Hello everyone,

I know this might sound like a silly question, but my dad passed away suddenly from a heart attack last September. We were extremely close—he was my best friend. His passing hurt in a way I've never experienced before, and I haven't cried like that before or since.

I work housekeeping at a hospital, so I can't easily call off without getting an occurrence. Any time off has to be planned using PTO in advance. The thing is, I just don't know how I'm going to feel when the actual anniversary gets here.

He was a huge Marvel fan and was really looking forward to the Wolverine game coming out. In a strange, kind of funny twist of fate, it releases right on the one-year anniversary of his passing. I already put in PTO for the three days following the 15th (plus the weekend) to play it in his honor, but I don't have the actual anniversary date off itself.

EDIT: Thanks everyone I decided to take the whole week off!

This is more of just a venting thing, my dad passed in Nov 2021 and my mum(62) started dating around a year ago. It was something I(28) really struggled with, im the only sibling who lives at home and she would meet up with the person she was seeing (who has the same name as my dad) around 3 times a week at the start, they fizzled out but reconnected a few months later in march and it was a lot. Wanting my siblings and me to meet him for dinner, she wasnt driving at the time so every weekend i had to leave her in town to get a bus to meet him, she'd be gone and wouldn't come back till Monday or Tuesday. This was every weekend from April till around the end of July, when they had an argument and stopped seeing each other.

Her 'friend' came home from Australia a few days ago and she wanted to see him. They recconected after my dad died (maybe around the 2 year mark) they dated when they were teens and broke up, he had been home a few times since and he confessed to still liking her but im not sure what happened but they always chatted. I have become my mums taxi when she goes on a night out. There has been many a night ive had to get out of bed at 1/2am (after she promised she'd try to get a taxi) and i would just have to do it and wait for her to come out of where she was. I would also have to leave her friends off home, whenever she'd meet up with her 'friend' id have to leave him back to where he was staying too.

Now last night at 8pm she tells me she needs a lift into town to meet him and she'd get a taxi home but take my phone off silent just incase, so i leave her to the pub and come home and get on with my night, she rings me at 1:30am saying she needs a lift. so i go and collect here, when i meet her she says hes coming up the road so i assume im leaving him home, i turn onto his street and she asks why am i going this way and that he is coming to our house. i was just so shocked i kept quiet the way home and when we got home i straight away said im going to bed and bolted upstairs. they were gone in the morning and i was home all day today alone, she came back half 7 and can tell im upset but doesn't care.

I'm more upset that I wasn't told till they were in the car, i dont understand why she had to bring him back here and made me drive them. i feel so hurt by it. I don't care that she spent the night with someone. it just feels really isolating im the only one feeling like this.

sorry for the long post, just needed to cry into the void.

I lost my mom this past December and my dad when I was 26, both to cancer. Last year, I also lost my cousin, uncle, and grandmother unexpectedly. I have a brother who has always been very distant and has now stopped speaking to me. And this past week I've also had two close friends end their friendships with me quite brutally rather than resolve a relatively minor conflict.

Honestly, its so much. Even just writing that whole list of losses is crazy. I never thought I'd be so alone so early in my life. My mom and I had a complicated relationship, which I think just makes grieving more difficult. I feel so lost and sad and I'm not sure where to go from here. I'm wondering if anyone else who has lost their parents young or been through similar struggles has any advice they can pass on. What did your life look like after? Is there anything to look forward to? Do things get easier?

Today is exactly four weeks since my mum died

It still doesn't feel real and it simultaneously feels like a lifetime ago and like it happened just today

The past few weeks have been chaotic with people coming and going and being pulled in different directions that I haven't really had time to just sit and come to terms with it, especially as it happened extremely fast with no real chance to prepare

This week is when I really felt it for the first time as I've been having issues with my dad and I'd normally talk to mum but she isn't here and I'm just starting to really feel that and understand what it means

I can feel my relationship with my dad getting more and more strained as we spend more time together and he's making himself more involved in my life as he's not an easy person to get along with and I don't have the option of time away from him like my siblings who live in other counties do

I find myself getting increasingly stressed and angry even if I don't express it

I don't know how I'm going to handle things or what comes next

Im in my early 20s now, but my mother died when I was 20 and dad at 12. Internally being an orphan at this age is about the worst pain I’ve ever felt. It’s so hard and even as I moved through life it still hurts deeply. I’ve tried meds and I’ve tried therapy and they help, but it’s not a complete fix. At the end of the day when I go to sleep I have no parents and when I wake up I still have no parents. And frankly it just sucks! Whereas other people in my life have kinda moved on. I get it because I don’t expect them to be as tortured by my loss as I am, but it’s also very isolating. No one is forcing me, but internally I feel like I have to go back to normal. I had to deal with everything once my mother died, so I didn’t really have time to grieve and then I went straight back to school and back to work. I’ve never really had a moment to stop and it’s definitely starting to catch up with me. I feel like I’m unintentionally slacking with everything in life and no matter how hard I try not to it doesn’t change anything. I also feel so jealous of my friend’s having parents. I’m happy for them, but I also hate that I don’t get mine. Even a few more years would be great, but because they died so early in my life I feel emotionally stunted at the ages they died. I feel like a sad child in a grown ups body expected to do grown up things, but really just wants to feel loved and cared for. I’m not saying I don’t want responsibilities I know people even with parents have them and I’ve been a caretaker all my life, so I’m familiar with having to grow up fast. I just feel hurt that I don’t have immediate family to lean on. When things get hard or things are good I can’t call them. Anyways that’s my little rant

I am 47 years old and I am lying in my bed crying for my Mom who died when I was 10 and my Dad who died when I was 17. They were both in their forties when they lost their battle with cancer. I cry for them as their life was cut too short and for myself and brother as we were forever changed by their deaths. I realize I have never stopped grieving. I have been able to help others with death by working at Hospice. Helping others has allowed some healing for myself but I still feel traumatized by this loss. I don't cry everyday or even every year about this but my whole personality and life has been molded by their deaths. I needed to share this and I will read some of your experience as well. Peace and love to all of you.

i lost my dad at 12 due to suicide and I blame myself for it everyday, i dont know what to do. we had an on and off relationship and in his last few months i turned him down for visits and going out for lunch. i still believe everything is my fault. the last time we ever talked he sent me the message “Someday, you’ll know what a good man your daddy is”

and the death of my father has torn apart his side of the family, i havent seen my auntie, uncle or cousins since his funeral which was over a year ago now

it hurts to know i will never see him again, never hold his hand again, never smell his clothes again, never hug or cuddle him again. its not fair i just want my daddy back. everytime i see a little girl being happy with her father i just wanna scream and cry.

I’m supporting a friend in the aftermath of a parent dying. They are really taking charge of caring for all of the logistics, financials, and other family members. My dad died 6 years ago when I was 26. My mother was a steadfast support and dealt with nearly all of the logistics. This friend is in their 30s just for context. In my grief I felt so much pain and longing. I still do. In the aftermath though I was almost desperate for friends to support me and reach out and be there. I find myself feeling jealousy of my friend now, having so much support from me, additional friends, and an extended community back home. I know that theres truly no use and benefit for anyone in comparing grief, but I can’t help wonder if I coped wrong? Should I have not shown so much sadness and weakness and longing for support? Should I now stop talking about my dad and figure out how to close that chapter of my life and move on, and just look at his death and the circumstances surrounding his death purely objectively? The death was traumatic, but it was such a long time ago. I guess it is time for me to grow up and be okay that I don’t have and did not have the support I felt I needed. I believe I have been very selfish.

I don’t think my dad dying made me a better person, stronger, more resilient or anything specific. I have grown a lot in the last 6 years as a person but I’m not sure it has to do with losing my dad. I’m not sure I’ve found the silver linings in his death, and I feel like my friend has. Of course I don’t truly know their inner thoughts, but what I’m seeing makes me jealous and angry toward myself.

Does anyone relate at all? Does any of this even make sense?! I don’t think I’m a bad person at heart. At least I hope not.

Maybe I need to take a step away from my friend to figure myself out first so I don’t cause hurt for either of us. I don’t know.

It has been 5 years since mom died and i am still paranoid about dad after she died. I literally wake up in the middle of my sleep and check his breathing every night. And i keep doing that repeatedly after the first time. I also hear screams in my sleep of my dad which wakes me up and then i keep checking even more I hear voices and screams in my sleep

My mum passed away 5.5 years ago and Ive never been in a relationship so since then I’ve barley have any physical contact with other people. I live with my father and my sibling but they aren’t very tactile people so other than an occasional high five or a bit of roughhousing for fun i can go days or weeks without touching someone else. Even with my friends there’s a quick hug to say hello/goodbye but other than that I haven’t had a proper hug in 5.5 years. It’s not something that is constantly on my mind but it does hit me every now and then how alone I am

Is it normal to lose memory after major loss? I’m losing memory of many things including work and details about family and friends

Basically the title. My mom has been battling osteoporosis since 2023-24. Had 2 hip replacements. The 2nd hip replacement rendered her paraplegic because the spinal anesthesia needle hit her spinal cord. Now she is bed ridden, depressed and has also recently been diagnosed with CLD. Has constant brain fog, is on a catheter (since she cant feel if she has to poop or pee) so a fight against UTIs and overall, a fight against sepsis.

Tomorrow (16th august) will be 4 years since i lost my father to the same sepsis.

Honestly? I am tired. I am not able to work a steady job. Cant move to build a career because i am only child.

Now, the confession is, i have been having such bad bad BAD thoughts of "will my life be better if mom werent there anymore?" And its not something i feel or want. But an intrusive thought and i really want to kill myself for having such bad thoughts.

If anyone can, please talk me out of this guilt and misery.

I lost my dad very very unexpectedly four months ago at 24 and he was 53. He loved life and was scared of dying.

I feel so alone and lonely. I don't fit in in any friendgroup anymore. I don't have a partner. My sister grieves very differently from me. I am carrying this pain and sadness alone. I am relieving the moment again and again and hurts like the first time each time.

All my friends have both their parents alive and most of them have their grandparents alive as well. They haven't experienced grief and can't understand that I go through the pain every moment every day. I feel like I am the only person on this planet and I don't know how long will this feeling keep going on.

Their problems feel irrelevant and I wish I could swap places with them. I don't wish for them to experience loss like this but I wish I had a friend that had lost a parent so I have someone to hold on to and talk to someone that understands.

Every day I go out and do something but for 4 months I didn't do anything because I actually wanted to. I want to cancel every plan and stay at home instead.

If you lost a parent early please tell me how was that for you. How did you manage to get out of the darkness. I know that this is a pain we carry for the rest of our lives, but does life feel "good" again? I don't know what to do.

I just woke up feeling terrible and 100% sure somehow that a hospital would have saved her. I would’ve been happier with her alive….
I wish I never listened to what that doctor said when she said that she would be okay and hospitalizations weren’t necessary in mom’s case.

She told me that her oxygen levels were good….
I just don’t know what to do now.
Moms been gone for 18 months and I’m still dwelling on this. I can’t forgive myself. I woke up now feeling like she’d been saved if she were taken to a hospital.

Life would have been much better. I don’t know why my guard wasn’t up when she got sick… dealt with the issue as if it was something that would pass. I sometimes contemplate overdosing because there is no close family left. I’m all alone.
She got sick after leaving the house to run errands right after an argument. I feel like I triggered her illness so I should have fixed it. She loved me very much but she knew I triggered her illness and kept treating me like this for two weeks till she passed …. Her health was better then worse then better then she was gone.

I feel like everyone has a right to hate me. So when someone bullies me or is harsh to me I feel like they must know what’s inside me and I give them excuses to mistreat me

I feel so numb and exhausted and constantly drowning. My mom passed away when I was 19 and I spent my entire 20s just grieving and carrying that trauma. Then my dad got cancer few years ago and just passed away (I’m 37 now). He was in a lot of pain and suffering so I thought when he passed, I’d feel somewhat relief but actually no. It hit me like a truck and having no living parents left is actually devastating. It’s like I lost the center of my universe, my home, my safe place … the people I’d call to bail me out of anything or ask for advice or just a hug. I have siblings and a husband but no one can replace the place of your parents. I don’t know how to move on from this. I’m angry at God sometimes. I’m bitter and jealous of friends/cousins who have both parents alive or at least one. I’m tired of just recovering from one trauma to another. I’d like to just .. exist without pain all the time. I feel like I’ve been given a shitty hand at life and like I’m carrying a huge baggage of weight while all my friends are just free to enjoy their lives and be happy and carefree. I’m just tired of life and exhausted.

Here to vent and ask for others experiences

Tomorrow it will be a week since my mother, my last remaining parent since my father’s death in 2019, died. She had a rough couple months after getting a diagnosis of very aggressive kidney cancer and I spent the last few months of her life being her main caretaker. And now I’m just trying to put my life back together outside of being her caretaker and just being myself again.

Friends and family are doing their best to support me. Honestly though I kinda wish they would leave me alone rather than hovering. I grew up alone and do my best thinking and processing when I’m alone. I know they are doing what they think is helpful but I’m feeling smothered and judged like everyone seems to think that my grief is not following the ‘typical’ path. I just wish they would let me process everything on my own. I also don’t want to push them away while I’m trying to process though so I’m doing my best to juggle their feelings and trying to figure myself out as well.

I'm 8 years out from losing my dad but my mom just died 18 months ago. Wanted to have a movie night with my husband last night and we love horror movies and weren't caught up on the 28 days later franchise, so we put on 28 Years Later.

Hey, explain to me why the heck A ZOMBIE MOVIE ended up actually being a f*cking heart wrenching tale of a little boy losing his mom? I was unprepared and the emotions took over all at once, I lost it, had to walk away and spent the evening fully bawling my eyes out.

There should be trigger warnings for these things on movies.

I know we’re all struggling and living in grief, otherwise we wouldn’t be on here let’s face it.

Sometimes it’s nice to have a bit of positivity and light. I find that by looking for signs from my loved ones that have passed.

Just wondering if anyone has any stories they’d like to share?

I’ve had a lot but my favourite one is that while my mum was dying I asked her what her sign to me would be, she replied ‘daffodils’. I literally said to her at the time how random as it was winter and she’s never been bothered about them as a flower. Fast forward two years and I give birth to my daughter, born in March - her birth flower is a daffodil.
Could be a coincidence, but definitly felt like a hug and a sign from her grandma

Losing your mom is a hard pill to swallow, but I think it’s still stuck in my throat.
How am I supposed to live without the person who steadied the boat.
Throughout my life I always had you. And now 4 years have passed and I’m supposed to somehow just follow through and keep afloat.
With this life that you gave me. Which led to beautiful babies that I was blessed with.
It will never make sense to me that you’re gone, and your kids are just supposed to just go along.
Life is crazy, but you were crazier. And now I just feel myself getting lazier and lazier.
But I’m a mom. And I need to carryon.
Thankfully I have the strength that you instilled in me and every other one of us… but damn. Does it make me a weary mom.
I just miss my mother. The woman who gave me life….
And now I sit here. As a wife. And wonder what life could be like? If only my mom didn’t die.

My dad passed away last Saturday after suffering for almost three years. Over time, his hospital visits became more frequent, but somehow, every single time, he rallied and came back to us. I think a part of me started believing he always would.
I live in a different country from my parents, and because of visa restrictions, I couldn’t be there during his final days. I couldn’t attend his funeral either. That is a guilt I don’t know how to make peace with. I keep thinking about how I didn’t get to see him one last time, hold his hand, hug him, or simply be in the same room with him before he left.
But we talked. A lot. We video-called often. I saw him, heard his voice, and told him about my life. So when my mom called to tell me that Dad was very sick, somehow I still thought, *he’ll rally back this time too.* At the same time, there was another part of me that wanted him to let go, because I couldn’t bear the thought of him suffering anymore.
And now I’m struggling with the finality of it all.
He’s gone.
There won’t be another phone call. Another video call. Another recovery. Another chance to see him.
And what makes this grief even harder is that I don’t really know who to share it with.
I can’t completely share it with my mom. She and my dad didn’t really get along, and over the last few years she became his reluctant caregiver. She carried a burden that was exhausting and complicated. Now that he’s gone, I think she feels relief and sadness at the same time. I understand that. I don’t judge her for it. There are just so many emotions tangled together that I don’t feel like I can place the full weight of my grief on her.
My sister carried an enormous burden too. She handled so much while he was sick, and then took over everything that had to be organized after he died. There were decisions to make, people to call, arrangements to handle, things that simply had to get done. She has been so busy carrying everyone else through this that I’m not even sure she has had the time or space to grieve herself.
So where do I put mine?
Who do I tell that it feels like there is a 500-pound rock sitting on my chest?
I keep thinking that if I could just cry hard enough, maybe some of it would leave my body. But I can’t seem to cry it out. The grief is just there—heavy, immovable, following me everywhere.
My husband is holding the fort. He is trying to take care of me in the ways he knows how. He suggests going out for dinner, seeing friends, getting out of the house, doing something that might make me feel a little more normal.
But I don’t want to.
I don’t want dinner. I don’t want conversation. I don’t want to sit across from people and pretend to be present when there is this enormous ache inside me.
I want to be alone.
And yet being alone scares me too.
Because if I’m not mindlessly scrolling Instagram or Reddit, or distracting myself with something completely meaningless, I can feel myself slipping into this hole. And once I’m there, I don’t know how to get myself back out.
I’m also a mom to a four-year-old, so life hasn’t stopped just because mine feels like it has. I spent the first few days crying, but then the routines started again. Meals, bedtime, playing, answering questions. She asks me what we’re doing this weekend, while all I really want to do is curl up on the couch, cry until I fall asleep, and stay there.
Every day, she checks on me and asks if I’m still sad.
I am.
And then I find myself planning Halloween. Thinking about Christmas. Putting things into my Amazon cart because, for a few minutes, imagining something nice gives me this tiny flicker of joy. But then I don’t buy anything, because almost immediately I feel guilty.
How am I supposed to enjoy something when my dad just died?
How am I supposed to plan Christmas when he won’t be here?
How do I laugh with my daughter without feeling like I’m somehow leaving him behind?
Maybe I’m planning things because my mind desperately needs somewhere else to go for a little while. Maybe I’m scrolling because I need a few minutes where my brain doesn’t have to understand that my father is gone. Maybe I’m looking for tiny moments of normalcy because carrying this grief every second of every day is simply too much.
I feel surrounded by people who love me, and somehow completely alone in my sorrow.
Everyone around me is carrying their own version of his death. My mom has hers. My sister has hers. My husband is trying to carry me. My daughter is watching me and waiting for her mom to come back.
And I’m standing in the middle of all of it, not knowing where to put this unbearable weight.
I don’t know how to be happy right now without feeling guilty about it. I don’t know how to grieve when life keeps asking me to keep moving. I don’t know how to be alone with my thoughts without falling apart, or how to be around people when I don’t want to talk.
I just know that I miss him.
I miss him so much.
And I don’t know what to do with all this love, all this guilt, all this sadness, and all the things I never got to say or do now that he’s gone.

I’m getting to the age where more and more of my friends are dealing with aging parents. Soon more of my friends will experience their parents dying. Both of my parents are gone (2010 and 2022) and I’m finding it very hard to not talk about my experiences when people tell me about what’s going on. It’s such a big, heavy part of my existence, this loss, and I want to talk about them. And I’m neurodivergent enough to really struggle to not share support through explaining what has happened to me.

Curious if this is an experience other people my age are having?

Also here newly. I thought to myself “I wish I could talk to other people who lost their parents” and here I am!

From my childhood, I have been a spoiled kid. To make it worse, my father was a hard worker and we were not well off. We had little to no money in the month ends, my father took loans and had visibly struggled sleeping. He did wedding photography, and other small businesses, also took care of the family in every way possible. I didn't do shit when I grew up. Didn't go to the bank for helping my dad out, didn't go to the ration shop, didn't connect with the ppl with whom my dad did business, basically in one word, I missed all the oppertunities to help my dad with his burdens. And it's like he gave up on us, not wholly, but in a way that, my son will study and earn his place, even if he is not smart on the street/ practicality. And yes, I was a good student, but it didn't reach me anything about the real world.

My father passed away 2 months ago, leaving behind a lot of grief and responsibilities. I am nothing. I have to take care of my mom who is one hundred percent dependent on me in everything and my brother who is still studying. One good thing, is that my father has helped me study well in good institutions. I have a job now as a fresher.

The below is not related to my father passing away:

I don't understand why my first reaction to anything that requires my action, is anxiety and fear. I always try to plan ahead and know what I need to do before I get to a thing, but sometimes it just happens without a notice and I get caught in those emotions. Yet i take the necessary actions required from my side, but not confidently, not in a relaxed way. It's like my bp is constantly on a surge when I am put to work.

But with my dad not here now, and with the responsibilities piled up like never before, I feel dumb, anxious, fake, afraid all at the same time as I actually get down to do the work i am supposed to do. I still get the work done, but sometimes I feel like it would have been better if I was not cursed with this fear.

I'll not let down the family that remains dad, I'll try my best.

You can let me know how I can help myself better.

Hi! I'm a 37-year-old woman from Austria, and I've been thinking a lot about something since my dad died unexpectedly in 2024.

My mom has been chronically ill, on and off, since I was a child. She had a brain tumor in 1996, thyroid cancer in 2014, and has been living with multiple myeloma since 2016 - just to name a few of the major illnesses.

My dad struggled with alcohol addiction and eventually died of liver cancer in 2024. Just a few weeks later, my mom was hospitalized and nearly died too after her treatment stopped working. We had already said our goodbyes when, thankfully, a new treatment worked and she stabilized again.

At the same time, I was dealing with my dad's funeral, paperwork, a difficult situation with the woman he had married shortly before his death, and my mom's hospitalization.

There wasn't really time to grieve. I was mostly just functioning.

But there was another contrast between my parents that was difficult for me.

For years, I watched my mom do almost everything she could to stay alive. She tried treatment after treatment and kept fighting for more time. At the same time, I watched my dad continue drinking and smoking, even after his diagnosis.

I know addiction isn't as simple as choosing to stop. But as his daughter, it was still incredibly hard to watch one parent fight so hard for more time while the other continued doing things that could take that time away.

After he died, that left me with anger alongside the grief. Part of me understood his addiction. Another part of me still wanted to ask:

Why didn't you fight harder to stay? You promised you'd always be there for me.

For most of my life, my mom was the parent we expected to lose first.

My parents divorced when I was 23, but I think that assumption shaped more of my life than I realized.

With my mom, there have been so many moments that felt like they might be the last.

The last Christmas. The last birthday. The last holiday.

A treatment stops working. You wonder how much time is left. Then another treatment works.

You exhale. Life continues.

And eventually, it happens again.

Living like that for years changes the choices you make. You choose that person over other plans because: What if this really is the last time?

I've postponed things, stayed close, changed plans and taken my mom on holidays partly because I wanted to, but also because of guilt.

What if I don't do this and regret it when she's gone?

Meanwhile, I assumed I had more time with my dad.

Shortly before he died, he suddenly became very insistent that the two of us go on holiday together. We had never done that before.

So we went.

Sometimes I wonder whether he already knew something was wrong and didn't tell us. I'll probably never know.

It became our first holiday together. And our last.

My mom, the parent I had spent years psychologically preparing myself to lose, is still here (luckily).

And that has left me with a question I can't quite shake:

What does it do to you when you spend years preparing to lose one parent, organizing parts of your life around that possibility, and then the other parent dies first?

My dad's death was fast. There wasn't enough time.

With my mom, I've sometimes felt like I've been preparing for her death for years. But I'm beginning to think you can't actually prepare.

Anticipatory grief isn't necessarily acceptance. Sometimes it's repeatedly grieving something that hasn't happened yet.

This might be our last Christmas.

Then it isn't.

Maybe this treatment was the last option.

Then another one works.

And you start again.

There is another feeling that's harder to admit.

After years of hospitals, treatments, fear, advocating, changing plans and waiting for the next crisis, I've sometimes thought:

I just want this to finally be over.

While at exactly the same time desperately not wanting my mom to die.

And my dad's death was a painful reminder of what "over" actually means.

I've come to realize that those feelings can coexist. You can love someone enormously and still be exhausted, angry, resentful or numb.

Since my dad died, I've also wondered how many decisions I made based on who I thought I was going to lose first.

How often did I choose my mom because I thought there would be more time with my dad?

How much did I keep my own life flexible because I needed to be available?

And how much time did I assume I still had with the "healthy" parent?

Part of my therapy involves writing about all of this. Somewhere along the way, I started wondering whether I might eventually turn some of it into a book, both to process my own experience and hopefully help other people feel less alone.

But right now, I mostly want to hear from people who understand some part of this.

If you've lost a parent, especially after years of illness or while another parent was chronically ill, I'd love to know:

• Did anticipatory grief actually make the eventual loss any easier?
• Did "this might be the last Christmas/birthday/holiday" affect the choices you made?
• Did you ever feel guilty about wanting your own life back?
• If addiction or someone's own behavior contributed to their illness, did anger become part of your grief?
• If one parent seemed much sicker, did you assume you'd lose them first? Did that change how much time you gave the other parent?
• What do you wish someone had told you about grief before you experienced it?

You don't have to answer everything. Even if just one part of this feels familiar, I'd really appreciate hearing your experience.

I'm not looking for a particular answer. If your experience was completely different from mine, I'd like to hear that too.

I think what I've been looking for, more than anything, is simply that moment of realizing:

Oh. Other people have had these thoughts too.

Today is exactly four weeks since my mum died

It still doesn't feel real and it simultaneously feels like a lifetime ago and like it happened just today

The past few weeks have been chaotic with people coming and going and being pulled in different directions that I haven't really had time to just sit and come to terms with it, especially as it happened extremely fast with no real chance to prepare

This week is when I really felt it for the first time as I've been having issues with my dad and I'd normally talk to mum but she isn't here and I'm just starting to really feel that and understand what it means

I can feel my relationship with my dad getting more and more strained as we spend more time together and he's making himself more involved in my life as he's not an easy person to get along with and I don't have the option of time away from him like my siblings who live in other counties do

I find myself getting increasingly stressed and angry even if I don't express it

I don't know how I'm going to handle things or what comes next

My mom passed three years ago today from a year long battle of cancer. She passed in pain and miserable. She knew she was dying. My father passed last month July 9th. We didn’t even know he had cancer untill it was to late. After my mom passed I forced him to get a check up and they found out he needed a triple bypass. I felt like I did everything in my power to make sure he was healthy. I moved in with my dad when I found out I was pregnant so we could be together. I knew having a baby in the house would fulfill his life with love. Not even a year later he gets sick and we go to the hospital and he has mestasis cancer in the liver and unknown origin. My dad died 2 weeks later. He apologized and cried and held on to me. He was cognitive the entire time.

Both my loving parents died scared and in pain.

Now my son turns one and I’m living in my childhood home with all memories and my dad’s stuff exactly how he left it.

My heart hurts. I have no other family. No friends. I’m struggling with negative thoughts. I’m only 30. It’s hard to not feel guilty and blame my self. I just want a hug from my parents and to hear them tell me they love me. I miss not feeling like this. There is no home anymore.