If you lost your parents young (before you turned 40, say) did you ever feel like this?

[followtheswallow]

I already know I’m going to explain this badly. Both my parents are dead. My mum died when I was still at school then my dad died when I was in my late 20s. I’m now 45, almost 46, so quite a while ago now.

My friends parents (and PIL) are probably going to start passing away in the next ten years and while of course I’m sorry for their losses there is part of me that feels resentful. FIL is currently undergoing tests - there’s nothing been established as ‘wrong’ yet.

I definitely don’t mean I want them to die! I suppose I just feel sad my own loss and grief has long been forgotten.

Not quite what you’re getting at but when I lost my dad at 14 I thought he lived to a ‘good’ age of 55 😂😂

I found peace at the time that he was spared being one of the ‘those’ doddery old people.

As an adult I realise that 55 was no age. Just because he was going grey and listened to Motown didn’t make him close to having to go into a home.

But I feel it made me resilient. Loosing my mum later to cancer I was pragmatic.

I think that older people sometimes make loosing a parent their identity/struggle to get over it. Being pregnant and having a baby at home I was too busy to sit about throwing a pity party.

I get where you are coming from OP. Mine were both gone by the time I was 30.

My mum died suddenly on a Wed morning, and on Friday my dad found himself another partner.

He flipped between soaking up all the sympathy given to us, and then dousing on the aftershave to go out with his new woman. Once when I was upset at losing my mum, and losing my dad as he checked out of our family, and into another one, my dad got angry and told me "I don't need this shit". To this day I do not remember anyone asking me if I was OK, or giving me a hug. I also remember going to the Doctor and they asked me if I felt depressed and I told them I had thought about stepping out in front of the train when I was out and about.

My grief was not only minimised, but I had to watch my remaining parent ditch us kids (I am the youngest) and become dad to this other woman's DC.

Now all these years later (30 years without a Christmas with my Dad. My DC not recognising him in a line up) he is widowed again and very lonely. He has also been quite ill.

Oh, I bet you can't guess who everyone thinks, including him, should be taking care of him? 😡

I never got bereavement counselling, and I think I needed/ need it. I do think I lack compassion for people who get upset about things I feel are stupid problems. I also have zero sympathy for people who get themselves in pickles because they are stupid.

Time has healed not having a mother, but it was replaced with upset and resentment that my lovely mum, and she was lovely, beautiful, kind and wise, died suddenly and has since then been treated with disrespect by my remaining parent.

I lost my dad when I was 24 and my mum when I was 32. I had a 2 year old and a baby. I knew I’d never have another baby if my mum would never know them. I had PIL who are still alive and now very elderly. I resented the fact that they never understood the privilege of being grandparents when my parent never got to really experience it. And that my kids only had one set of grandparents and therefore no balancing experience from a second set. I mourn the fact my parents never knew me as an adult, as a parent. But I am so glad I never had to watch them grow old and infirm with all the associated decisions

Oh god, im sorry for the multiple posts before, I dont know what happened there.

Whilst it is difficult watching dh and his siblings trying to work out how best to deal with increasingly elderly parents I do resent the years they moaned in their sixties and seventies and overlooked the fact that my parents didn't get the opportunity to know our kids.
Also the fact that they had favourite children and grandchildren...not to mention great grandchildren.
This is quite cathartic...everyone feels things differently but it is good to express this.

I really don’t understand the narrative “at least they were spared old age”

many people who die young aren’t spared those years of suffering, albeit from a different cause. From cancer to alcoholism, as a child watching a parent go through a terminal illness and die, well it’s no better because they’re 30 rather than 70.

am I less burdened because I carry the trauma of a parent dying young, rather than the difficulty of watching them grow old?

i hope I am privileged enough to grow old and watch my kids live their lives.

I mean, if dying young has spared you from watching your parents “suffer” old age, who has plans to spare their own kids? Quick trip to dignitas when you’re 65?

I had a chat with a young friend whose mum had a horrible terminal illness for six years. Friend was 22 when her lovely mum died. We came to the conclusion that neither sudden death nor long illness is wonderful for the people left behind.
Im now at the point of thinking anyone under 80 is young...

I feel the similarly, (although was older when my dad died) I had 2 v young children when my mum died and I had PND with the second. I couldnt imagine having another baby without support from my mum. Not necessarily practical, just a friendly ear, or reassurance I was doing an ok job. (But I realise thats a privilege that those whose parents died when they were children/teens, didnt get)

I found it hard when a friends mother complained constantly about her husband. I’d list my mum and found it touched a nerve with me, this was about 18 months after my mum had died. I was 28.

when he did die 25 years later, the friends mum couldn’t cope, fell to pieces & had to move in with her son

Yes, younger people can and do get terminal illnesses etc but there are lots of other things which make old age difficult, that are less likely to affect younger people: isolation and loneliness; loss of mobility and strength making daily tasks more difficult; daily pain from conditions like arthritis; vulnerability to viruses; dementia/Alzheimer’s; loss of independence and not being able to drive; having to rely on people for support…

And realising that you’re the ‘last one standing’. An elderly lady I work with gets really sad about the fact she’s outlived her husband, siblings, cousins and all of her friends 🙁 The only people she has any regular contact with are her family and her neighbours, all of whom are of a different generation. She has nice people in her life but I can see how weird it must be to be the only one left from your cohort.

So old age in general can be a bit shit- not just because you are likely to get illnesses that will kill you off, but for all those other reasons that can make for a poor quality of life. So I think that’s what people are talking about when they say that there is some sense of relief that their parent(s) didn’t get really old and have all that to contend with. I’m sure it’s ideal to have a parent who lives happily, healthily and independently to the age of 90 and then dies peacefully in their sleep, but I don’t know how many people are lucky enough to get that kind of life and death.

And as a PP said- those of us who grapple with the sorrow/anger/resentment/envy provoked by losing a parent before their time perhaps feel like we have to be able to acknowledge the one tiny compensation of having a parent who never got old.

And my kids and I have a running joke that they’re to send me to Dignitas if I get too much/too mad/too sad in old age 😂

People are allowed to feel as they feel about it though @Waitingfordoggo . I do understand why people say it but I don’t like it. It’s also another thing that keeps you out of sync with peers.

Yep! I’m in my 40s and still angry that my parents selfishly had me when they were in their early/mid 40s and I had to go through such agonising bereavement before my brain had even finished growing.

I had mine in my 40s. But you just never know … mine weren’t very old, just very unlucky I think.

I don’t have huge amounts of sympathy for grown women who fall apart completely when their dads die. Particularly when said dad was old. I was 11 when mine died. It is what it is and people feel how they feel but grief so bad you fall apart is a little crazy when your parent was literally old.

Although my mother isn’t dead I lost her to alcohol when I was a teen. I don’t resent friends who have their parents, I do however feel sorry for friends who have lost wonderful, loving, unselfish and toxic free parents - and I feel sadness on Mother’s Day for them, because I have a mother who is still alive but just gave up the joys of motherhood and being a grandparent etc - when my friends mothers would have done anything to have had extra time.

Surely though if old age were that shit there are positives to dying young then why don’t we have a queue of the elderly for dignitas?

my mum has always said she doesn’t want keeping alive if her quality of life is shit- she’s had a DNAR signed and lodged with her GP since she was 60.

I know people seem to think it’s a positive spin on an awful life event but I just cannot see any positive to dying young, or have a parent die young. I would far rather deal with their elderly issues than not have them here at all.

Do you really think your parent would have chosen to die young and not be around for much of your life in return for sparing you age related issues?

when I got to the age my dad was when he died it was a massive moment. The thought i could die and leave my kids, not see them grow up…

if you were offered the choice of dying at 60 but you and your kids wouldn’t have to deal with you as you age, would you take it?

i am completely baffled by that logic.

I do see it like that. But I also think people are trying to put a positive spin on it. I agree though, broadly speaking. It is a clumsy and tactless thing to say - a bit like when women are struggling to conceive and get told that children aren’t that great anyway!

Ok. Well sorry to have offended. It felt good to have somewhere to say the unsayable, but I’ll bow out. 💐

A colleagues mother died in her eighties after a few years of becoming increasingly frail. He was annoyed by people saying that she had a good innings. As if that was a comfrt to him. She was still his mammy.
I suppose my inner voice is saying that she had a good innings but I make my voice say something sympathetic!

I’m really sorry if that’s how it came over! I don’t think or want you to bow out; I’ve really valued your contributions. I guess I just feel like I’m saying the unsayable too so let’s both say it even though we’re saying opposites!

I think people just say anything at all … it’s a struggle to know what to say to the bereaved and terminally ill.

@eggandonion

I mean yeah she had a good innings at 80 🤣. Not something I would say of course, but the sympathy only goes so far for 80+ like damn be grateful she lived for a large part of your life. Just my thoughts 🤦‍♀️.

I suppose people on this thread learned that people either say nothing or something really awful. I go for something along the lines of what a difficult time it is and how sorry I was to hear about your Grandma. (Whilst inwardly feeling sorry for myself !)