronation this is my fear. The last time I saw Mum was 36 hours before she passed for 2 minutes while she was in the hospice.This thought keeps me awake at night. It's only been 10 days & it feels like an eternity already. All I want to do is give Mum a cuddle & tell her I love her.

@Cherrycee that's exactly my story. DH has two healthy grandparents in their 90s. It is so horrible, right? And I guess all terminal illnesses are awful. But the ones that affect the brain are the worst ones to me. Probably because it is what I have been through, but it is also so hard to see your parents not being themselves!

My heart goes out to you. Xxx

@Cherrycee and I totally agree with you. It is SO hard to see people my age doing the normal things I should be doing with my parents! It reminds me how extremely unlucky I am. I know of few people that lost one parent, but in real life, I am the only one in my situation

I feel so resentful of my friends and people I know. They talk about their mums helping them out with babies, or visiting them. It is the small things, saying 'oh my mum says that when I was a baby she used to give me this or that to help with teething'.

Meanwhile I dread my sister calling me to say that my mum think she is kidnapped and that she wants to go 'home' (she is already home).

I live in a constant state of anxiety and panic. Missing my mum despite her still being alive.

Still, I don't want her to leave me! I prefer to have her even though she is not herself. I would have never thought I would live something like this.

Sorry for the ramble. I suspect my husband is tired of see me crying. I have to be the strong one when I talk to my sister, she is the one dealing with the worst of this. And I have no one else that understands me.

I am so terribly sad all the time

*seeing me crying

@Coronation

I feel so resentful of my friends and people I know. They talk about their mums helping them out with babies, or visiting them. It is the small things, saying 'oh my mum says that when I was a baby she used to give me this or that to help with teething'.

Meanwhile I dread my sister calling me to say that my mum think she is kidnapped and that she wants to go 'home' (she is already home).

I live in a constant state of anxiety and panic. Missing my mum despite her still being alive.

Still, I don't want her to leave me! I prefer to have her even though she is not herself. I would have never thought I would live something like this.

Sorry for the ramble. I suspect my husband is tired of see me crying. I have to be the strong one when I talk to my sister, she is the one dealing with the worst of this. And I have no one else that understands me.

I am so terribly sad all the time

My mum wanting to go home was one of the worst bits imagine not feeling home or at peace my mum has hallucinations it's so hard to deal with

@Coronation It's so hard and I do get it. Dad was quite content even with the dementia and it hadn't got to the very advanced stage. So he could still walk around (slowly), chat to us (he seemed to know on some level that we were 'his' people) but he wasn't making much sense. He found the most random things hilarious. So even though he wasn't himself, it felt like something of him was still there. Til covid hit and just absolutely floored him, he went from fine one day to dead the next. It was horrific.

Mum's tumour was diagnosed because she tried to walk to the shop in her nightdress. Luckily a neighbour saw her, brought her home and called an ambulance.

Anything to do with the brain is very tough because you lose them slowly while they're physically still around. And for me the focus was always on making sure they were safe and looked after, dealing with all the things that needed doing, so I didn't really have a chance to come to terms with it while it was happening.

Make sure you look after yourself too. Do something small for yourself everyday, it helps keep you sane!

Shocked it was always my mum’s strongly expressed desire that we did not visit her in a chapel of rest or at an undertaker, because she’d found the experience she had with her own dad, who died suddenly when she was only in her 20s, so upsetting. She said the person had gone and it was just the body, and she deeply regretted it was her last memory of her dad, not when he was alive. So I didn’t need to make that decision- she made it for me. (“Just make sure they give you my jewellery” was her other instruction.) But the need for a cuddle or hug or touch, one more time to tell her I love her, hasn’t left. It’s been 5 months now. I dreamed about her this morning- in the dream my dad was talking to her on a video call on the iPad and I leaned in behind him to say hello. Then I realised it wasn’t a live call, just an old video of her, and that she was still dead.

My dad is amazing and coping but I just feel a great deal of frustration and guilt and also self-pity for poor poor me. I feel like I’m not doing enough to support dad (guilt), but lockdown is just exacerbating what’s even possible (frustration). My mum’s birthday will be soon and I am dreading it. We should be planning a family celebration- she’d have wanted that, us all to get together as a family & share a meal, have a walk to the cemetery, support my dad and distract him - but it’s not possible. It will be just me and him putting on a brave face for each other, and for my DC who miss Grandma. My mum understood - she would have had sensible words about not feeling guilty and trying your best and not to worry and look after yourself too, and that I’m doing a good job under bad circumstances, but there’s no one to do that for me now. DH can’t help tho he tries very hard. It’s just that his care and concern isn’t right. He can’t be Mum to me.

Oh I miss her so.

for you all. It’s a terrible terrible thing, and it comes in waves.

to everyone here

@nosquirrels I understand that completely. I've not been able to cry since the day Mum passed but reading this thread makes so much sense and am having a quiet cry upstairs. Thank you so much ladies.

Hi I hope I can join in too. I lost both parents last month. Mum had cancer and dad from
COVID (that he caught in hospital). I was with them both when they died and we had a joint funeral and burial. Mum was only in her 60’s and dad early 70’s.
I’m absolutely devastated and at the minute I’m just keeping myself really busy. But then at night it all comes out and I can’t sleep.
It’s just horrendous. Big hugs to everyone.

I have just read the whole thread, and everything said here sounds so familiar. I feel a little less alone now.

It is unbelievable that life just keep going while I am here in tatters.

I was sobbing, and husband came to hug me. I stopped crying but only because I forced myself to do so. Few minutes later he was telling me joke his colleague said and laughing. I can't believe people is so happy while I'm suffering so much. But I get it, he has a great life. He is happy.

To me, life has died.

I am glad to see that some of you got better as time passed

@Nurse1980 it must have been horrible to lose them both so recently.

I am really sorry for your loss

Thank you. X

@Nurse1980 I'm so sorry, that is absolutely cruel. Your head must be all over the place.

Go easy on yourself for the next while. If keeping busy helps you that's great, but if you need to take some time for yourself do it. It's more than understandable.

You are stronger than you know @Nurse1980 so sorry for you x

@Nurse1980

I'm so sorry for your loss.

I lost my mum to covid 7 weeks ago. The pain and heartbreak are indescribable.

Losing 2 parents in a month is unimaginable.