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Came home from vacation to find my girlfriend dead on the bedroom floor


ATALL25

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Two weeks ago I came home from a ten day vacation to find my girlfriend dead on the bedroom floor. I walked in at 4AM, ran downstairs to give her a hug and she was on her back, blue in the face and had vomited. I woke my roommate who had been asleep and called 911 but it was too late. They placed her time of death at 10:30PM, hours before I found her. I had last talked to her at 9:30PM. She was slurring her words a bit and I asked her if she had been drinking and she said it had been 4 hours and seemed frustrated by the question. I had to go through airport customs and she abruptly ended the call. That was the last time I ever spoke with her and the last conversation she ever had with anyone. At first I blamed myself because I had spoken with my roommate around 11:45 to unlock the door because she wasn’t answering and had been wishing I had just had him check on her but it already would have been too late. She stopped responding after that conversation and I had called her back multiple times but I assumed she was either irritated with me for calling her out on being drunk (I had asked if she could be relatively sober when I got home) or that she realized she was drunk and wanted to sleep it off before I got home. The night before I left for vacation she was going to stay up with me until 2am, which she usually stays up until anyways and instead she got really drunk on whiskey and then took a sleeping pill and I was pretty frustrated about it, hence asking if she could be somewhat sober when I got home.

We had been dating for about 5 months and she lived with me and I knew she drank a decent amount but I didn’t think it was as big of an issue as I guess it was. Her sister found a half a Percocet in her wallet and 9 empty alcohol containers in her trunk. I just wish I had known and had been able to help her. I drank with her, not to the same extent she drank but if I had the slightest inclination it was a real issue, I would have tried to help. Thinking back, there are some indications that she might have had a problem but everyone gets a little too drunk at times and after the first month she calmed down a lot in her drinking or at least wasn’t doing it around me. She had severe sleeping issues and sometimes I would wake up at 3 or 4am and she would be upstairs watching TV and have a glass of whiskey or something but she never seemed inebriated. Though sometimes she would pass out on the couch or the guest room and had said it was because she didn't want to come down and wake me up. I know she lied to me about some minor things, probably trying to make herself look better, and I am struggling hard with the emotions. I want to be angry that she lied, I want to ask her so many questions and just try to understand what happened and I will never have the chance. The only thing that will give any answers is the toxicology report which her family should have in the next few weeks. Being the one to have found her, it appears she had choked on her own vomit. One thing I am sure of is that it was an accident. She had made multiple plans with friends the following week and had bought stuff to make me breakfast and dinner and was so excited for me to come home. My guess is that she mixed either a Xanax or Percocet with too much alcohol, something a lot of people do and I know she has done before but this time her body couldn’t handle it. I feel guilty, angry, lonely, and just at a loss of what to do. I wanted to spend my life with her and we were a perfect match and I am pissed at life for taking away a wonderful person far too soon. She had just turned 30.  

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ATALL25,

There are no words that will take your pain away. Your loss is so tragic, to have to have been the one to find her, that had to be so traumatic for you. 

First of all, please don't blame yourself for this. She may have had an alcohol problem, she may have just gone a bit too far this time. We don't know, and the toxicology report may help bring some answers, but the harsh, sad, painful truth is that she was taken from you far too soon. 30 is such a young age to die. My girlfriend died, she was only 22, and hers was from an undetected brain aneurysm which burst suddenly when she was on a trip with family. Like you, we had plans for the following week, she was excited to come back and see me again. We talked the morning of January 23rd, and only a couple hours after we spoke she passed out, went into a coma and never woke up. She died on the 28th. 

We do the best we can do with what we have at the time we have it. My girlfriend also showed some signs of slowing down, she had frequent headaches, vomited, and seemed to be generally not feeling well. I never encouraged her to go to the hospital, instead I just would tell her to go rest and call me later. Even if I had, though, the odds that the doctors would have checked her brain for aneurysms is pretty low, because that tends to be quite rare in young people to begin with. There are things she said that in hindsight should have been clear signs that something is wrong, but I believed she was young and invincible and even if she got sick, I did not believe she would die. She was a headstrong fighter and I believed her attitude and will to live would save her from anything, especially at her age. Nature has a way of showing us its indifference, the harsh truth that anyone can die at any time for any reason, regardless of age, health or quality of life. We here on this forum are changed forever, we have been forced to face the truth about death far too early. We can no longer live oblivious to the true pain of death, we can no longer exist with an "ignorance is bliss" attitude. We know the pain and hurt and empty feelings that a lost future brings. 

The only thing you can, and must, do right now is take care of yourself. Try to eat something. Drink fluids. Rest when you need to rest. Exercise lightly if you can. Don't try to "keep busy" and distract yourself too much. Let yourself feel the pain. The memories of good times will come, and they will hurt terribly. For a time everything will remind you of her, and so many things will be a symbol of the future you lost. You can only let these feelings happen, accept them for what they are, a sign of how deeply you loved her and how much you miss her. The stronger our pain, the more a sign of the love we shared it is. If we didn't love our lost ones, it would be easy to put the emotions aside. How much do we cry when the news reports on a tragic death of someone we didn't know? How much pain do we experience when we read an article about someone we don't know dying tragically at a young age? Not very much. The difference is that in our cases, the deaths were people we loved, cared about, felt very deeply for. That's why it hurts so much. Love and heartache are not opposites. They are the same emotion, just the positive and negative sides of it. Two sides of the same coin.

There is nothing any one of us can do to bring back the ones we've lost, even though that will be our only true wish for the rest of our lives. All we can do now is try, ever so slowly, ever so painfully, to find a little purpose left in this empty, cold, meaningless world. Anger is normal. Depression is normal. Frustration is normal. Empty feelings, crying, are all normal. Fantasizing and wishing it wasn't true is normal. It's the only way we can work through the horrible tragedy we're faced with. Losing a loved one to death is quite possibly the most difficult emotional experience any human can have. 

Good luck and keep posting. We're here for you.

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ATALL25----I am deeply sorry for the tragic way you lost your girlfriend. The pain, the many conflicting emotions are unbearable I know. The confusion and questions. My heart aches for you. I hope you have support of each of your families and friends at this time.  Understanding support and shoulders to lean on are so crucial for your well being.

This forum is a life line to many of us. We have listening ears, compassionate hearts. Please come back and post when you feel the need to share, to let out those emotions and feelings when you need to.

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ATALL25,

I am so sorry, no matter how many such stories we hear, it always hits me afresh, that another life is gone, and another person is left dealing with the aftermath.  The hardest thing in the world, and her only 30.

I'm glad you found this site, we're all helping each other through this.  It helps to let it out and know you're heard by those who understand.  I hope you'll continue to come here and post.

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ATALL25

I'm so sorry for your loss and how devastating it was for you to have found her.  I can only imagine that it must be the worst kind of pain one can ever experience. Losing someone hurts the most when their story was not finished - especially someone so young.  When someone close to you dies suddenly, or unexpectedly, you feel like you never got the chance to really say goodbye.   It's the thing that you least expect that hit you the hardest and nothing in life prepares you for losing someone we love - nothing. 

You'll never really stop missing that special person; her smile, her laugh, her everything; after all, she was your soulmate.  You just learn to live around the huge gaping hole in your chest and her absence. I like to think, that just maybe, there is some validity in accepting that a part of you went with her when she died, and a part of her stayed with you.

But through all the pain, God will bring you through.  This loss has hurt you, but God will heal you; this loss has confused you, but God will magnify you; this loss has challenged you; but God will give you peace.  Sometimes God's blessings are not in what HE gives, but in what HE takes away.  HE knows best - we only need to trust HIM,  For every storm in your life is a rainbow and every dark season in life comes to an end. Hang in there, you'll reach the dawn.

I hope you continue to post here on the forum.  There are some amazing people who not only will share their stories, but give you comfort, support and encouragement.  We're all on this grief journey together and with God's love and strength, we'll all make it through.

 

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