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lost 3 immediate family members


MDenise

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I lost both of my parents and a sister. We had been a family of six, and a wonderful family. Seems like everybody's dying, and young, though one parent was as old as 67. It was my mom at 52, then a sister at 30, then my dad recently at 67. It's me and two sisters remaining. It's sad. My twin sister is handicapped and living in a group home. Another sister has had her own place for many years.

I was living with my parents and my sister who died.

It started in late 2004 with my mom. It happened very suddenly. She seemed fine up until that moment, except I heard later that she had a headache. She collapsed and died. Paramedics worked on her for a while, then took her to the hospital. We went to the hospital on our own and then were told that she had passed. We could not understand the sudden death, and I hate that she was taken from us like that, although the bright side is that without her being sick, we did not worry about her dying, before it happened, and she did not suffer. The coroner's report came back after about two months or so, said "fluoxetine toxicity", regarding a medication she was on, and she had congestive heart failure from a medication. We attended bereavement counseling because of her death. The months after her death were hard.

For some time the family was missing just my mom. My household had my dad and my sister who would die.

Then my sister died only a little over one year after my mom did. I have a twin and two older sisters; this is the middle sister. She had major depression and a long history of overdoses, and I worried about her suicide attempts, that she was always trying to harm herself. She took my mom's death very badly and ended up doing an overdose that was successful. She had refused to attend bereavement counseling about our mom with the rest of us, and she was the most in need of it. I guess it would have been hard for her. This sister and I were like friends sometimes.

Their deaths were around major holidays, like designed by forces to ruin our holidays. Mom's was a little after Thanksgiving, my sister's was a few days before Christmas.

For years I would have dreams with my mom and/or sister (I dreamed about being at the original family residence, also). Sometimes a dream would be about one of them, especially my mom, having returned after death. I wish that could happen.

My family was given seven years plus a few months, before the next death, my dad. It was me and my dad living together, and we became close, and we were friends. He was very nice to me. He was patient with me. He was very easygoing.

He took care of me in ways. He drove me places. I liked going to the grocery store with him, and he would often take us to eat at a restaurant before that. We went to church together. He owned a small business, doing bookkeeping and business consulting for several other small businesses. I worked for him, doing typing, and my dad kept planning for me and another sister to have major jobs in the business. He was also a tax preparer and made a lot during tax season. He had been struggling financially, and tax season was getting started when he died, and he had been planning to have several particular big clients for his business, also, and I think that was when I would do much more and get paid accordingly.

I had my dad until several weeks ago. He became sick on Sunday or Monday, January 20 or 21. He said early that morning (around the very early time he normally got up) he had felt like he was dying and had thought about going to the hospital. For two weeks he had symptoms of the flu. He would get better and then be bad again. He spoke of feeling bad/awful and being weak. He said his chest and stomach hurt. He sneezed, coughed, and had a sore/hoarse throat, and had chills, all of which made it seem like really the flu. He slept all the time and didn't have an appetite. I worried about his feeling of dying, chest pain, weakness, and sleeping all the time. I hoped this wasn't something fatal. He carried on for two weeks. People tried to get him to go to the doctor. My sister (a living one) was going to force him to go to the doctor the next day, her taking him. Sadly he died the day before he would go. He would've gotten proper care.

I actually witnessed his death. He seemed to be sleeping as he did a lot, and I was nearby, luckily. He sounded like he was doing a little minor coughing, then he started doing like snorting through the throat or mouth, and that alerted me. When he died, he did several of those, about 10 seconds apart, each one making his body jump. He appeared not to breathe, otherwise and after the snorts stopped. I tried to rouse him and couldn't. His eyes were open and not moving. He was unresponsive. I called 911. He was worked on for some time and then was pronounced dead. At one point as the paramedics worked on him they said "he's in", and I thought he was surviving.

We had him cremated because there was no money for burial. I didn't want to deal with his body in a casket anyway. We had a memorial service rather than a funeral with a body. There were several photos and a continuous slideshow of family pictures with him in them. I liked that.

Until my dad became sick, he had tended to stay healthy, even as he had high blood pressure and a lot of stress. He seemed like he would live long, much longer than 67 years. I was wrong. I'm grateful he was a little into old age. For years I had wanted him to get really old before he died, and would wait for each birthday. He turned 65 and dealt with getting Medicare. He had over two years after that. Many people had thought he was younger than he really was. He looked young to other people. Probably his good health. But to me he looked about his real age.

I have felt that if someone's parent(s) would be like 80+ when dying, that's good, because the parent(s) had a properly long life. I have wished those who died had had more years. My mom would be 60. I would wish to be back at the times when they were alive, but sadly that's impossible. I had my dad until very recently as of this writing. The period I had him is so close but impossible to reach. It's that way shortly after every death. It would feel like I never had my mom or my sister, since it has been so long since I lost them. I feel a little like that about my dad already, since he has been dead.

For days after the recent death of my dad, I did the normal crying, I would get emotional at times. I thought of my dad as my best friend and the person holding up the family as a parent. I may have been closer to him than to anyone else, ever. I have adjusted surprising well/quickly. I'm now living with my sister, the one who was living alone, and I have been busy with gradually moving my things and clearing out the old house. My sister will help me with my affairs and support me the best she can until I get income. Very grateful for her.

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MDenise,

I am very sorry for your losses. Have you considered some type of professional help to sort through your feelings? You've got to be reeling, and sometimes it is so difficult to process losses when they are so profound. There are many here who have similar experiences. They may be able to offer you support and encouragement. Do you have pictures you'd like to share? Are you talking to anyone about your losses? How are your sisters handling all of this?

We will be here for you,

ModKonnie

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I am so sorry for your losses. You have indeed been through a very difficult time these past few years. I'm sure it must seem all surreal to you to have to adjust to living without your family. I am so glad that you are living with your sister and have some from of support. I agree with Konnie that it would probably help tremendously to seek grief counseling. I too lost my father very suddenly from a heart attack when I was twenty. While his unexpected death came as a major blow to all of us we found that in time were so thankful that he did not have to go through a prolonged period of ill health and suffering. My mother was another situation altogether. She did suffer tremendously and it took years before she actually passed away. Continue to post and know that you are not alone in this. I am thinking of you and hoping that with time you will be able to find a degree of happiness in your life again. Take care. Kate

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I am very very sorry of your loss.You have to keep some self confidence in your heart.Don't be furstuate about this thing otherwise you can't proceed in your way.So keep faith on god who helps must you in other way.

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Thank you all for your replies, your kind words. Sorry I'm late with this, I waited in case others would reply.

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Hello MDenise,

I know exactly how you feel. I lost ALL 3 immediate members of my family including my younger sister. My father died in November 2015, 8 weeks later my younger sister died tragically and suddenly, 9 weeks proceeding my dear sweet beloved sister's death, my mother died. All 3 succumbed to cancer. I am DEVASTATED, my world is DESTROYED. I have no other family and no real friends. My sister was my world, she was my rock, my adviser, my BEST FRIEND, now I have NOBODY. What grieves and saddens me more is that through an incompetent evil doctor, I was arrested WITHOUT PROOF of murdering my sister and my father. I was already reeling in colossal grief for my losses when this occurred. I was arrested first and my sister's autopsy was performed 4 weeks proceeding my arrest. The autopsy revealed that my dear sweet beloved younger sister, whom I worshipped and cherished, was that she died of a rare cancer, that displayed no signs until 23 days prior to her death. She died very young, she had disseminated neuroendocrine cell carcinoma and for that I was BLAMED for her death, which is too preposterous to even contemplate. All I got from the police was "I'M SORRY". Not good enough, my world and life is destroyed. I have tried counselling and all I got was the police had to do this to me, not good enough. I wait in the family home (my father's) home that he left in a will to me and my late sister. I am just waiting to die, this world has nothing to offer me.  I am GLAD you got one of your sister's for support, I have NOBODY.  GOOD LUCK, GOD BLESS YOU ALWAYS.

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Eileen LeDoux

I stumbled upon this website as I was searching through my phone. I have a similar story in that I lost my whole support system all within a very short period of time. We were a family of 4. I lost my mom on August 21 2018 just 19 days after her birthday she was 81 she past from COPD. 15 months later on November 17 2019. I lost my sister unexpectedly to sepsis due to pneumonia. She was 50. Then I lost my Dad on April 5 2020 due to COPD as well he was 80 when he passed. My sister had 2 young  children at the time of her passing my nephew is 18 he will be graduating from high school this year. My neice recently turned 21 on my sister's birthday no less. I have 2 sons both are 23. They are 10 months apart. It's been difficult to say the least. I cry daily for all of them as I cannot separate one from another. I'm praying daily and know that God has a plan for each of us We must believe and know that he has us in his care. It's hard to keep going but I get up every morning and put 1 foot in front of the other moving toward the light. It's a scary time for all of us. We just have to hold on and help each other out when we need it. Hold on you are never alone. N it's true that it will never get better as it can never be better when you lose your family but I find comfort in knowing that they are all together with God on a very important mission and I was left to care for our young adults my son's and neice and nephew. That's a huge job for me all young adults under the age of 25 n they all think they know everything. Ok I hope you are all well. Cry when it comes. Laugh when you can and remember always as family is still with us they are just in a different room n we will see them again as our time comes. God speed n God bless

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