23 years old and both parents pass 3 weeks apart

[crtnygrn]

So, I've never written in a forum before so bear with me! To start here is some background: I'm 23, my brother Cole is 25 (with 6 kids and a wife) and I recently found out I had a long lost brother from my dad-- Josh is now 40. My brother Cole and I grew up in a loving-- yet flawed household in a small town in GA. Our parents were well into their 30's when they married and had my brother Cole. We lived in the same single-wide trailer for my entire up bringing and they lived there until the both passed away there. 

My parents: without boring you all with the details, my parents were alcoholics all throughout my childhood. But the worked just hard enough to give us at least some of the nice things we wanted. My mom suffered from bipolar, depression, severe anxiety and PTSD. My dad suffered from a plethora of health issues (mostly attributed to his drug and alcohol use) that ultimately lead him to be disabled around 50 years old. About 7 years ago, my father got sober and mom didn't. That created toxicity in the household when I was in high school-- and ultimately lead to many resentments towards them for not being better. My mom (a long term smoker) was diagnosed with stage 2 lung cancer in May of 2020. She progressed to stage 3 in less than a month because she refused to deal with the problem and coped in her own un healthy way. She eventually started treatment and my dad was there with her through everything-- even though my mom continually pushed him and her kids away. She passed away 1 week after finishing chemo. My dad was SHATTERED. I could see the pain and despair in his eyes when I went back to GA to help be there for him. The look in his eyes haunted me in the following days-- I knew what was to follow. Sure enough, 3 weeks later my dad was found dead in the same house my mom was. 

Me: I'm freaking angry. Angry at my mom for not taking care of herself. Angry at my dad for not holding on longer. Angry at myself for not calling them more. Angry that no one I know knows how to comfort me. I'm sad that I can't call them to ask them how to deal with this. I'm sad that they both stopped answering calls a week prior to their deaths-- I would have listened. Dad, I would understand why you wouldn't want to go on. This world is cruel to someone who has no knowledge of technology or "handling affairs" after all, mom was the one to take care of all of that. I would have said mom-- I know you are suffering and if you give up the fight-- I won't blame you for it-- just tell me how you feel in this moment I want to know more about you before you go. Did I want my parents to die? No, I don't know what those thoughts mean. Maybe just that I wanted to be there with them so bad. They went through it alone, separately. 

What I am looking for: Someone to identify with me, to tell me what it's like 6 months or a year down the road when people are no longer as sympathetic. Someone to tell me they have been through the same and when their grieving process hit them. I haven't cried since both days I found out they passed. The tears don't come natural. They feel blocked by something inside of me. What is that? How can I turn it off? I want to cry and mourn and move on to make them proud but all I feel is a mix of self-pity, resilience, motivation, sadness, abandonment, opportunity and overall avoidance. 

[Leej]

Sorry you loss both your parents! I loss my mother and my father passed away two weeks ago. My mother passed away fourteen years ago from lung cancer. I miss them both very much! It is normal to be in shock and tears may not come for awhile. The pain does get better over time. 

[Rebecca H]

I’m so sorry you are going through this. Although I don’t know exactly what you are going through, I lost my dad suddenly in April and I am also in my 20’s. It has been almost 5 months and I can’t say that it gets better- for me the longer he has been gone it seems to get harder especially with “special events.” Recently I was on a family vacation and this is when it seemed to hit me the most that my dad was gone because he was supposed to be there with us. There was no goodbye for my family and some days I still feel like I’m in shock. The loneliness sinks in once everyone on the outside has stopped asking about them and seems to have forgotten what happened. For me this seemed to happen pretty quickly. Please don’t feel like you should be grieving a certain way- grief comes in waves. Sometimes I feel like I’m still in shock and haven’t really dealt with my dads death. Some days will be ok and other days the loneliness and pain will seem so unbearable.