Grieving parent who did not love you

[KittyBurrito]

Please can I ask: does anyone here have experience of how to cope with a parent dying when the relationship was really poor. Parent is still alive but very elderly and frail now so, it's likely coming soon. This parent has made it plain they don't love me and never wanted a child - any relationship is pretty superficial and all about them. I go through the motions for the sake of the other parent, but that's about it. I thought I'd made my peace with that years ago but feeling very emotional recently. Any words of wisdom?

In some ways, you have been grieving them your whole life but that doesn't mean it won't hit you as bad when they do die. The death can be bring up the deep, deep hurt of emotional abandonment that was never healed. What you must do is come to a point where you can see it was never about you, but something missing in them. I highly recommend therapy or counselling to prepare you

Thank you @firstmummy2019. I appreciate you coming on to respond. And I appreciate it even more that you didn't say "No, no I'm sure they love you in their own way." Because really - they don't. It hurts every time I see them as it's just ...empty. Like a shell. I feel such a fake.

@KittyBurrito i have no words of advice, but I wanted to say strongly that, you are not a fake. I do know how it feels to feel ‘abandoned’ by a parent emotionally, and I know it makes you question every part of yourself, but please know that you, as a person are not the sum of the parts of your parent, you are a completely separate entity who has much to give.

Best of luck.

Thanks for your kind words @Myeyeballsareonfire.I think the best thing that's come of this is that I am so thankful to come home to the happy, loving, messy, imperfect family that DH and I built together. I know what real love looks like now, and how good it feels when that's normal. That's a lot to be grateful for.

I’m another who can totally empathise with how you feel; I never did anything right in my mother’s eyes. Even as a tiny child I was a ‘confounded nuisance’ and my father silently let her.
Both of my parents died close together several years ago and I have yet to grieve for them, I guess I never will.
You are worth so much more than that, we all are 🤗💐

Perhaps you are grieving for the parent you didn't have, and now have to come to terms with the fact that you will never have that parent. As long as they were around, you could have had the hope, secret or explicit, that you might one day change the dynamic.

But it's not you. You were not and are not responsible for the choices your parent made. Though you are left to deal with the consequences.

Your feelings are real and valid. They are yours and you are allowed to grieve or not to grieve according to your need, and not according to anybody else's expectations.

It’s one of the hardest things I think. Everyone takes for granted being loved by their parents - after all for the vast majority unconditional love from parents is automatic from the day you are born. For some though it’s not there and you question everything because you feel like ‘well if my own parent/s don’t love does that mean there’s something wrong with me ?’

I think you have to approach grieving from any way that gives you the most peace. If you need to say goodbye for closure then do so but don’t feel guilty if you just can’t face that. It’s too hard sometimes. You need to think of what keeps you calmest and is in line with your own beliefs and values and concentrate on that. Don’t be swayed by what other people, relatives or society in general will tell you should do or how you should be feeling. This is a very personal
journey. Don’t feel guilty if you feel nothing afterwards except relief equally don’t feel shock if you feel deep sorrow as sometimes the mind will take us back to the few good times if there were any , it’s like a protective measure inbuilt and wired into the human mind.

i wish you well at a difficult time

Thanks everyone, for such very kind and understanding answers. The thing I am dreading most is that I want to support the other parent in their grief (which will be difficult as they have lived their whole life around their partner, and don't have close friends who would rally round, so they will be desperately lonely). But I can't fake grief for someone who was so hostile and resentful of me. How does anyone handle that?

So don't fake it. Just be yourself. Calm is fine. Are they expecting you to grieve demonstrably?

There's an episode of Griefcast about grieving an estranged parent. Might be worth as listen. X

@WashAsDelicates They have already said that they will probably be "alone in their grief" and were very upset about it. I tried to be as reassuring as I could be that I would be there to support them. But what they don't seem to have worked out is it's going to be pretty tough for me too. Maybe I should have said that, but I didn't want to make it all about me. I certainly can't make speeches about what a wonderful person this parent was because to me - they weren't.

I will say I’m sorry for your impending loss, because whatever you feel about your parent this will (and already is) a confusing time for you. The only thing that’s pretty much certain is that you’ll not be able to guess how you’ll feel in the days and weeks ahead, and probably not how you think you “should” feel or react. So be kind to yourself in that respect.

in terms of supporting your other parent, try to be honest and fair to yourself about what’s ok for you in this time. Maybe that’s practical support, meals or paperwork, with someone else picking up emotional support. Maybe it’s biting your tongue, or maybe it’s acknowledging their memories are valid as are yours, or maybe not. It might be a process you have to change how (much) you support the other parent as time goes on - and that’s ok if you need to.

best wishes for the time ahead.

It can be very confusing. You grieve for the person they should have been, the person you wanted them to be and the person they were (faults and all).

Its very very tough.

You don’t have to fake grief or make speeches about anything. TBH ( I hope this doesn’t upset you ) it sounds like your other parent is a rather self absorbed person, because they have never noticed that your other parent is not very good to you and doesn’t love you.

The parent who will be widowed is not going to change now and start thinking of anyone apart from themselves. So they won’t be expecting you to show any feelings, they won’t even notice.

If it’s been all about them and their husband / wife for ? 40 or 50 years , it’s not going to change now. It will continue to be all about them.

So you don’t have to worry about faking anything. If random people ask you how you are feeling / coping etc , just have a a few stock sentences / platitudes eg

yes even though they were unwell for so long it’s always a shock at the end isn’t it?

yes it’s hard for mum / dad - do you know they were married for X years .

as you know they have been ill / in hospital / in a nursing home / for a while so it was hard for mum / dad to see then so unwell / disabled / in pain.

yes it’s been a busy time winding up the estate / selling the house / organising the funeral / supporting mum / dad .

I’m now an expert in saying things that are not a lie but are not the truth , which would be “ Actually they are evil and abused me as a child, wrecked my siblings marriage and abused their grandchild so I’m glad they are dead”.

Id also agree with PP who have suggested counselling now. As you know it’s very VERY hard to talk about this to anyone in RL as it’s totally taboo.

So counselling can really help .

Have you thought of joining the “ Stately Homes “ threads here on MN?

This is all really very helpful stuff, thank you. Stock platitudes are a brilliant idea. Then I won't have to feel I'm lying. And yes other parent can sometimes be rather self absorbed - but it's only sometimes, and they really do try most of the time, which is what makes the difference. They kinda know but they don't want to know what their partner is like IYKWIM. Denial, it's a weird thing.

I also wanted to say how really sorry I am to those of you who have clearly had a much worse parental relationship than I have had. That must hurt like hell❤

Hi I’ve been in a similar situation to you OP. My mother died 6 months ago. I was totally unprepared for how many defences I had put in place to avoid feeling the truths I knew about our relationship (as a child). Anyway they all got dissolved or stripped away in grief and I had a few really hard months.

But I only had to feel it all once, it seems, as I’ve suddenly got much better and it’s all lifting. It was also hard for me feeling the disconnect around other people who she had treated differently, like my siblings. With the reminiscing I was often helping them with our childhood memories - as the eldest I remember a lot more - but then I’d also have more difficult memories resurface, but have to deal with that alone. It just hasn’t been anything like I thought it would be, even though I’d had anticipatory grief during her illness. Hope it goes as well as it can for you

'Yes they'll be missed' is another useful phrase. It'll be assumed it's by you, whereas it really isn't, it's one of those phrases that isn't questioned. You will grieve op, as others have said , but it'll be for what should have been rather than for the person who's gone. It's not going to be easy.

I hope I'm not being insensitive adding to this thread as I don't think my father didn't love me. But we had a terrible relationship and he'd done many awful things in my childhood and beyond which got us to that point.

He died 2 weeks ago and I'm going to be totally honest, after an initial 10 days of sadness, I feel absolutely nothing. I have well meaning friends who send me lovely text messages , but there's nothing there. I'd even go as far as to say I'm glad he's gone. I suspect I've done alot of grieving over the years as he would disappear out of my life for long periods of time at his own will.

The complication for me is that my brother for reasons I don't understand , has him on a pedestal, so is in full 'grief' mode. He calls me on a daily basis with stories of our father and telling me how sad he is. I am having to fake some level of grief that he expects..

I'm just telling you this OP as you may find your 'loss' isn't what you expect. I feel like I'm having to fake some level of grief to satisfy others expectations. I'm trying where possible to not to discuss it at all, much like I did when he was alive to prevent the 'but he's your dad' comments. I'm finding it very strange and feel guilty for not being in the state I know I will be when I lose my DM.

Actually, I will rephrase that , I don't feel guilty for not feeling anything. I find it odd, but I have worked out it's probably because I grieved for him long ago.

Similar to PP, when my father died I felt very little, I cried for about 10 seconds at the funeral, and I can honestly say I've not felt sad since. People seem to find this strange, but I realised when he died that we weren't very close.

So, OP, you're not alone with whatever you feel when you parent dies, even if it's not how people might expect you to grieve.

My dad has just died and I'm in the same place as a few of you. Not crying, not really upset, focused on logistics.
My brother, the goldenchild, & my mum are talking and grieving over a man that never existed in my life.
DH has been handy, confirming my recollection of events in the past which have swiftly been reframed.
I'll probably be more upset when my in-laws die. I'm 50 now, childhood was a long time ago and my relationship during my teens, 20s, 30s & 40s has been one of me sitting on my emotions.
I'm trying to congratulate myself on being supportive and respectful, not feeling guilty or upset about my lack of emotion.

It's a different type of grief. When my (adoptive) mother died 4 years ago I felt the grief of my siblings but not really my own. When the funeral was over my overwhelming emotion was relief and I was glad I would never see her again. She was a poor excuse of a mother to me and I deserved so much better.

This must be really hard for you.

Do you think counselling would help?