For Anyone Needing Support After Losing a Parent. Very Supportive Thread (September 2021)

[Crunchymum]

Hi guys,

New thread here for when the other one gets full.

Lots of love to you all.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/bereavement/4162017-For-Anyone-Needing-Support-After-Losing-A-Parent-Very-Supportive-Thread

I'm so sorry @Testarossa44. That must be awful.

I've got all his text messages, so that's something. I thought I backed up WhatsApp, but nothing but just random odd stuff downloaded when I tried to restore it all. Super sad. Xx

@ Testarossa44 - I’m so sorry too. That’s really upsetting. I haven’t had a good week with any of this, I must say it feels like it’s getting harder. I haven’t seen my Dad for 7 weeks now and I keep thinking that.

@Saz345 - I’m glad your birthday was ok. And it’s great news to hear you’ve had a nice day today. It really is nice to go out for lunch or a coffee or shopping etc with a friend and child-free. You forget who you are a bit when you’re always with your children and doing everything for them, I think you sort of just become ‘mum’ and forget that you’re not just mum. I went out with a friend shopping and we had some lunch on Friday, I’m
glad I went as it was a nicer day than Monday to Thursday had been, and it felt nice to be out with a friend and not alone with my thoughts but walking round the shops I was constantly thinking of my Dad.

mrssunshinexxx I didn't want to tag you, as not to disturb you. I hope you are snuggled up with your beautiful newborn baby. Congratulations my lovely and I hope it isn't too trite or out of place for me to say your mum would be so very proud of you.

@Mummylin

I hope you didn't mind that I took up the mantle so to speak. You other threads were so helpful and supportive.

I am almost 14 months in. It still burns and I'm still finding my way on an hourly basis.
But I've coped and I have kept going and it's all we can do?

I agree. We just keep going.

That’s all any of us can do, just exist and function through each day.

Bloody hard just to do even that sometimes.

@Crunchymum not at all . I think you are right x

Oh goodness no Crunchymum only too pleased to see the thread continuing. I myself found a lot of comfort from those of us who went through a loss at the same time, then there weren't quite so many of us, now more people are aware of it.
All of you are doing a great job with support for each other, it is lovely to see and helps such a lot. 🌻

@Testarossa44 I really, really feel for you about losing your dad's messages.

Not quite the same thing but I used to email my mum everyday (from my work account. Which is allowed). My company had a cyber attack in June and thus far they've only managed to restore our emails for 1 year so back to June 2020. My mum died in September 2020. I've lost years and years worth of our emails.

I could (and will eventually) ask for them the be restored but understandably, as they are private, they'll be lowest priority.

My mum never had WhatsApp. I wish she had upgraded to a smart phone. W.A would have been a gamechanger for her (she had terrible mental health and was virtually agrophobic when we lost her)

Things like this add to the misery of the actual loss.

It really has upset me. At my mum's this weekend. I used to love my weekend visits quite often we'd go out for a meal on the Saturday, I'd take Mack (he passed in June) out for a walk Sunday morning while dad was at his regular golf game. Then he did a fabulous roast for Sunday tea. Now those lovely weekends are all gone. I'm ending up doing jobs for mum now, cooking, cleaning, changing her bed etc. I don't resent it, she's my mum, but instead end up shattered. We put some photos of dad in frames this afternoon. It so upset, that's all my amazing dad is now, just photo's. And it's horrible.

@ Testarossa44

I know just how you feel. We used to spend every weekend with my mum and dad, and now we’re still doing it but it’s just with mum. We’ve spent the whole weekend at my mum’s doing the garden. Me, my DH and my two kids have spent all weekend clearing leaves and doing the garden because they have a very big garden and my dad always kept on top of it. I’m shattered and now come home to make tea for everyone. Like you, I’m doing everything now for my mum and it is tiring but of course we don’t mind. It just rang so true for me when I read your message about putting photos in frames. I’ve just framed a picture of my mum and dad together on my wedding day and I’ve had two canvas’s made of my dad so we have 3 pictures up. But how heartbreaking is it that pictures and memories are now all that we have. It’s truly heartbreaking xx

Hi everyone am in floods of tears tonight. I spoke to my aunt my mum's older sister a couple of days ago she said she was having some birthday celebrations "just the family" I thought this must mean just her kids and grandkids then I just seen a video on Facebook and my uncle is there too my mum's brother and his partner. My mum isn't there when she should be and am so sad about this and also sad because I wasn't invited. They are all so like each other mum and her siblings I want a relationship with my aunt but it's just not happening and I feel like some desperate person looking in from the outside in the cold. I actually feel pathetic

@Ttc42nearly43

I’m so sorry you’re feeling like this. You will feel deeply saddened that your dear Mum should be there, of course she should. I can’t understand why your Aunt would have told you she was having something ‘just for the family’ and then not include you or ask you. It almost sounds unkind because you are family. Has your Aunt reached out to you since what happened and has she been there for you?

@Ttc42nearly43

Oh and don’t ever feel pathetic. It’s not pathetic at all to feel desperately sad and heartbroken. Any family occasion or get together where your Mum should have been there is bound to make you feel devastated. It’s the same as Christmas. How any of us are meant to get through that day this year is totally beyond me, when we will all be feeling that the one person who should be there now isn’t. Christmas Day and Boxing Day I have never ever spent without my mum and my dad. I wish I could somehow fast forward to passed Christmas Day and Boxing Day to just after new year.
And re your Aunt, I wonder if a part of you feels like you’d like to build a closer bond with her because she was your mum’s older sister? I know that since this happened to me losing my Dad, I feel like there’s no family really now apart from my mum and my DH and my two kids. I wish I had other closer family to be more of a supportive network. But we were always in a bubble with my Dad, the 6 of us. My sister seems to have vanished and is being very unsupportive and i have never been close to any of my aunts.
Would you normally be invited to a get together organised by your Aunt or would it just have been buoyed mum who was asked?

@LucyintheSky21

Thank you for ur reply. Yes I have had contact with her and have seen her in person maybe 4 times in the last 8 months since mum died. She is literally 5 mins up the road in the car. There was a falling out at the hospital and it plays on my mind so much when we were told that mum wouldn't make it me, my sister and my dad all wanted to be in the room with her none of us wanted leave even for a few minutes. Mum's granddaughter was there too my neice but there was only 3 people allowed in the room at the same time it was really stressful and difficult to try to rotate. I did something terrible and asked asked my aunt and uncle to step away to let us be with mum. There was an argument and then when mum died I tried to reach out but it's taken a while for my aunt to speak with me she was hurt deeply. I haven't spoken to my uncle yet but think about writing him an apology letter a lot but I don't know if I've left it too late. I regret saying something to them and I will never forgive myself I kept thinking to myself who would mum want with her in her last moments and I knew that it would be her children and her husband although separated still very close. I have deep regrets thought about that conversation. My sister doesn't feel like me doesn't feel any shame for that conversation but it was me who had the conversation asking them to leave us in peace with mum this was following my uncle asking my sister to leave the room so that he could stay on longer. I feel like such a horrible selfish person. I understand why they keep me at arms length but I want to be part of the family to feel included.

During the same phone conversation my aunt said that we should meet up for lunch sometime no fixed arrangements maybe just something to say. I feel like am just being thrown a pity invite and actually she doesn't care about me. It feels that my aunt is the closest person to my mum. They look similar and they are a bit similar in character so I want her in my life. I have been inconsolable sobbing in her house apologising for my behaviour in the hospital. She says that we both said things we regret. I feel unworthy and I feel unloved by her. The thing is I only ever used to see her a couple of times a yet if even that before but now my mum is gone I have such a huge big hole but there is no one to fill it. O feel desperate for her to care about me but am not her daughter and that makes me so sad that I don't have a mum anymore. I miss her my mum I love her so much and it hurts so much.

@LucyintheSky21

This is the crazy thing mum would have been invited but probably not me and my sister. We used to have a family Christmas gathering at my aunt's house not every year but some years. I keep thinking that she's had special birthday's before and I wasn't concerned about not being included but now every single exclusion seems like I have failed to and that am not good enough. My mum was interested in everything I done in my life we spoke everyday day as she was always asking about me and the kids. No one will ever be able to match her devotion. I feel like am constantly searching for someone to fill the huge void in my life that mum has left it's torture x

@Ttc42nearly43

I truly feel for you, and I don’t want to speak out of turn but I feel like I also do understand. Your relationship with your Aunt is much the same as mine with my mum’s older sister. Of course it was my dad who has passed and not my mum. However, I don’t feel like my aunt cares one bit about me and I only see her a few times a year, and that’s only if she’s at my mum’s house and I happen to be there. I don’t want to speak out of turn but feel I have to give my opinion and that is that I’m afraid I’m with your sister. I don’t think you did any wrong in having that conversation and asking your aunt to step away. Firstly it was a very raw time and a very deeply emotional situation. I can relate, because as you know my dad went into hospital the Thursday night (night after my bday) and the next day it was just me and my sister and my mum with my dad at his bedside. No one else. We are his immediate and closest family. Not brothers or sisters of my dad etc. He actually only has a brother and they hadn’t spoken for many years (different story) but the point I’m making is that even if they had been speaking I wouldn’t have felt that under the circumstances when only so many can be in a room at once that my dad’s brother should have been one of those people. The 3 if you were surely closest family to your mum, and what I call the ‘immediate family’, I personally don’t think your mum’s sister is as close or as immediate family. Not to say if more had been allowed that she shouldn’t have been there but it was an emotionally raw excruciating time (I know) and you asked her in I’m sure a nice way to step away. I don’t see that you did anything wrong at all.
We were at my dad’s hospital bedside and the 3 of us said our goodbyes and cried over him and had to watch him take his last breaths and I also can’t get over this or come to terms with any of it. 7 weeks on and it’s only because I have my two boys that I am having to keep going and doing things. But inside I feel like I’ve lost everything and that this new life I now have is a life I don’t want. Like you feel, I feel my dad should still be here. He was the main one in our family. Sounds like your mum was too in yours.
I can relate to how you feel about needing that closeness now that she is gone. Your aunt will be no substitute for your mum, no-one ever can fill that void and nor would you want that. Maybe ask to see your aunt to talk and explain how you feel and be really honest and see what she has to say. Maybe in time you’ll build a close relationship with her which could help you deal with what you’re going through.
I don’t mean to turn this post around to be about me, but I have similar family issues that have come about since my Dad passed and I feel so dreadfully alone with my grief and when I read your post it feels like it’s me. That’s how I feel. My mum was married to my dad for 47 years so she is utterly broken. She is smoking still and says she hopes it kills her as she’s nothing to go on for. And my sister has cut contact with me and my mum since dad passed and it’s a whole mess (another long story) but not one to post for all to read. If you do want to PM me you can at any time. I don’t know if you feel I can help you but I also feel a huge void in my life since my Dad has gone. I still don’t feel like he’s really gone forever or that I can face that. I have never felt so floored or devastated by anything and every day I wake up just wanting this situation to not be happening. I never expected my dad to go so soon, like you must feel. I don’t think you have anything to feel so deeply sorry or regretful for. Pain and devastation and heartache take over and we don’t always think about what we’re saying or doing at a time like that being the rift thing or the wrong thing. Your aunt has to understand that if she’s a reasonable person. But for what it’s worth, as I said before I honestly don’t think you said the wrong thing. It’s how you felt at that moment and you as your mum’s daughter I think had every right to do that. xx

@Ttc42nearly43 I truly think you did nothing wrong in asking them to leave, the 3 people rule weren't your rules it's the hospitals. Of course your mum would of wanted her children with her over her sister anyone can see that don't for a second feel bad about that, please,. Tough love coming up.. I know exactly what you mean about wanting your aunt to scoop you up and care for you especially as she looked similar and has similar characteristics as your mum, but she has made it quite obvious she isn't going to. And that is very sad and disappointing and I am unsure why she is like that. I too wish someone would just scoop me up my husband asked if I was ok tonight (day 3 baby blues pending ) I cried and cried and I said i just wish my mum was here to help me heal and look after me I told jim no one else will ever come close to making mr feel safe and cared for like she did he just held me and agreed what else can he possibly say. Life can be so fucking cruel when we lose the ones we need the most and far far too soon. I'm rambling cos I'm knackered just wanted you to know I'm sending a heartfelt hug to you x

@mrssunshinexxx

Being scooped up sounds lovely doesn't it having someone to hold you and tell you that everything will be ok. I feel that am searching for this but can't find it anywhere. I maybe wouldn't feel so strongly like this if me and my husband were close we start relationship counselling in Wednesday this week. There's not been much scooping from him but then I know am looking for someone closest to my mum to take me in. I know it sounds daft in my 40's needing looked after not practically but emotionally I mean. I know ur right that she's made it quite clear that she's not going to be that person. It has made me feel like shit like am not worth anything. Am going to talk to my grief counselor about this yes am starting two different lots of counselling. I just feel that everything is so crap and I just want to be happy somehow and feel loved an so fed up feeling sad.

Hugs to you hold onto that wee baby of yours and you will be scooping her up hopefully this will help you heal even if just a little bit ♥️

Hi Everyone,

About to sign in to my work emails for the first time since it happened. It feels wrong to be doing something so 'normal'.

Still working from home, employer has been very considerate so far. Have a telephone appt with the doctor tomorrow in case today is awful and I need a phased return or more time off. Tomorrow is a month since she died, 5 and a half weeks since I had any contact (covid hospital rules). Heart is broken still.

for everyone here this morning. I wish none of us were in this club.

@refreshingseahorse

Good luck if u need more time take it like u say even a phased return I had one for 4 weeks.

@Ttc42nearly43 Thank you. It was going OK then I got back to the replies to my email informing them, and there I was back when it happened. Reducing hours for a bit is probably a good idea.

This mix of not wanting to feel always sad but not wanting to feel better because that means leaving them behind. What do you do?
(Cry and drink tea is generally my response at the moment)

@refreshingseahorse

I hope today isn’t too bad for you, and like @Ttc42nearly43 has said if you need more time then take it. I’m 7 weeks on and this isn’t any fun. I’m a SAHM so I’ve not got the going back to work issue to think about but I think if I was still working I’d be the same as you, taking it in my own time xxetbus know how today goes