My mum has died suddenly

[kittlesticks]

My wonderful mum has died suddenly - I'm not sure of the exact details yet - she was 68, a wonderful mum, wife and grandma to three grandchildren aged 1 to 6.
I will miss her until the end of time. I loved her immeasurably.

I think I genuinely cried daily for about a year. It's ok to cry.

@Cloe78 I'm so sorry.
It is like being shattered. My mum was so strong tho, she would be so intent on me carrying on without her.
I find it hard to imagine what life is going to be like now.

She sounds like she was a wonderful person, your posts bring it all back about the early days after my Dad's aneurysm, I'd forgotten about the fear about carrying on without him.

It's such a cliché but sadly it's only time that helps, tiny baby steps through each hour, each day, it's 8 years since Dad died and it still bloody hurts and my life is nowhere near as happy as it was with him in it but I'm making sure I raise my two daughters with the morals and compassion he taught me and I can look back and feel so incredibly thankful I got to have him as a Dad.

As for work don't put yourself under any pressure, you may find though that the distraction helps, the first day back will be hard having to talk to people who will pass on their sympathies but once you've had the initial conversations it might be that a bit of normality feels nice amongst the chaos.

How is your Dad doing?

My mum would never have wanted me to cry this much. I just loved her so much - so so much, and it was so unexpected. She was so full of life and joy - and now that's gone.

You know that your mums life and joy hasn't gone, not really. It never will as the love you shared was so strong. I know it feels like it's gone, but it's just not in the same place or way it was, but it will come back. I promise.

I know its hard to understand at the moment but it hurts so much as there was so much love. And the love is what will, ultimately, help to make it hurt less. At the moment I'm a few months down the line from you, and I think I have gone through every range of emotion possible. I still cry almost every day, but not all the tears are sad ones. Some are happy memories too, but the tears still happen.

I wish that I had of taken more time off from work too. Losing my mum has taken its toll on my health and now I'm suffering still.

It's my daughter's second birthday soon. How on earth do I celebrate it? Without my mum?
The mornings are so difficult I just want to cry and cry in a dark room but I have two small children.

Sorry - I am reading the replies it's just so hard to take stuff in.
I keep worrying I'm going to be a bad mum now - because I'm always going to be sad over my mum and shout at the kids or whatever.

You aren't going to be a bad Mum, but it is hard for our kids to see us unhappy.
Sadly you can't rush grief. It takes its own time. Horrible though it is, what's happening to you now is not unusual, and to be honest you will keep feeling pretty crap for some time. But chinks of happiness will start coming back.
You are forever changed by the loss of a much loved parent, but you do learn how to live without them.
Bunbury makes a lovely point in the post above. Loving someone this well makes the initial shock and pain worse, but in the longer term better as you won't look back and wish it had been different when she was alive.
My Mum died several years ago and in many ways i feel her influence really strongly still. I see her in me, in my daughter and in the way we live.
One day at a time at this stage though.

Thank you @Beamur I agree about all the points made.
Expecting a call from my GP today - want to talk to her but unsure what I should really say.

I found my GP really helpful. Very kind and sympathetic.
Hope it goes well.

You aren't a bad mum, and by the sounds of it you never will be!
Cry if you need to. I can only imagine how hard it is with little ones, my dd is a little bit older and I feel guilty for crying in front of her, as I don't want her to feel that she has to support me, but her hugs do make things feel better.

The first birthdays are hard. I didn't want to celebrate mine, but went OTT for my daughters day. I couldn't help it. Your daughter is only tiny, she wouldn't even know about her birthday properly yet, so don't feel bad if you can't do what you would've wanted/usually done. A few balloons and some cake will be enough at that age.

When you speak to the GP just talk. Tell them how you're feeling. Again, cry if you need to.

@bunburyscucumbersandwich thank you for taking the time to reply to me.

My little boy is 4 and knows I'm upset and why, my little girl is just oblivious and a very happy cheery toddler.

My mum would not want this to affect the children. I know I have to do everything in my power to be strong for them. She loved them so very much.

I am so terribly sorry for you, losing a beloved mum is a devastating loss which you can't fathom until you join this club that none of us want to be part of.

At 26 I was, and still am now at 34, the only one in my friendship group who has lost their mum. Grief is a wild beast which everyone experiences in an incredibly personal way, and I struggled and felt very alone.

Counselling with a grief specialist helped in learning coping methods, and I found great comfort and understanding in the book Motherless Daughters: The Legacy of Loss by Hope Edelman. Rather than a traditional book on grief, it is an exploration on the void of losing a mother and the impact on her daughter(s).

And please, let yourself feel and go through the emotions; I locked mine down hard for a number of reasons, and that then has frozen my life in a number of different ways.

@YellowMonday thank you. I have ordered that book.
Do you think it's one I could read quite soon or does it need to wait?

I'm a mess this morning. Is anyone around?

Hi. Difficult morning?
What are your plans for the day?

Thank you for asking. Every day I've been going to see my Dad. It's so hard. It's as if she's gone out for something from the shops. We are finalising funeral stuff today I think. The mornings are dreadful because slowly the all encompassing stuff comes back to me as I wake up but the kids obviously need breakfast and stuff like that and their lives must go on.

So sorry to hear that OP my mum died 25 years ago and I still miss her but it does get easier. Allow yourself time to grieve and don’t be ashamed to cry. In time you can show your children pictures and talk about your mum to keep the memory alive x

@kittlesticks I am so sorry for the sudden loss of your Mum, it is still early days and you will still be in shock, it’s also a massive loss. Ultimately be kind to yourself.

I lost my Mum last April, she was 60, still worked full time and was full of independence. I found her one morning in February collapsed so called an ambulance. She died 8 weeks later after a long battle in hospital, I will never get over the guilt of being unable to help her. It wasn’t her time to go and I feel robbed. The weeks/months after her death were a complete blur, I just ‘functioned’ and walked around on autopilot whilst juggling a million things in my head. Somedays even now, I cannot believe she isn’t coming back, I still have moments were my eyes just fill with tears. I am starting some therapy hopefully next month, but it has taken me until now to feel ‘ready’ to face up to it all.

I think you'll find more time to work through your feelings after the funeral. This first couple of weeks are just so brutal. The contrast between a certain amount of 'life must go on' especially when you have kids just feels like such a struggle when you want to just curl up and pretend it's not happening.
I put together a photo album for people to look through at my Mum's service and I still look back on it quite often. It's a little reminder that their life was a sum of much greater parts.

I'm so sorry OP. Sending love

Morning,
Sorry to hear today is bad. That will come and go, or sometimes just some hours are bad.
Remember the wave analogy of grief.
Take some comfort in knowing you're not alone in the terrible awful grief of losing your mother. And it's OK to feel rage at those who still have theirs.
The clock feels like it's stopped ticking for you and the world keeps going around you. (How dare it without your beloved mother!) But at some point it will start slowly ticking again and the stopping will become less frequent. My God she loved you so much and you her. Hold fast to the love Xx

@Frazzle76 I'm definitely finding it comes in waves. Thanks for understanding.

Sending you and your family my thoughts, the same thing happened with my mum 20 years ago when my eldest daughter was a baby. So sorry OP xx

@dancinfeet I'm so sorry. Can you tell me anything about how you coped?

Today I have this massive twilight zone feeling. I'm my house I can shut the door and sort of believe mum is fine and at home. Is that... normal?
I also keep playing out scenarios in my head where somehow this issue was identified (even tho it was symptomless) and fixed earlier. Or where she just felt unwell and went to the drs and it was discovered.
Is this 'bargaining?' As per the stages of grief?