Losing a parent when you are NC

[Anycrispsleft]

I just wondered if anyone else is going through the experience of losing a parent they are NC with?

I cut off my mother many years ago when my children were small. She had been physically and emotionally abusive to me when I was a child but I never really thought much about my childhood before I had kids, I dreaded seeing my mother but kept in touch with her. When I had my kids she wanted more contact and so we did that but she seemed constantly stressed around us, her comments and behaviour towards my kids seemed really off and there were lots of weird incidents of the kids' things breaking or going missing (something that happened to me too). Finally I caught her hurting one of my kids in the content of performing an act of care for her (sorry to phrase that in such a strange way, but I don't want to put the details on a public forum as it was a very specific thing). I always said my red line with her would be if I had reason to believe she had hurt one of my kids, and so, I then broke off contact with her, and explained why in a letter. I heard nothing from her, and had no contact until recently when a friend of hers got in contact and told me she was ill and wouldn't see a doctor. Then a couple of months ago she was admitted to hospital with suspected covid and tests showed she had terminal cancer. She died two weeks after she was admitted.

I was just wondering if anyone else is in a similar position? It feels quite strange - I think I mourned the relationship back when I went NC, and to have been back in contact with her shortly before she died and now back in contact with the family was a very strange feeling. I had to arrange the funeral, I had to tell the minister what to say in the eulogy. The whole time just hoping that those of the family who didn't know we were NC would not suddenly cop in and that those who did know would not have a go at me at the funeral. I felt like I owed it to my mother not to start bringing up the abuse during the time around her funearly, I know how I feel about thus stuff now.
I'm back at home, I live abroad, literally nothing has changed in my day to day life, yet I feel myself going through many of the stages of grief just like I did when my dad died. I'm mostly just knackered and short tempered. I wish I could just have a couple of weeks of peace vut I was already away from work and my kids for long enough with all the business with the funeral, I feel as if I am constantly swimming through treacle. Any perspectives from those who have been in a similar position would be very welcome.

3 years ago my mother died pretty unexpectedly 1 week after I'd had my baby
I still don't think I've really processed it
I think I mourned the relationship we should have had rather than the one we did
I certainly didn't react the way people expected me to react in the circumstances but she'd been no mother to me for years and I'd had her blocked for about 2 years prior to this
I hope it doesn't suddenly creep up on me at any point but I doubt it will
I think everyone processes these things differently

I didn't go completely NC with my Mum, but I certainly distanced myself (rarely visited her, put off her visits, ignored quite a few calls etc, the only reason I didn't go NC was because the kids loved her and she was good to them).
She died last year, very suddenly. On the Monday she called me. I watched it ring. I can't remember why, but she'd annoyed me somehow that day and I didn't want to speak to her. That night I tried calling her back, but she never answered.
The next morning, nobody had seen her. We got police to break the door down, and she was dead in her bungalow.
I grieved too, and at the same time I was relived that she was gone. I regret not asking her why for so many different things relating to my childhood. But someone once told me this. Everyone dies. Does that mean we should forgive every person for every bad thing they do? Of course not.
It's okay to grieve, it's okay to feel exactly as you feel. Go easy on yourself 💐

I've no helpful advice but it sounds so hard.

I've been grieving my mother although she is alive. She will not speak to me. A conversation in my view might help us meet in the middle but her view is that I submit to her perspective or I'm disrespectful and deserve the silent treatment. I heard a term recently, google ''complicated grief'' and your situation sounds like it fits that.

i HAD hoped that I'd feel relief when that time comes for me but I guess it's not that simple. We always hope (while they're alive) that they'll surprise us with insight or growth.

My father died after I'd been NC for 15 years. 13 when I cut him off, I was shocked how little I cared

I hope that is me. They have broken me the last three years. If I had to go through this grief again, I'd have been grieving for decades.

I really feel for you OP. People with loving parents might read this and think having no contact with a parent might lessen the grief, but I would guess it makes it more complicating that just straightforwardly grieving for them.

I’m NC with both my parents. It’s really sad and it took many years of trying to have a normal relationship with them before DD was born and I just realised how wrong their treatment of me has been. It goes way beyond personality clash or general rows and into abuse territory. I hate them both for what they did to me and my siblings over the years.

I haven’t seen my mum in 5 years and my dad for 3. Dad isn’t in great health and is an alcoholic. I often wonder how I would feel if he has another heart attack and dies. Guilt? Relief? Numbness? Regret? Sadness? Will I wish I had made some kind of final contact?

It’s extremely difficult and the only thing I can say (without actual experience of that yet) is that I will just go with whatever feelings I have at the time. But will try to remember just how devastating their effect on my life has been, and that I really had no choice but to cut both off. Particularly now I have DD - I can’t be a functioning mum and live in the endless cycle of spite/drama/bullying that they trapped me in.

Dont blame yourself 💐 until you have such parents you can never know what it’s really like.

This sums up my situation too, sadly

Hi op my mum died when I was 19 I'm feeling for you

I'm NC with my father after trying for months to resolve the situation with him but ultimately he chose to NC. I often wonder how I will feel when he eventually passes away, will I be welcome at the funeral etc. All I can think is I have tried my upmost to mend the relationship and I have nothing to feel guilty about.
It strange because I feel I've already grieved for him and the relationship we once had.
I hope you manage to come through this OP.

Maybe dad died yesterday, I hadn't spoken to him in 5 years. I'm really not sure how I feel and I think it'll take time to come to terms with it.

Thank you so much for all your replies. I really appreciate being able to talk to people who have been in the same position. It helps just to be able to actually say it all. I feel like there isn't anyone in real life who I can talk to honestly about this. I know my mother tried to keep it secret that we were not in contact and I felt it would be better not to tell any of the family any different. She would have much preferred it that way; I'm aware though that while it could be seen as wanting to follow my mothers wishes and not disclose abuse it, it could also be seen as me wanting to protect myself from her family's anger if they knew I was not in contact with her, even when she was ill.

I find I resent the fact that my mother effectively made me choose between protecting my kids and remaining one of those nice people who look after their elderly relatives. I keep going over it all in my head, defending myself from her relatives (some of whom knew we were not in contact, although not why) and trying to find a way to formulate my story that males it sound more compelling. Because I know it is not that compelling. My mother was very careful to keep her harmful behaviour towards my kids on the right side of plausible deniability - it could all be construed as a loving grandmother making a mistake, if you had not had the experience I had as a child, when she was far more overtly physically and emotionally abusive. And I have always felt things were complicated by the fact that she absolutely set my teeth on edge and I was so relieved not to have any contact any more. How can I be sure my intentions in going NC were "pure" and not just an excuse for something I was relieved to do anyway?

I realise how mental this all sounds by the way. I am still really hung up on being a good person. I did also just wish I could have helped a bit in the end, because my mother was rapidly becoming unable to manage by herself. And actually, she would have hated any sort of care, let alone residential (when I spoke to her in that period when she was in hospital, the only time I saw her old, scary persona rear its head was when I floated the prospect of her getting a home help) and in many ways it was the best kind of death she would have hoped for - in her own home until shortly before her death, which was in a regular hospital (she had a horror of care homes since my gran had dementia). I was selfishly glad that she had been hospitalised because I knew she would need to go from there to a care home, and it would have meant a period where I could have visited and phoned and because there would have been other people around, she would have been OK with me. And I would have got the chance to play the devoted daughter. But God had other ideas and she died the day after she was diagnosed with cancer.

I'm struggling at work - I've always been able to put on a brave face when anything was wrong, but suddenly I just can't. I can hear and see myself saying and showing what I think. Is it maybe something to do with losing the person who always insisted on my having a smile plastered to my face? But whatever it us, I'm not ready for the consequences of people learning for the first time that I'm not the cheery, obliging person I usually pretend to be.

God I wish I could just go and hide for a few months. Forever. I just can't imagine feeling up to my life as it is just now. I went back to work last year after years of SAHM, I live in a country I don't like and where there is not much childcare for school aged kids, so there is just no down time and if one of us gets sick or anything the wheels just fall off. It was really hard before and all this has just made it worse. Even though it was really no work compared to what I would have anticipated as my mother's dementia worsened. I feel like I got off easy. And I worry that the amount of work I had last year influenced my lack of contact with my mother even after she was ill. When she died there was still a half completed form for grocery deliveries for her on my computer - I'd planned to try and get a nice posh local grocery to do her a delivery of like bread and fruit and tea each week, as her doctor had told me she didn't have much food in the house. And I'd run into trouble because nobody does that, there are charities that will get your shopping in but they have to arrange with the person themselves. And then probably one of the kids came with a bit of unfinished homework or whatever and I put it to the one side and the next time I looked at it my mother had already died.

Mine died a year ago, I’d not seen her for years. I didn’t feel grief at all. But I did feel a loss, that I’d never get closure from the old bitch.

I'd recommend listening to Grief cast episode 84. It's about exactly this. 💐

You're not alone. I'll be brief as need to tend to youngest but I had a very difficult relationship with my neglectful mother. She was more interested in new boy friends and frequently left me home alone from aged 5. Sent me away at aged 8. As an adult I tried because people kept saying 'but she's your MOTHER!', but when I had dc1 I suddenly got a clarity that scared me. How could she have done what she did to me? After many many incidents I went nc, she kept writing pleading letters (usually ending asking for money). She never met dc2. Then in the first wave of covid after 5 yrs nc I got a call from a hospice that she'd died. I waited and waited to feel a sudden wave of grief but it never came.

I realise I had already done the grieving for the loving, caring considerate mother that I never had years ago. So in the end ,once I processed that I felt relief.

All these stories are different and personal but those with kind nice parents will never understand why those of us with abusive parents go nc but it protects our sanity.

And I have always felt things were complicated by the fact that she absolutely set my teeth on edge and I was so relieved not to have any contact any more.

Ifyou feel like this about your -mother- ... there's a reason. We are programmed to love our mothers and if we don't, or if we are deeply uncomfortable around them, it's almost always because they have acted in a way to create those feelings (exception: very very occasionally it's not the case)

For you, it's very clear that you felt the way you did for good reason. you -knew- what she was capable of, none better.

Could it be, and I may be thinking too far here, that you are so worried about being a good person because you think that if you are a good person, you won't have deserved this treatment from her? We tend to turn problems with our parents back on ourselves and feel guilty...

Fwiw you do sound a good person, you made the right decision to protect your children from a known danger and still did what you could for her at the end. But being a good person and feeling like a good person are not necessarily the same thing.

it seems to me you've got stuff to process about your mother, very deep feelings, but they might well not be about her loss.

Take care

Grateful to read others’ stories… having NC parents is a sad reality ❤️‍🩹

Thanks again everyone for sharing your stories. I´m feeling on a bit more of an even keel now, I guess it will just be up and down for a while. I just wish I could put life on hold for a week or two and just sort my head out but no chance of that.

Anycrispsleft, If you like, I can be your Fairy Godmother and say you are not mental and you are absolved of any guilt.We cannot choose our parents but we can decide that they had a screw loose!! I am not sure about the other things that are troubling you but good luck and best wishes.

Really feel for you OP, pretty much NC with my father, he's 90, I often wonder if I will just feel enormous relief when he dies or will sob for the relationship we never had. It's very complex and think you have to just ride along with your feelings , sending love and strength to you xx ❤️

Muchxperience

Any chance of waving your godmother wand over here as well to absolve the guilt and sadness?! xx

I'm sorry for your loss.

I find this blog very comforting as I work through similar issues: thebodyisnotanapology.com/magazine/when-theres-no-hollywood-ending-how-do-i-grieve-the-dying-when-i-am-estranged-from-family/

KillingitinHollywood...of course I can wave my wand over you. Some people are not parent material.. maybe their own childhood was bad but that did not give them the right to treat their own kids badly.As an adult they could have tried harder to nurture us.We can break that chain with our children by making life fun,encouraging,listening to their worries ,teaching them how interesting life can be, to deal with the nasty people of the world,in other words setting them up to be a good parent themselves one day.We can consign our unhelpful memories to the trash bin as of now.You are absolved.Now onwards and upwards,very best wishes.

For those of you saying you have been NC for several years.

I went completely NC with the whole of my family 30 years ago. My mother was never a mother to me. I was born illegitimate in the early 50's, mother married her cheating, abusive husband several years later and I was duly dumped with any relative who would take me in whilst she moved to another city nearby and started a brand new family.

I had a half sibling died 7 years ago shortly followed by mother's husband and finally my mother died 2 years ago. (Found out via the internet about all of them months afterwards.). I felt nothing but relief! (Although I was a little sad about half sister who died relatively young and I would have kept in touch with had it not been necessary to go NC with the rest of them). I do sometimes feel guilty for feeling the way I do but then remind myself they obviously weren't bothered about me and over the years we gradually became totally different people living in completely different worlds, thank goodness.

I honestly believe this is what happens following many years of NC.