what do i do now

[sawyer22]

I'm 22 i lose my stepdad august 26th of this year. About a week later my real dad decide to walk out of my life. Between all that the relationship i was in fell apart. i have been in piece ever since but i have to be tough for my mom. I dont know what to do anymore cause i can't talk to any of my family cause there their for my mom and tell me to take care of her. I'm trying to get into college cause i have put it off long enough but i cant really leave her alone for very long. My life is so messed up right now just not sure what to do.

[karebear]

I am sorry to hear you have experienced so much loss. After someone dies it seems like any form of loss, especially involving a relationship feels like 100 worse. I lost my dad in May and I also was told to be strong and take care of my mom. I felt that I had no one to which I could really express my grief or loss to because I had to be strong for my mom and didn't want her to worry. The thing is that grief can't be hidden, if you keep it in it just comes out in a different form, like anger or depression. I encourage you to find someone, for me it was a distant aunt that I hadn't talked to in 20 years who you can share with. It has been over 6 months for me and I grieve everyday so I am not going to tell you it is going to get better faster, but it will eventually get better, I have to believe that. In the meantime I like to think that each day I live my life to the fullest and push forward, especially when I don't want to, makes my dad proud and I believe he can still see me. As for dealing with loss of others such as relationships, all I can say is that it hurts much worse now but you have to remember that you don't deserve to be treated like that and that it is their loss. Hang in there.

[Silvergirl61]

This is a good place, with a lot of caring people. i am sorry to hear about your loss, too, and it's good of you to be taking care of your mom. It sounds like you are going through some of the same things my daughter is going through, and I am so sorry about that! We lost her stepdad, almost three months ago, too, and I feel like I am leaning on my girl way too much, and I worry about her constantly...and wish i was a stronger and better mom, or that I knew what to do for her, or the right thing to say. My ex and I don't have a good relationship, so it colors my views, and I'm afraid of saying the wrong thing, and making it worse for her. She is such a wonderful girl, and I love her very much, and I feel really stupid and weak sometimes, not able to cope with this better. Maybe your mom feels like that, too. It hurts so much, I just can't think straight sometimes. I wish she would talk to me more, but I don't even know how to start a conversation anymore..

Maybe you could try talking to your mom about how you feel? You know her, and if you have a good relationship, maybe she is just waiting for you to try. Maybe you can kind of lean on each other, or help each other. I know if I could just get something to feel slightly normal somedays..it makes things easier.

I hope coming here helps you, it has been a lot of help to me.

Make sure you think about you, and take care of you, too, ok? Your mom will get better, and I'll bet she's really proud and grateful to have such a great daughter. I know I am. Welcome to the site, Sawyer. Try the chat , too, if you haven't..sometimes, having someone to talk to helps a lot.

[mperez13]

Today is my son Christopher’s birthday. Only he won’t be here to celebrate. He would have been 28 years old. Three months ago today he drowned in a swimming pool after passing out from a seizure brought on by years of drug addiction. It started when he was 16, first with marijuana, then oxycontin and finally heroin. From the first time I discovered he was using drugs I had a premonition this would happen and so I lived for all these years in a state of worry, anxiety and dread. Addiction runs in our family. My brother died from it. I am a recovering alcoholic (26 years sober) and my son’s grandparents on his mother’s side were alcoholics. Even before using drugs we knew something was wrong with Chris, starting around the age of ten. He had bouts of mild depression and an obsessiveness which, at times, was unending. We had him tested and discovered that he had ADD which accounted for his difficulty in school and also led to a lack of self esteem. He would start a project and never finish. He gave up easily if a task was too hard. He has temper tantrums and was often nasty and rude to us and much later on, in the full throes of addiction blamed us for making him feel abnormal and different by taking him to doctors and therapists to try to help him. A catch 22.Despite all this he had an IQ of 135. But this didn’t matter. Genetically and psychologically he was ripe for addiction. The correlation between ADD and addiction alone is high and when you add all the other issues, my son was marked with a disease that kills so many young people. We did everything in our power to help him conquer his addiction: 5 rehabs, numerous therapists and addiction specialists, outward-bound programs. For a period of 4 years he was sober and it looked as if he had won the battle.

In those years he was so respected and considered special by the last rehab he went to they hired him to help other young addicts. But five years ago an accident that caused severe nerve damage and constant pain incapacitated him for while and, of course, the doctors put him on highly addictive painkillers. It was the perfect storm from which he never recovered.

Arrests, car accidents, disappearances, unpaid bills. This was his life from that point on. And our nightmare. 24 by 7.

What was my son like if you stripped away the addiction? He was a lovable, teddy bear with a smile that would melt your heart. He was extremely good looking, generous, loyal and had

such charisma that everyone who met him fell in love with him-and never forgot him. He had an aura about him even people who had every reason to hate him couldn’t get over. At his service three months ago over 400 people came and filled the church. People came from as far away as Australia. I was stunned by the outpouring of love and affection all these people had for Chris. Stunned because all I saw for so many years was the affects of addiction: the terrible times, the accidents, the overnight trips to California to get him out of trouble, the midnight phone calls…How many people told me to “focus on the good times”.

How could I? I was like the soldier who comes home after years of battle and fatigue and fear with a case of post traumatic stress disorder. In fact, the therapist I am seeing now told me that this is what I have. After so many years of trying to save his life, he dies. Now what? My hope for him dies with him. My yearning to see him recover and become a happy young man dies with him. The future dies with him. When I look at his smiling, innocent picture, taken when he was 7 years old, before all the trouble started, it becomes immensely sad. A lovely, healthy young boy becomes frozen in time and neither he, nor his mother nor I know then what was in store. We were oblivious. How I wish that little kid could walk in the door. Knowing what I know now I fantasize about taking him in my arms and telling him it’s going to be alright-because I know where it’s going and I’m not going to let that happen. I tell him that I will protect him. An impossible dream which only leads to despondency and a sense of helplessness.

Everyone who has lost a child understands what this grief is like and although everyone goes through this journey in his or her own way there is one common elements which we all share: there is a hole in our hearts which will remain until the day we die.

I miss my son. I want him back but know I cannot have him, or see him or touch him ever again. The pain of this knowledge, at times, is unbearable. The sadness is so deep it has no bottom.

I can only pray that what I hear from so many people who lost a child that time does lesson the intensity of the pain from the loss. And that we can even learn to laugh again without feeling guilty.

I am not there yet. By any means. Someday I hope to be and remember my son and his smile and his basic decency and goodness.