If your mum/dad died when you were a child..

[Letsgroove]

Did you talk about it within your family or was everything swept under the carpet?

My mum died when I was 7. This was back in the 80s. I don’t remember a lot about it and nobody ever mentioned my mum and that is how it has remained. Very rarely my dad will mention her now that we are all
grown up; it’s just not a topic we ever discuss. I’ve just started counselling after all these years and it’s coming to light that the not talking about my mum especially within my family is one of my biggest issues. I would find it totally uncomfortable and awkward to bring up the subject with my siblings or dad and wondered if anyone else still can’t talk about their parent’s death because it wasn’t spoken about at the time?

Being the one who isn’t allowed to grieve does ring a bell with me actually.

When I told my siblings (as in the children of the parents who raised me rather than birth siblings) that I’d spoken to a therapist and she seemed to think losing my birth mother was bound to have had some kind of affect on me - there were shocked faces and a lot of ‘well no, we all loved you so much, you were spoiled rotten, you never even knew your birth mum and our mum was such an loving mum to you’. That was all true but it doesn’t take away from the fact I’ll never know my birth mother, my birth father also died whilst I was a child, there’s a lot of loss in fact my whole life started with loss and it’s had an impact. The narrative is very much I was ‘lucky’ and almost ‘fell on my feet’. I also very much got labelled as over-sensitive and dramatic which, when I look back I think ‘well fucking obviously’ but I don’t think I was supposed to have experienced any consequences to the way I came into the world.

It’s not deliberate, I know everyone was just doing their best, my ‘adoptive’ family have always loved me and we remain close - they are just my family and that’s that. (I put adoptive in inverted commas partly because there was never a formal adoption but also because it’s not language we really use or ever did - they were just my parents and my siblings were my siblings but there was also this other set of parents/ grandparents and all kinds of feelings and undercurrents to navigate).

My (adoptive) dad also had a massive stroke when I was 15 and my mum and I ended up caring for him until he died 8 years later. Shortly followed by my mum getting breast cancer. She died when it came back - I was in my early thirties and that’s when I lost it a bit I think - everything seemed ok and manageable whilst she was around but losing her brought absolutely everything to the surface.

I do feel a bit adrift sometimes. I remember the advert of the dad making his daughter cottage pie or something because she was upset and when I first saw it I cried for about an hour because there was NOBODY to make me a cottage pie because I was upset, I’d lost FOUR parents and even when they were around my parents were all to busy with their own grief/ issues/ alcoholism (adoptive dad and to some extent bio dad too)/ getting ill and dying to do that kind of thing anyway.

DH’s parents are annoying as hell in lots of ways and I can see that, but I also want to scream at DH when he moans about them because he doesn’t know how lucky he is - he had a childhood free from any of those complications or big losses and even now as an adult has loving parents around who want to help him. I find him quite immature sometimes in that he still treats his parents as parents - he’s never really made that switch to being the one worrying about and caring for them, although as they age it’s probably starting a bit. I feel like I had to grow up really quickly, never really had that security of always knowing I had parents who would always have my back/ be there to sort out any messes (not because they wouldn’t want to but just because there was so much else going on) and always had that insecurity and fear of who was the next person I was going to lose/ when was the other shoe going to drop? I definitely felt responsible for my mum from quite young and as much as we had a very close relationship it was probably a bit codependent really.

Sorry for that ramble! It’s stuff I don’t think about that much day to day but having my own DD has definitely brought a lot of it back up.

Does anyone else find goodbyes really hard as a result of their loss? I get ridiculously emotional if I know I’m not going to see someone for a while or when we close a chapter in our family life eg. Moving on from nursery to school.

Im guessing it all stems from the fact that I have no idea if I said goodbye to my mum.

@Letsgroove I find the sort of 'I'm NEVER going to see you again ' sort of goodbyes really hard, like when I leave a job or a relationship ends, and I've held onto both those when I've outgrown them simply because I can't bear the thought of things never being the same again. I've learnt over time that if you don't dwell on that it's much easier to move on and you don't actually tend to look back.

@Flowerfairy101 Those are good examples of when I would find good byes hard.. currently trying to leave my job but as you mentioned, it’s the thought that things are never going to be the same again that is holding me back.

Interesting about the goodbyes. I feel I am at the opposite end where I say these kinds of goodbyes without much emotion ...sort of it cannot be worse than losing a parent

I have already commented on this thread (dad died when I was 7 and similar experience to others, he wasn’t really mentioned) but I wanted to comment on a couple of things said by other that resonated with me.

i am the youngest of three and there is definitely a feeling that my two older brothers had more entitlement to him as they remember him more and somehow he doesn’t really belong to me and my grief shouldn’t be as bad.

also really good hear from others what they have experienced as sometimes I don’t feel I have a right to grieve. But it is a profound loss and it does affect everything about me.

also yes to the deep longing for him and the fantasy I had all childhood (and probably still do) that he isn’t really dead and will come back for me.

Oh and I didn’t even get a day off school. Was waken up, told he had died and we all went off to school. Bonkers.

we did go to the funeral so that was something.

there is definitely a feeling that my two older brothers had more entitlement to him as they remember him more and somehow he doesn’t really belong to me and my grief shouldn’t be as bad.

Exactly the same here. My mother would say "the big tragedy of your father's death was for your brother" and all sorts of things about how boys are damaged by growing up without their dads. Never a word about me because she seems to think girls don't need dads. although to be fair she does acknowledge I was traumatised at the time as I started wetting myself and playing disturbing games about death, among other things!

This, together with comments from other people about how I was too young to be impacted by it (I was 3) mean I feel like a fraud if I say anything about it to anyone. I can't express sadness because I think people won't believe I have a right to be sad, but I equally can't be totally blasé about it because that feels like a betrayal. So I awkwardly avoid talking about it.

@newtowelsplease @Berlinlover
I fully agree, my good friend recently lost their 95 yr old grandparent and I'm losing patience with the 'grief' and woe is me. My DD lost her dad 18mths ago, she was 15 and it's had a devastating affect on her life and MH, she is in therapy and we do talk openly about him.
It's frustrating when people have no awareness, the lose of a very elderly person is not quite as devastating as someone in the prime of life leaving a young family behind.

I almost laugh at obituaries where is says “Jim smith, died suddenly/unexpectedly at home aged 102”

it’s not sudden or unexpected over 90 ffs.

sudden and unexpected is someone dropping from a heart attack at 40 or in an RTA at 30.

I am sure this sounds awful - please don't take it the wrong way - I am so relieved that other people went through the 'not being spoken about. no photos, ignoring any psychological impact' issues. I'm surprised it happened as late as the 1980s.
The whole neurotic mother thing. I felt I had to look after her in so many ways, and she treated me like an adult, as after my sister left when I was 9, there were literally no other adults in the house. She always used to blame us for never remarrying again as well: 'Who'd take two girls like you on?' which made me very sad. I had a lot of other childhood trauma on top of all this which severely impacted and I still don't; feel good enough. No idea how relationships between men and women worked, so went through a raft of unsuitable partners; and yes, the rabid jealously of friends with loving dads.
it's insane to think how much this affects us

And another thing (sorry!) my mother's father died when she was 12 and she always used to say how awful it was for her and how sad she was. I wasn't allowed that, as I was too young apparently (2, as I said above)

I actually find the opposite. I think I’m desensitised

@Gwdihooooo I really wish I had gone the opposite way like you. I waste too much time trying not to cry at goodbyes which ruins the whole experience.

I was proud of myself the other day for talking about my mum dying without crying. Little steps!

Another one here.

Dad died in 2001 when I had just turned 8. Sent to school the next day, not allowed to go to the funeral, never spoken about. To this day I still don't know how he died and cannot bring myself to ask anyone. Seems ridiculous to think at 30 I can't just ask but that whole situation of sweeping it under the carpet just really set me back emotionally, socially.. everything.

I didn't tell a soul at school what had happened. Just went back the next day and pretended everything was ok. If things were different at home and it was spoken about I know I'd have told my friends and had some support there too. But the hush hush and basically ignoring it made me think it was something shameful and not very important.

I really wish someone was looking out for me all of those years ago, I think my whole life would be different now if they had.

My husband passed away from suicide when my kids were 3 and 7. This was 6 years ago. Thankfully I made contact with a child psychologist who advised me what I needed to do. I started both kids in play therapy and when the time was right I let them know that daddy was unwell and stopped his own heart. It still hurts to bring him up but I do for my children's sake. It took 3 years before I was able to hang back up pictures of him.
If he had died 30 years ago I think the advice on how to handle this situation would not be there and things would have been dealt with very differently

@2chocolateoranges
My situation is very similar.. Dad died by suicide in the 90s when I was 4 years old and no one ever explained what happened to him, I found out (through other means) as a teenager. Mum remarried and all was swept under the carpet.

@CoffeeAndEnnui I also struggle to say ‘Dad’ out loud. I have thought about seeking therapy but I would feel embarrassed to tell family why I was in therapy, given the taboo nature around the subject within the family.

I am sure my family were trying to ‘shield’ me from the pain of the truth surrounding my dads death but sometimes I wonder what on earth they were thinking. If this happened to my DH, I could never imagine sweeping him
under the carpet and just assuming my DC were fine.

@Bletherblather No one told me how my dad died until a distant family friend casually mentioned his suicide. I was sick to my stomach but was too ashamed to let on that this was the first time I had heard of it. Like you, I couldn’t bring myself to ask any of my family members so I ordered his death certificate online. Perhaps not the healthiest route to go down but seeing it in black and white did give me a sense of confirmation.

@eliybetty I cannot imagine how hard this must be, but you are absolutely doing the right thing for your children 💐.

I didn't tell Anyone other than my DH I was having therapy. Ot was during lockdown so all online and honestly it's the best money I've ever spent .

It did affect my relationship with my DM for a while and I don't know if I can ever bring myself to talk to her about it all.

I get embarrassingly upset when I have to say goodbye to people. When my children left nursery, I was inconsolable saying goodbye to their teacher. She thought it was because they were taking their next big step but it wasn't as they and I were both ready, I didn't want to say goodbye to the teacher! I remember being at a colleague's funeral, and going to pieces. I was mortified because we didn't know each other well and I behaved like she was a family member. Another time I cried saying goodbye to the owner of an Air Bnb where we had stayed for a few weeks! I find goodbyes impossibly hard. I never said goodbye to my mother. She went to hospital or maybe to a hospice and never came home. I don't even know where she passed away. So much was left unsaid and I could never ask because it was not spoken about.

I knew the above related to losing my mother at a very young age but I didn't realise other people who had lost their parents would also find goodbyes hard. Tonight reading the above post is like a revelation to me. And yet at times I can be as cold as ice and feel completely detached from situations and friends. When friendships fade, I can carry on as if the person never existed.

My DC asked me recently for a hug, and said we hadn't hugged for a long time. I didn't realise that. We kiss goodnight and chat but we don't hug and I didn't even realise. I have no idea how to be a mother and I don't know if I am meeting their emotional needs or even what their emotional needs are. Small children aren't meant to grow up without a mother. I love my children but I wonder if they would flourish with a mother who knew how to create a loving home. I don't have a clue what that looks like.

Yes my dad died when I was 8. Never spoken about, except with sadness every so often. Then everyone would go quiet and look depressed. No sharing of happy memories or anything like that.

There was just a cloud of depression over the house until I was a teen and moved out.

@KitKat499 @Bletherblather It's so sad to think how boxed in we all became by that unspoken rule that you are simply not to bring it up, the ripple effect is emotionally catastrophic.

Like KitKat I had my father's suicide confirmed by a total stranger, until then I had strongly suspected but didn't dare put it into words. Ironically it was at a wake when someone who used to live near my childhood home said they had read about his suicide in the paper. I went totally cold and just shut off until we could leave and then I howled in the car the entire way home.

I tried to hint to my now ex (who was there for the revelation and driving as I wailed) that I needed help with my grief a few times over the years and once wrote him a note (after watching a documentary about Winston's Wish) literally saying I can't keep carrying this. Unfortunately, it was an increasingly abusive relationship and within a few years he was using suicide threats and direct references to my dad to control me so it backfired phenomenally.

A big step in moving on from all of it was being able to see that he wasn't actively suicidal and understanding that my DD's life was not the same as my childhood and that she would in fact be better off without her dad in our home. Once I realised that her life was going to be damaged in a different way if I couldn't do so, it was like a light going on. I heard the words in my head, "there are worse things than him being dead" and that was that. I got him out.

@KitKat499 I really hope the day will come when you can allow yourself to seek therapy. You don't owe the reason for going to anyone, this is your journey, I think saying, "this is just something I need to do" should be enough.

I lost my dad when I 9, he died suddenly from a heart attack after going out jogging, he was 36. I’m now 42 and my children are the same age as me and my brother were when my dad died.

I’ve just been reading this thread this morning, and completely by chance I have my first therapy session this afternoon - at the booking appointment on Tues the lady said it sounded like I needed to deal with my childhood trauma. It all felt self indulgent somehow but reading through this has made me realise that what I thought was work related stress probably is more to do with unprocessed childhood grief and my feelings are valid. I’m so sorry that there are so many of us affected by this but thank you for sharing here

Dad died when I was 11 in early 00s after first being diagnosed with cancer when I was a baby. Life back then was spent in and out of hospitals, not knowing if he would ever get better. I still really struggle with uncertainty even now.

We (me and DB) were not told a great deal and when he died it was all just too upsetting to speak about. We just went to school and were just expected to handle it. The hospice where my Dad died offered bereavement counselling but this wasn't the done thing and my grandparents discouraged my poor DM from taking us along to the sessions.

I wish we'd opened up as a family. I believe the course of my life was altered completely. Since then, I have struggled with MH (eating disorders, anxiety and depression). I'm lucky to have had access to regular therapy to work through things, but it's left such a gaping hole in my life.

This article was published 6 years or so ago (sorry for dragging up more royal stuff!) but I often go back and read the comments when I feel guilty for missing my Dad and what could've been 'after all this time'. We are not alone

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/commentisfree/2016/jul/26/losing-parent-in-childhood-prince-harry