Living without my Mum.

[shirleyvalentine]

I've never written on a forum but something compelled me to tell my story. I'm not sure what I'm hoping to get out of this but I'm hoping it will be therapeutic. 

My mum passed away on 4th June 2015 at 51 years old. It took me a while to even type that part as I've taken to saying she 'ascended to the next realm'. It was very sudden. I've managed to cope pretty well for various reasons but lately it's feeling like I have the weight of the world on my shoulders and it's getting harder to cope. 

I guess I'm reliving a lot of feelings at the moment as my best friend has just lost her mum and my heart breaks for her every day. 

My mum went out for lunch with friends one day, felt a little breathless and that was it. I console myself with the fact it was painless and she didn't suffer. I know that, given the choice, my mum would have thought it was too soon but been okay with the way it happened. We were super close and I'm glad I'm not just whimsical about my mum now but appreciated how amazing she was while she was here and knew how lucky I was, always. Ironically, my mum worked as a grief counsillor in the last years of her life.

My parents has a son before I was born who had spina bifida and died at 3 days old. He would be 28 now. Although I'm not religious; I do believe there is an afterlife and I like to think that I had 23 years with my mum and now it's his turn. 

Right from the very beginning I had to be the one to hold it all together. I was living in london with my boyfriend and came back to live in Scotland with my dad to look after him and also and grandpa, my mums dad. I had to arrange the whole funeral on my own and I had an overwhelming feeling the whole time that I had to do my mum justice, I didn't want to look back in 10 years and think my grief had clouded my ability to give her the celebration she deserved.

My boyfriend, for whatever reason, didn't seem to handle it all very well and turned into a very nasty person so he left me and I was left to deal with the loss of my mum and a break up after 4 years together at the same time. I would never equate a break up to the loss of anyone, let alone a parent but the two situations as so intertwined for me and I really don't like that. 

My mum has 2 brothers and a sister and they all fell apart. My auntie and my mum were really close and my mum was always looking after her but she doesn't speak to me anymore. I have no idea why but I often think I must have done something wrong to make her treat me like this. I'm not one to feel sorry for myself but I'm only 25 and I have no women in my life, no one to look up to and ask for advice, I'm all on my own and that thought is really overwhelming. I know that is someone else was in this situation and has tried as many times as I have to reconnect with my mums brothers and sisters with nothing in return i'd definitely be saying '**** them, they don't deserve you' but for some reason I can't let it go. I don't know what my mum would do at this point, I feel like I've exhausted every option but we were always such a close family, we used to joke that we were The Waltons. 

I feels like I just blinked one day and everyone was gone. I went from having my mum and a family and a relationship to having nothing. 

I always here that grief makes people selfish and unfortunately this has definitely been the case for my dad. I'm lucky that we have a really close relationship and he is a great dad but it really hasn't been easy these past 18 months. He has lost his wife and it breaks my heart to see him to hurt though he seems to be doing a little better recently. I became a little bit of an emotional punching bag for him and I don't resent him for it but it has been really hard. 

I feel like this whole post has felt really dramatic and 'feeling sorry for myself' which really isn't like me. I know I'm strong and I'm like my mum in that respect but sometimes I feel like I want to scream at everyone that there is only so much I can take. 

I have been able to accept my mums ascending and although I have the natural thoughts of it not being fair etc; I can accept it's 'just one of those things' but there are times when I wonder if I can't even really miss her because I'm too busy worrying about everyone else and all their rubbish. 

 

[The Girl]

I'm sorry for everything you've gone through.  In a way (and maybe this is just my background talking) it sounds like you've taken on many of the responsibilities of a mother, and during a time where you could probably use a bit of a break.  

There will likely always be triggers for you that bring you back to the loss of your mom.  However accepting you are of that loss, it is a sad thing to have happened and it's completely okay to take time for yourself to think about it, or deal with it, or whatever fits for you.  In events that significant, it's okay to be selfish.  Personally, I don't really consider it selfish, but more of a time for healing.  I'm empathetic to a fault and have a tendency to overextend myself for the comfort of others, but at some point something has got to give.  Just as you give so much of yourself to others, you need time and care just the same.  If only just to have a moment to absorb everything and process where you are now, mentally and emotionally.  Taking that time for yourself is really just setting boundaries, b/c we all need self care and personal time.  

We all grieve differently, and I don't think it's ever as simple or transient as being boxed in to that time period following their passing.  It's a long, and to some extent never ending, process which you and your family will all go through.