Requesting Post Mortem Report

[fandjango]

This is a difficult subject.

My Mother was murdered days before our 30th birthday.

At the time we were so overwhelmed dealing with the police, sorting her house and probate alongside the subsequent trial.

When it came to the matters of how she was murdered we were told she wouldn’t have known anything about it.

I’ve always felt that was untrue.

I saw a programme this week stating that next of kin are able to have a copy of the post mortem and following that I impulsively requested one.

I’ve received it and i’m absolutely devastated. There was so much in it that we didn’t know. Plus time of death was a lot later than we were told and the time from initial injury to death was not instant as we were told.

My Husband is not happy I have requested the information (he is worried it’s going to set me back) but from my point of view this is part of my life and my child’s life (born years after and will never know her)

Not sure if I should have requested the details or not. I felt like I should as if anyone else’s family member passed, it wouldn’t even be considered not to see the post mortem report.

Would it?

@SeaShelli This is one of the most compassionate posts I have ever read. I only wish I could be so eloquent. I want to thank you for touching me so deeply with your words.

when the dust had settled, so to speak, you were left thinking about your mother's tragic passing. There did not seem to be any other way of recovering the full details, so you had to order this document. The trouble is that a post-mortem report is written partly from a medical point of view, obviously, but also from a legal point of view, so it will be in some places quite brutal and maybe not very clear from a layman's point of view.
I am sorry that it was so distressing for you but I totally understand why you had to do this. Please now put it behind you and move on with your life; i am sure it is what your mother would wish

I am so sorry for your loss, I hope you eventually find some peace.
With regards to TOD my Sdad found my Mum in bed around 11am (they had separate rooms). By the time he alerted a neighbour who called 999, Paramedics came and eventually declared her dead I think she had been gone for hours, she probably passed between 10pm and 5am but TOD was around 2pm

I’m so sorry @Phillipa12thats heartbreaking

Did the details not come out at the trial of whoever killed your mum?

I just wanted to say Thank you to everyone who has sent such kind and empathetic words. This has helped me so much as I have been going through all sorts in my mind and thinking maybe I should not have requested the report.

I have sobbed quite a bit over the last day or so and sobbed more at the kind words but it has helped me to see this situation from an outside perspective and for that I am grateful.

To answer a few questions the murderer was found and sentenced to life with a minimum of 22 years. Hardly life is it!

During the trial the public and my family were asked to leave during the part outlining the full post mortem. This was due to how harrowing it was. I completely understand now after reading the report why we were asked to leave but so many unanswered questions have been going round in my mind for a long time.

Two of my Aunties did not attend the trial as they were too traumatised and I feel that by maybe sharing the information with them it probably would cause them more pain.

I am going to sit with it for now. Then file it away and know that if anyone does ever ask anything, I can answer as delicately as I can.

Thank you for the links to the specialist homicide therapists I have never been told about this service.

I have had NHS CBT therapy, Hypnotherapy and recently more CBT therapy and that therapist has written to my GP to request specialist trauma focussed EMDR Therapy.

I have checked the Homicide Therapy website and they do offer EMDR therapy and help with people who have become disabled due to chronic pain and CPTSD which I also have unfortunately.

I think the one thing this has raised is that I do need some more help to continue processing everything and hopefully the EMDR therapy will help.

I just need to be the best mother I can for my son and to do my own mother proud.

I am so sorry to. read the posts of loss and grief that others are also experiencing. Life can be so totally cruel at times.

Thanks again all x

I just wanted to say Thank you to everyone who has sent such kind and empathetic words. This has helped me so much as I have been going through all sorts in my mind and thinking maybe I should not have requested the report.

I have sobbed quite a bit over the last day or so and sobbed more at the kind words but it has helped me to see this situation from an outside perspective and for that I am grateful.

To answer a few questions the murderer was found and sentenced to life with a minimum of 22 years. Hardly life is it!

During the trial the public and my family were asked to leave during the part outlining the full post mortem. This was due to how harrowing it was. I completely understand now after reading the report why we were asked to leave but so many unanswered questions have been going round in my mind for a long time.

Two of my Aunties did not attend the trial as they were too traumatised and I feel that by maybe sharing the information with them it probably would cause them more pain.

I am going to sit with it for now. Then file it away and know that if anyone does ever ask anything, I can answer as delicately as I can.

Thank you for the links to the specialist homicide therapists I have never been told about this service.

I have had NHS CBT therapy, Hypnotherapy and recently more CBT therapy and that therapist has written to my GP to request specialist trauma focussed EMDR Therapy.

I have checked the Homicide Therapy website and they do offer EMDR therapy and help with people who have become disabled due to chronic pain and CPTSD which I also have unfortunately.

I think the one thing this has raised is that I do need some more help to continue processing everything and hopefully the EMDR therapy will help.

I just need to be the best mother I can for my son and to do my own mother proud.

I am so sorry to. read the posts of loss and grief that others are also experiencing. Life can be so totally cruel at times.

Thanks again all x

I just wanted to say Thank you to everyone who has sent such kind and empathetic words. This has helped me so much as I have been going through all sorts in my mind and thinking maybe I should not have requested the report.

I have sobbed quite a bit over the last day or so and sobbed more at the kind words but it has helped me to see this situation from an outside perspective and for that I am grateful.

To answer a few questions the murderer was found and sentenced to life with a minimum of 22 years. Hardly life is it!

During the trial the public and my family were asked to leave during the part outlining the full post mortem. This was due to how harrowing it was. I completely understand now after reading the report why we were asked to leave but so many unanswered questions have been going round in my mind for a long time.

Two of my Aunties did not attend the trial as they were too traumatised and I feel that by maybe sharing the information with them it probably would cause them more pain.

I am going to sit with it for now. Then file it away and know that if anyone does ever ask anything, I can answer as delicately as I can.

Thank you for the links to the specialist homicide therapists I have never been told about this service.

I have had NHS CBT therapy, Hypnotherapy and recently more CBT therapy and that therapist has written to my GP to request specialist trauma focussed EMDR Therapy.

I have checked the Homicide Therapy website and they do offer EMDR therapy and help with people who have become disabled due to chronic pain and CPTSD which I also have unfortunately.

I think the one thing this has raised is that I do need some more help to continue processing everything and hopefully the EMDR therapy will help.

I just need to be the best mother I can for my son and to do my own mother proud.

I am so sorry to. read the posts of loss and grief that others are also experiencing. Life can be so totally cruel at times.

Thanks again all x

oh my goodness what is wrong with my posts. Sorry that last one came through so many times!

Oh also for the person that asked me where I saw I could request the postmortem report.

It is a programme on Amazon Prime (may have been somewhere else before that) called The Trial - Murder in the Family

Tonight has been quite tough. My Husband hates me talking about this subject, and I understand how he feels but it has happened to me and the repercussions are still happening to me.

He thinks i’ve made things massively worse for myself emotionally and I should have just let it lie and not requested the report.

I understand what he is saying but until you’ve been in this situation you can’t imagine how you’d feel or react.

I’ve said that I want my mother’s history to be available for anyone who wants it including our Son (when he is old enough to understand).

Why should she be remembered for something horrific when we have so many lovely things to say about her.

I don’t want to hide anything from my son. He is such a lovely, kind and considerate little boy and I don’t want to ruin him either and wouldn’t say anything to him about it until he is old enough to cope.

It may well have made things worse for now. But it may well be that with time and processing it will actually help you moving forward. Really hope that is the case for you.

Your husband wants life to be smooth. Fair enough.

But life isn’t smooth. It has bumps, turns, sunshine, and flowers. This is a massive cliff you had to navigate and still navigate and always will. Sometimes it’s small in your life but right now, through circumstance, it’s looming large. And soon enough it will be back in its place. The specialist counselling may even help make it smaller in your mind than what you have been living with for so long.

You don’t say whether your husband was part of the homicide experience or came along afterwards in which case he has no idea of what you went through. And you get to mention it just as much as he gets to mention how he went through his life experiences.

I understand completely OP. My situation is a bit different to yours but I felt I needed every little bit of information I could get my hands on. I needed to understand what had happened, how and try to find some understanding.

Your DH probably just doesn't like to see you hurting and upset, but it's all part of it. I think it's hard for them when they can't just make it all better.

Sorry but your son doesn’t need to know these details ever. That’s odd to think he woukd. I’d destroy the documents.

I agree with filing away the PM report in case your son grows up and wants to know more about his gran.
Not a PM report, but my sister destroyed irreplacable, important papers relating to our dad, after the funeral. They would be useful to me now and I'm still upset, especially as she has said she doesn't know why she did it.

Its a personal thing. I understand. My best friend committed suicide 2 years ago in a very violent way. I found I wanted to read the post mortem and other documents. Can see it wouldn't be for everyone, but it helped me process.
Sorry for what you are going through.

Sending love OP. You are not wrong to request a OM report but I think it would be useful to sit with a doctor to go through it with you.
As @Greybeardy says the record time
of death is often different from the real time of death. They use the time that someone found them and could not feel a pulse Etc

I look at postmortem reports for part of my job. They aren’t of people I know and understand the clinical terminology and they can still be a hard read sometimes. I would suggest that you don’t show it as is to family members. There are some therapeutic services you can book that will debrief a PM report with you in a more sensitive way - this might be of benefit to others in the family if they want to read it?

just in terms of time of death - there can be a discrepancy between events and the recorded time as that was when the death was certified. For example, if someone drowned by falling into a swimming pool at 6pm, an ambulance crew began resuscitation and transported them to A&E who tried various lifesaving measures then called time of death once these were exhausted at 8pm, the time of death would be recorded as 8pm even though the person died in the pool at 6pm.

Has your husband had any professional support for the PTSD he must be feeling? He loves you and can’t bear to think what you have been through, so he’s trying to shut himself off from it all. He needs help too. I’m so sorry this happened.

Ah this is so sad OP. I havent read ds's PM report...he took his life last year. Ex dh did and it traumatised him. I have nightmares anyway about his death. But part of me feels I should read it.

I understand to an extent your view. However How would you manage this situation? knowing that some of the details are in the press? and will be forever online. I’m trying to protect my son and would never do anything to hurt him.

My Dad died suddenly and tragically. There was a PM and Coroners report.
I asked that the PM was sent to our family GP, we made an appt to see the Doc and he ‘translated’ the report in to family friendly language, but didn’t hide details but he did spare our feelings.
There is no way of knowing if you should have requested the report, it is not compulsory to have it. Your husband sounds caring and is worried for you. Please consider having a Doc go over the PM for you/with you and don’t think you understand if you are really just surmising things.

Yes, this is part of the tapestry of your life, but it is not the defining thing but is a rather unique thing I got grief and trauma counselling and I would recommend it to you as, it really helped me not ruminate on areas of the report that gave me sleepless nights and awful dreams.

I wish you peace as you move forward.

You don't know how your son might feel and what he might need in the future, OP.

I have these documents myself for a close family member. At the time I got them, some of my children were too young to need all the details or understand the info contained. I do think that, one day, they may have questions and want to know, maybe even need to know, more.

The way I have handled this is I have the documents filed away, with all the other paperwork and family documents, in a box with a number code. They won't access them accidentally, but I think it's important to have them there 'just in case' they do one day need it.

My children are a bit older now. I've let them know I'm always open to questions and to talk about it. Recently one of the younger ones (adult now) was talking about it and I let them know I had these documents if they would like to see them. They didn't want to at the time, so I just told them they are there if they ever do. I'm mindful that they will have their own needs around our situation and it's important to be able to meet them if and as they arise.

It's never something they have to look at or are expected to, they just have the option.

@fandjango

I just need to be the best mother I can for my son and to do my own mother proud.

I think you can rest assured on both fronts. You are remarkable. Your DM's legacy lives on through you and your DS x