My mother passed Christmas day in 2018 while in Hospice in a hospital. I witnessed her suffer tremendous, excruciating pain as the staff could not control her pain (despite their promise to "make her comfortable and control her pain"). I stayed with her for 13 long days and nights, right by her side until she took her last breath. I STILL have PTSD from that which I relive over and over again . She was married to my father for almost 60 years. My father was never the same after she died.
My father passed away last week from Sepsis while I held his hand at the same hospital my beloved mother passed away in. (The hospital they were at failed to properly diagnose him and it was too late by the time they did).
I am beyond devastated and just feel totally alone and empty. It literally took all I had to get out of bed this morning.
I know people are saying "well, they are together now and no more pain for either one of them" but that doesn't help, unfortunately. I hurt...the pain of them not being here is almost too much. "Time" did not help me at all after my mother passed. Not at all. Being isolated from friends and family during this Pandemic doesn't help either. I just want to be with my parents.
Any advice would be most appreciated.
Thank you.
I read somewhere that when faced with terrible grief, the mind protects us by hiding the loss deep inside somewhere, quarantining it in a way, until the griever is able start to process the loss. That made sense to me. I also started on a low dose anti-depressant (Zoloft) which helped greatly.
My suggestion for right now is to make an appointment with your doctor to assess whether medication is warranted. Talk therapy should follow. It helped me to talk with others who had lost loved ones.
One last thing that still gives me comfort: my mother's and father's genes are within me. As long as I carry their blood, they live on in me.
May you find peace and comfort.
My dad almost passed last year from sepsis also
He was brought to hospital with very little energy and stomach pain, they kept him overnight, called me the next morning and said he was ok
I brought him to his home where as soon as he got out of car collapsed on sidewalk
I immediately called an ambulance and had him brought to another hospital
His temp was 104, he had a gallbladder that spilled into his system and caused sepsis
They gave him high doses of antibiotics and ended up taking his gallbladder out
Now he is ok
As far as both parents being gone I know it has to be devastating, I almost l ou st my mom 5 years ago so for the last 5 years have been spending lots of time talking to my parents, spending a couple days at their house and when I leave always hug and tell both of them I love them
I realize someday they wont be here but I have lots of memories and know it's the cycle of life.
It's only been a week since your dad died. The fact is a lot of older people die from things that are missed or just can't be fixed. Doctors and nurses are not super-human and they do the best they can. Some pain can't be eliminated, and not all infections are clear and treatable.
I'd say the most important things to do now are 1. Forgive those who tried to help your parents but didn't measure up to your expectations. As I said, they're human. 2. Give yourself permission to grieve, to feel empty, and to realize we only have so much power to make things go the way we want.
The end of life is still part of life, and while it's painful, so was the birth of that person. With a birth, the pain comes before the joy, and with a death, the joy comes before the pain.
My neighbor and friend lost both her parents within 6 months of each other and her husband left her in between their deaths.
She is still (2 years) grieving and struggling with her impending divorce. All I have done is be a listening ear to her. She has so much anger and pain. Her soon-to-be ex has installed listening devices all over the house and she cannot talk freely, b/c he records EVERYTHING for the upcoming divorce hearings. We have a signal between us--that if she needs to talk freely, she makes a comment about a recipe and then I know she needs to come to MY house and talk.
I have encouraged her to seek counseling, she has not done so. She has supportive siblings and they are shoring her up.
Along the way, with this husband, she lost her 'faith' and I am hopefully helping her to find it again. Just being there for her, I know is helpful. She's a hoarder, and knows it, I have let her know I will come and help her, she has to empty the house b/c she is not going to get it in the divorce.
I've prayed for her, encouraged her to return to the faith of her parents--and she knows that would help.
Life is hard. It's unfair. BUT, there are kind people out there and she will be OK. Our neighborhood has wrapped their arms around her and are supporting her, emotionally. She has to work through the pain herself, but she is NOT alone.
I hope you seek and fine people to share your feelings with. There are brighter days ahead, although I know it seems impossible now that could be so.
((Hugs))
Its silly she is allowing that and also you should be helping her to not have to live like that
My dad died (the closest person to me on earth) unexpectedly and instantly three weeks after my first child was born. This was a calamity in my life. On one side, this monstrous loss, on the other, a beautiful baby. I made hideous mistakes with both my baby and the rest of my world. My amazing husband, who loved Dad as much as I did, would leave for work and I’d be plunged into an abyss of “aloneness”. I was left through NO FAULT OF ANYONE, to fend for myself.
This went on much much too long, and ultimately I was hospitalized for an absolutely USELESS week on a psychiatric floor where no one learned my name, and everyone smoked and yelled.
What do I know now that I didn’t know then? I am a very non-fanciful person, and for about 3 1/2-4 years, I had a significant loss of “....Faith beyond understanding...” . I resented the fact that people would tell me they were praying for me, since their prayers hadn’t prevented my father’s loss.
But then, ultimately, my personal universe caused me to realize that the love I shared with my father had not been lost. The series of inexplicables that began to surround me became more insistent. We didn’t talk, but we were together. Decades later, this belief remains. It has nothing in particular to do with spiritualism or religion. It’s just part of my daily life.
I don’t contact my father, I just observe.
Consider this thought, and if you choose to reject it, that’s OK. Don’t be embarrassed as I was, by wanting to seek out the help of specialists. Give yourself credit when you DO “get out of bed”, and forgive yourself when you don’t.
Take hugs from friends and other LOs, even in these horrible times, virtual ones.
While the “they are together, he’s in no pain...” comments were NO HELP AT ALL to me, the thought that he was wanting me to be happy and enjoy things again DID gradually come to help, partially because I know that he’s still wanting that for me.
Baby steps. I understand where you are.