Can’t escape constant grieving loop

[humanbeing]

Hello to whoever takes the time to read this.. I’m a 27 y/o guy who lost my mother to cancer in October 2017. 

I’ve gone through various cycles of grief, depression, ups and downs but seem to just be spiraling downward lately. The year after my mother passed I also went thru a rough breakup with my ex gf, had my old apartment broken into, been evicted from another apartment, had a car repo’d, and was working piss poor dead-end jobs that had no future or upside. 

2019 was a much better year for me.. had family help me get back on my feet, for the first time in my life I got a job that I could actually consider a career with great potential upside and have made what I consider to be real friends.. I’ve been a bigger guy my entire life and have finally gotten in shape, losing 70lbs last year and keeping it off the entire year, really the first sustained weight loss in my life, physically I feel so much better than I ever have, I’m lower than my high school weight..

However, I feel conflicted because I feel as if none of these things would’ve happened if my mother was still around, which might sound like a weird thing to admit to most people, but I know this is true.. this is not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s just a strange feeling to have, and I think about this almost daily and try to process what this means.

While I have many things to be thankful for and look forward to, many other aspects of my life are still suffering and have worsened. Prior to my mother’s death I never messed around with hard drugs, only smoking weed from time to time. Since she has passed I have experimented with many different substances, particularly struggling with cocaine recently which causes me great shame, knowing my Mom would be so disappointed and upset if she knew I did this. I used to view coke users as junkies or losers and told myself I’d never put anything up my nose, but now I can’t stop.. having ramped my usage up so frequently lately that I’ve used pretty much every single day for the last two months.

I have a tremendous relationship with my stepfather and sister who went through this painful experience of losing my mother with me, and it made us closer. However, my relationship with my biological father and my brother has suffered to the point of not speaking, and this causes me great pain and conflicting feelings every day. I have very legitimate reasons for not speaking to them, which are far too many to list off now, but still I feel the pain of this reality is eating me alive everyday and often times leads to me using drugs again. I don’t want my father to die when we are not on speaking terms, though for the time being I see no possible way I can forgive him for the things he’s done, and can’t justify trying to rebuild my reputation with him or my brother.

I also feel great anger / rage from the reality of not having my My mother around.. she passed of lung cancer despite having never smoked a cigarette once in her life, so many questions I have will go unanswered forever, and when I think about going the rest of my earthly life without her here, or being able to show her a future wife and grandkids, or all I’ve accomplished and will accomplish, it causes a great deal of anger and rage inside me that leads me to want to get violent, though I haven’t yet. I can lose my temper quite easily with people even if they’ve done nothing to deserve it. Often times to numb the rage I feel inside I turn to substances once again.. the best way to describe the anger I feel is like something that starts building up inside of my body, in my stomach or chest and just leads me to feel so enraged that I went to break things or physically react by slamming or punching things around me, better on objects than people to be sure, but I can already envision myself losing my cool and getting physically violent with another person which I do not want to do. 

 

I’ve tried therapy and have stopped going, feeling I was receiving cookie-cutter advice and still facing the same reality that the questions I have and deep sadness and pain I feel inside of me due to my loss will never go away, like I’ll carry this with me for the rest of my life, and sometimes I feel it might be better off to end my life to not have to deal with this constant state of misery.. the drugs do not help, often times causing me to see my life as having no value, and that if I die I die, leading me to engage in more & more risky behavior. Don’t know if anyone will even read this long, perhaps non-sensicsl rambling, but for some reason I felt compelled to post this. Any suggestions or sharing of similar experiences would be cool, I’m open to just chatting as well.. maybe a support group in real life would be the best way to go, but when I get high I lose the desire to follow through with it. Anyway, if you’ve read this all or any of it you’re probably a better person than me. Cheers.

[TaylorV]

I lost my mum recently and I completely feel the same especially with the aspect of fearing that this shallow empty space left will never go. I wish I knew anything to say to you to help but I also don’t know the answers yet. Everything seems so unfair yet so insignificant in comparison... Though it may not hold much weight with yourself and how you view yourself but I know for certain you have tremendous value and ending your life, though seems the easiest way out (I’ve had this thought myself so I can to an extend understand perhaps what you’re going through) it most definitely not the case. The little thought that helps me, though slightly morbid, is the thought of my family having to plan another funeral. If I can’t stay alive for myself right now I can at least stay alive for them to not add any extra grief to them than what they’re already feeling. Hopefully one day It’ll be easier justifying living just for the fun and joy I can experience myself and not for the inconvenience I’ll cause others.  This is just something I personally think to try and help me through my hardest moments I’m not sure if you would be able to relate to it at all or if this reply has helped you at all. I just wanted to let you know that at least one person (myself) is listening and hoping you can find a way through this.