For Anyone Needing Support After Losing a Parent. Very Supportive Thread (March 2022) )

[Crunchymum]

I hope no-one minds me starting a new thread, the old one is almost full.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/bereavement/4352163-For-Anyone-Needing-Support-After-Losing-a-Parent-Very-Supportive-Thread-September-2021

As always lots of love and strength and support to you all xxx

Someone else in this group posted this a while back:

As for grief, you’ll find it comes in waves. When the ship is first wrecked, you’re drowning, with wreckage all around you. Everything floating around you reminds you of the beauty and the magnificence of the ship that was, and is no more. And all you can do is float. You find some piece of the wreckage and you hang on for a while. Maybe it’s some physical thing. Maybe it’s a happy memory or a photograph. Maybe it’s a person who is also floating. For a while, all you can do is float. Stay alive.

In the beginning, the waves are 100 feet tall and crash over you without mercy. They come 10 seconds apart and don’t even give you time to catch your breath. All you can do is hang on and float. After a while, maybe weeks, maybe months, you’ll find the waves are still 100 feet tall, but they come further apart. When they come, they still crash all over you and wipe you out. But in between, you can breathe, you can function. You never know what’s going to trigger the grief. It might be a song, a picture, a street intersection, the smell of a cup of coffee. It can be just about anything…and the wave comes crashing. But in between waves, there is life.

Somewhere down the line, and it’s different for everybody, you find that the waves are only 80 feet tall. Or 50 feet tall. And while they still come, they come further apart. You can see them coming. An anniversary, a birthday, or Christmas. You can see it coming, for the most part, and prepare yourself. And when it washes over you, you know that somehow you will, again, come out the other side. Soaking wet, sputtering, still hanging on to some tiny piece of the wreckage, but you’ll come out.

Oh bless you. I ugly cried writing it.

Sometimes I have moments of feeling quite removed from my grief. I can think of mum and talk about her and i don't feel sad but then the magnitude of the loss hits me like a train and I realise again (for the millionth time) what I have lost and what I have to live without.

Grief is such a cruel an never ending journey.

Ttc42nearly43 I’m so sorry you’ve been through it too. I was so dazed and confused that I didn’t really understand what was happening. I’m still processing it all. I do wonder if a debrief with the medical staff would be useful but I don’t think it can happen. I’m so far away, they’re so busy. Would they even remember my dad? It would be so hard if they didn’t.

I wish you everything that you need from your legal journey. May it bring you some peace.

my dads last words and and actions were about his loved ones. Bless him.

I am so sorry that you’ve lost your mum over and over @CrocodileRocks.

Thank you for the grief post, that’s beautiful and helpful x

It's 8 weeks today that Dad died. I'm struggling really badly this week, it feels like I've been knocked off my feet again. And I feel so tired, right through to my bones. I'm struggling to get anywhere with the undertakers and Vicar over the ashes interral, and really feel like losing my shit to be honest... it all seems to be happening at snails pace and very much "you need to talk to this person first".

I've had to go back to deep breathing and trying to focus my mind instead of keep bursting into tears.

@Badger1970
I can relate to everything you say in your post. I'm exhausted, utterly worn out and still don't sleep great. I have to call my workplace today and the thought of it makes me feel ill. I've been off quite sometime now - since before DD passed. I hope to return next week but I don't know how I'll cope.

@Bluemat it's just so much harder than I thought it would be.

I'm sorry that there are so many of us sharing this journey.

I'm sorry too there are so many of us sharing the same journey. It truly is awful. I've been ok ish most of the day, I went out for food and just randomly started crying.

I feel almost like I'm homesick, i can't describe how I feel any other way.

I understand the homesick like feeling. I left my dead dad and came home, a really long journey. I stopped short of coming home and booked into a hotel for the night. I couldn’t reconcile the feeling of homesickness of my dad being dead with going “home”. I don’t really understand it.

I look for him everywhere, even without meaning to. I genuinely don't know how to do this and how to get through it.

I think the only way is minute by minute @Bluemat , to not think ahead at all. X

As I have said before i lost my mum just over 2 years ago so all if those people posting who are in the throws of the first weeks and months i can give some advice.

1. talk about your mum or dad to anyone who will give you some time and space to cry and express your feelings dont feel that you can call please reach out and people will be there for you.

2. Get in touch with Cruse Bereavement they have a helpline number and also offer early intervention sessions if you are really struggling. I used the helpline a lot and also had 3 early intervention sessions. I even called the Samaritans on evening in desperation they were so nice and just listened.

3. take time off work if you can as much time as you need, dont rush back even if people are putting pressure on you.

4. little meals, bland foods maybe just toast or plain oatcakes if you cannot face eating a full meal. I lost a stone in the first month.

5. sleep when you need to and rest your body. Sleep helped me it was the only time that i could get away from the pain.

6. exercise take up yoga or some sort of class. Mindfulness for example i took a few classes. I recall smiling for the first time in 4 months after i lost my mum and this was during a Zumba class. I felt something other than sadness and i have never forgotten how that felt. It was like a chink of light at the end of a very dark tunnel.

7. in time feelings of guilt will ease, if you are holding onto the what ifs and i should have's this does pass eventually. It take along time tho.

8. people used to say to me remember the good times. This seemed impossible at first and it took me a good year and a half to see past the rawness of the end of mums life but slowly i now feel very thankful that i had such an amazing mum. I still remember the end vividly but its not all i can see now. I can also see how lucky i was.

I hope this helps someone even just a little.

I found this amazing book Fox Under The Moon by Stacy McNeill it gave me some comfort

This is just an example of her words. I often pick it up and read it for some strength and i have a print in my hallway

@Ttc42nearly43
Thankyou for that suggestion I've just bought some things from the site. It's lovely.

Hi all, just found this , my Dad died after not surviving ICU in November last year. I feel like i have blocked a lot of it out and started to feel something new the past few weeks. First stage of grieving maybe?

@Ttc42nearly43 thank you so much for your wise words. I’ve found your list to be helpful, I think my brain works in a list format. If no one minds I’m going to use it to here, now.

1. talking about my dad. I can’t really do this yet. It’s too raw and painful but it’s more that it’s private. If I talk about him and no one understands just how important he is then I don’t think I could deal with it. I’ve not been able to speak to my friends or to see them. I can put on a face for people that don’t matter but I don’t want to speak to my friends. I’ve messaged them and they’ve been lovely but they’re not quite saying the right things, because who could, so I don’t want to see them.
2. cruse bereavement. Well I haven’t tried them but I have contacted the counselling service at work. They were wonderful. I’m down for a set of sessions but apparently you need to have some distance from the death. But I think I will talk to Cruse while I wait.
3. Work. Oh work! I’m so very glad you wrote to take as much time off as I need. My work is the sort of place where you’re expected to have a day or two off and then get back to it. It’s ridiculous as no one will die if I’m not there. But I can’t work. I just can’t think. And I work with the public and I just can’t deal with people. I’m feeling quite acrophobic. My GP has been amazingly understanding and kind and has signed me off but I know I’ll have to go back at some point. I’m so fortunate to be be paid sick leave.
4. food. I’m getting back to being able to eat but I had no idea I would lose my appetite. In fact I could eat so little but had cravings for things I don’t normally bother about. I ate a lot of protein foods where I thought I’d go for the chocolate. And now I’m a month in and I’ve lost a lot of weight quite quickly.
5. sleep. I couldn’t stop sleeping. I kept going straight after his death and the funeral as o was with my mum. But then as soon as I got home my body shut down. I couldn’t get up in the morning and I couldn’t go all day without a nap. I was beginning to get quite worried about myself. I’m fact it is only the last few days where I’ve got up in the morning and gone to bed at night without lots of other sleeps.
6. exercise. I said to DH that I was going to do pilates and running. I didn’t. I just can’t plan the pilates sessions and can’t countenance the thought of being in a room with people. I won’t do it at home. I’m beginning to think a quick run in the morning to the park would be the thing. I’d see ducks and people walking their dogs but I wouldn’t have to be with them. But my body is so weak I’m not sure I can run. I was never very good at the best of times!
7. guilt. I can’t even write about this. My poor daddy. My poor mum.
8. talking about the good times. I can’t think yet.

the other thing that’s just happens is I felt awful so went for a hot shower to try and relax. I was listing to the radio in there and something came on that made me think “oh, I don’t know the answer to that, I’ll ask Dad”. A split second later I caught myself and I can’t describe the pain.

Thank you for letting me get this down

@Sonotokay

I hope that something i write will be helpful. I have been through all of the "stages" often you can experience many of the stages at the same time.

https://www.cruse.org.uk/understanding-grief/grief-experiences/losing-a-parent/

For me the loss of the unconditional love has been the hardest to cope with. My mum was my biggest cheerleader god i miss her so much ❤️

Thats good there's something really special about her words. I ordered the book for one of my friends who has also lost her mum not knowing that she often looks at the moon and thinks of her mum. She said it was the nicest thing that anyone has ever bought her. I think most people tend to find some sort of comfort in her words. It was a colleague from work that introduced me to the author i have since purchased the grief book for the same colleague as she has just lost her dad 💔

The dear little banks of daffodils by the road had me blubbing in the car yesterday thinking of my darling mum who died in October. The carpenters playing on the radio didn't help! Sometimes it's good to have a cry.

@lollipoprainbow I keep looking at the daffodils and feeling sad that my mum didn't get to see them this year. Aside from Christmas, she hated winter and would rejoice when spring came round.

How's everyone doing? Still wading through quicksand here and waiting for the pain to ease. I'm really shocked and sad that we're hurtling towards the end of the 3rd month without Dad. It still feels like yesterday, and equally a lifetime away. Thankfully the horror of the nursing home is fading but I need to face the awful task of writing a complaint. I just don't feel strong enough still at the moment. I tried to put a photo of Dad out yesterday and had to put it away again as it just made me cry ever time I looked at it.

I would have been my Dad's birthday on Thursday this week, I'm feeling quite sad as this week has coincided with a stretch of good weather too and I seem to associate crisp bright mornings with him now, as that was what it was like over the 6 days he was in hospital.

I'm sorry you are in this position, I've also got writing a complaint on my to do list as my Dad's end of life care at the hospital wasn't the best and I hope that they will take the feedback in a way that it may improve things for other families. However its been 7 months now and I still can't bring myself to do it.

There’s always something, isn’t there? That reminds you. My dad would have been out with his mower in this sunshine. Now we’ve got to do it! I try and smile at the memory if I can. Sometimes I cry. I miss him every single day. We lived next door to him.

I'm two months on from mum's death and I still feel fairly numb to it all. I have cleared her house and put it on the market, sent off for probate, sold her car. It feels like every day is another action to erase her from my life, and yet I still keep calmly plodding on. I have cried, and I have spent hours in bed on some days, but all very steady. Very different to when my dad died, but his death was sudden and unexpected and I was at a very different stage in my life.

Occasionally I get a sense of falling into a massive hole and I stop myself from letting that happen. Life without either parent in it just seems too massive to deal with.