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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Original poster

The death of an ex

33 replies

SlimAndAthletic · 26/04/2019 23:30

Has anyone experienced this?
I have found out that the person I always carried a torch for died several weeks ago.

We weren't in touch (he left me) but I feel so sad to think of his little house all empty, and him being gone.

I suppose I always sort of felt that (Only in my dreams!) there was a chance that our paths might cross again, which is ridiculous, because we lived 100s of miles apart.

There hasn't been a day when I've not thought of him, so this has knocked me for six.

By the way, I'm not at all what my username says!

OP posts:

Tavannach · 26/04/2019 23:35

I'm sorry.
Would it help if you made a donation in his name to his favourite charity? Or named a star for him?

Original poster

SlimAndAthletic · 26/04/2019 23:38

Ah, thank you.
I think I just feel the need to mourn him, and yet he wasn't really mine to mourn anymore.
Silly really, but well, I was always silly where he was concerned.

OP posts:

MrsSchadenfreude · 26/04/2019 23:43

My first love died a few years ago. I knew from mutual friends that he had terminal cancer. When he died, I really felt nothing. Maybe sadness that his life was so short, but no more than any other colleague or acquaintance dying. I thought I would have felt more, but no.

AliceRR · 26/04/2019 23:47

Sorry you are going through this

Do you have mutual friends or anyone you can discuss / share the loss with (if that makes sense) as I can imagine it might be hard to grieve a loss when you feel he wasn’t “yours” or wasn’t in your life any more

SpeedofaSloth · 26/04/2019 23:47

Yes.
He and I were still very close, but no longer together. We may have got back together had he not died.
I felt guilt, and relief, plus guilt for feeling relieved. It was complicated.
I am now happily married with two children, for what it's worth.

AliceRR · 26/04/2019 23:47

But you are entitled to feel how you feel and if you need to grieve then you shouldn’t feel silly for that

Tavannach · 26/04/2019 23:47

You were part of his experience of life, just as he was part of yours.

Original poster

SlimAndAthletic · 26/04/2019 23:50

I have told a couple of friends, but they probably don't understand the depth of my feelings.
I don't understand them myself really.

OP posts:

AliceRR · 26/04/2019 23:52

It sounds like finding out about his death came out of the blue for you so it’s understandable you would still be processing your feelings

Perhaps if you hadn’t good friend you could talk to them about it. When I first read your post I assumed you were still in love with him.

You can share here of course if it helps

Hawkmoth · 26/04/2019 23:54

Yes, almost exactly. It was very sad and remains so, but with the guilt of it not being my grief.

Theninjawhinger · 26/04/2019 23:55

Yes, my first boyfriend I was with 7 years died due to alcohol abuse many years after we had split up.

I was shocked by the depth of my feelings to be honest - I went to the funeral to support his parents and it was incredibly hard. I felt sad for the lost hope I think. I had loved him SO deeply at one point, and that feeling of wanting him to be okay was still there. It really surprised me how I felt though, I wasn’t prepared to of been so shook by his passing.

Original poster

SlimAndAthletic · 26/04/2019 23:55

Oh, without a doubt I still was (am) in love with him.
It ended badly, and he upped and left, so I think people presume I should have been able to turn my feelings off, but I have never been able to.

OP posts:

SpeedofaSloth · 26/04/2019 23:58

When I found out my ex had died, I was away for a weekend with a new flame. In a heartbeat I knew where my loyalties truly lay at that point in time, and it was the death of the new relationship. It didn't help that my ex had died of a potentially contagious disease and I had to be screened myself quickly, because I'd been in recent contact. It took me another year to come to terms with the end of the relationship, then the subsequent death.

SpongeBobJudgeyPants · 26/04/2019 23:58

I think when you have really loved someone, even if you or they moved on for very good reasons, they always have part of your heart, so I understand your sadness.

sheepsheep · 26/04/2019 23:59

My ex died last year. Very young and very unexpectedly leaving behind his wife before their first wedding anniversary.

I found out that his funeral was actually on my birthday.

It really shocked me and I did have to mourn him in my own way while feeling guilty for doing so because he wasn't mine to mourn. I am happily married but he was still very special to me and I guess I had always hoped I would bump into him someday and have a catch up.

I felt and still feel terribly sorry for his wife. I heard she is doing well all things considered.

I am so sorry that you are going through this, the feelings are not straightforward. Be kind to yourself.

Original poster

SlimAndAthletic · 27/04/2019 00:02

I think because he cut me right out of his life, I had no idea he was even poorly, so its a lot to process in one go.
It feels ridiculous to even think, but I wonder if he thought of me at all when he was so ill.

OP posts:

T1nah · 27/04/2019 00:13

Silly really, but well, I was always silly where he was concerned

That's actually a nice thing to say.

An ex of mine committed suicide after many years suffering from depression. I was very sad because he was gorgeous as a young man and should have had a charmed life but it was ruined by mental illness.

Original poster

SlimAndAthletic · 27/04/2019 00:20

Thank you all for sharing your stories.
It does help, just being able to articulate some of my feelings.

OP posts:

GetOffTheTableMabel · 27/04/2019 00:28

I don’t know it’s silly at all. Its not just that someone you loved has died, but you have also lost your hope, your possibilities, that imagined future. It doesn’t matter how unlikely it was; it was your private daydream. We treat ourselves to these little imagined futures, not because we really believe in them but because they represent something - a time when we were happier and an optimism that the happiness can recur. You’ve lost a happy place as well as a love.
I hope you can feel better soon.

Original poster

SlimAndAthletic · 27/04/2019 00:33

Oh you have hit the nail exactly on the head!
All that you said is so true it's uncanny.
I hadn't even thought of it like that, but yes, a lot of my time with him was the happiest I have ever been, for all sorts of reasons which are now very different, not just because he and I ended.

OP posts:

Solo · 27/04/2019 00:35

My exh committed suicide. I actually lived in fear for nearly 2 decades that I might accidentally bump into him one day as he was extremely abusive but, when he died, it upset me more than I could come to terms with. It didn't help that he had contacted me via Fb a couple of weeks before he died and I hadn't responded to him. I was told at his funeral that he'd never got over losing me.
So, what I'm trying to say is, no matter how you feel/felt about your ex, when they die, it brings all kinds of emotions flooding back. Accept and mourn in your own way and live your life.

SpongeBobJudgeyPants · 28/04/2019 16:19

That's sad Solo I am also sorry that someone chose to burden you with 'he never got over you' situation at the funeral. Sounds like the solution was in his hands, but not yours

Decormad38 · 28/04/2019 16:26

Yes I felt the same when an ex died of skin cancer which spread to his brain. I mourned him privately. I felt very sad for his little children and wife.

Solo · 28/04/2019 17:31

Thank you SpongeBob it was a bit of an eye-opener to have confirmed what I'd always suspected (don't want to sound full of myself, I'm really not) but, yes he could have changed everything at any time if he'd wanted to (except have me back once I'd gathered the courage to end the marriage, finally).

SunshineCake · 28/04/2019 17:37

I am so sorry to read your OP and sorry that you never got another chance. I've found out a school friend who had a crush on me died and I felt sad he'd died so young and left behind a child. I've recently been thinking of an important ex and it upsets me to think he could die and we'd never have another conversation. We've not talked in over two years and at the moment he doesn't want too.

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