losing my mom

I'm so sorry for your loss.  *hugs*  I feel strongly that we are our own worst critics.  I would never be as hard on anyone as I am on myself.  And in my situation, it's because the people I'm caring for, my family, are the most important in the world to me.  Of course they deserve the best!  Can I always provide it?  No.  But do I always love them and let them know that?  Yes.  No other caregiver or facility can do that.  You are your mother's child.  No one could ever take your place to her.  Have faith that she took comfort in having you near in her final days.  I'm sure that was a huge comfort to her. 

One thing I may suggest is finding a local grief support group.  I'm betting the emotions you are experiencing are normal and others who have been in same situation have some great advice on how to cope with them.  Hopefully someone else will reply to you here, as well.

I can totally relate to the guilt. Its almost exactly a year since my mom passed on. 

I would like to have been able to do more, but I did the best I could.  Which wasn't always what I wish I could have been able to do.  I wanted to be superwoman.  Ha! So I've finally been able to come to a place where  I stopped beating myself up.  I feel more compassonate to others now.... understanding how hard it can be. 

btw,our local hospice organization has 8 week bereavement support groups.  A friend did that last year and found it really helpful.  I find it really helpful to just talk.  Most hospitals have groups too.

It was kind of funny -  just after my mom died I was at work, and  a woman came in for something and we started talking about all sorts of stuff, and then I just started blurting out about my mom, and she opened right up and told me all about her mom and losing her and it was just, well sort of sweet and amazing.

Missy you have such great perspective.  I just love that about being your mother's child.

hugs to you!

I totally understand about guilt surrounding your love one. I can't say I know exactly what you are feeling since mine is still alive. I know that you were there with your mom providing all the love anyone can show. No I didn't say perfectly but to the best of your ability. A mother knows the heart of their child for she held it close to her own for 9 months. There never seems enough time for anything anymore but you showed her love in one way or another everyday. Losing her hurts and will always to some degree, but carry her close to your heart always remembering we don't go by our feelings because they are fickle, but we go by knowing that grace was shown to her through you.

Charlene

I'm currently caring for my husband of 32 years. He is seventeen years older than I and has always been the boss in our relationship, now that he has end-stage congestive heart failure, I want him to keep the respect that being in charge has always given him, how do I do that and still make sure that things are done right? Sometimes he  doesn't think as clearly as he once did. Sometimes too, I get so tired and he really hates it when I have to go to the store or to the Dr. and  leave him with one of  our kids. How do I take care of us both, my health is not so good either.

Hi strugglingsue,

That sounds like a bit of a difficult time now for you all.  I think the reality of the situation is that we want to be in control, and the more that is out of our control, the more frustrated we become.  But at some point we really do have to surrender and give up. This can in fact open up the door to amazing and wonderful experiences of light and love and appreciation.

This is a good time also to find a balance of caring for oneself in the context of a relationship.  One way is to be really together when you are together and then really caring for yourself when you are doing that.... the quality of it.  (I know I go off to do something, and I can spend the entire time talking to myself about what I should be doing, and why I didn't do this or that....and I end up completely missing the little time to care for me.  big hugs!

What do you think?   

i lost my mom this past year from an car accident so i know how the pain is. im only 17 years old. but i have learned alot. my mom was 37 and she always was looking out for me and my sisters. and its really hard to deal with that so i know how the pain is. trust me . i do.

I'm so sorry for your loss, mommasbabygirl.  *hugs* 

I first took care of my Grand-mother befoe her death. She was never a grand-mothet to us even though we were her only grand-children. It made me feel good to be able to do this for her since I knew it meant so much to my Father. Ten years ago, I lost my Father, Mother and Husband in one year. They were not sudden deaths and we will never be the same people we were. A year and half ago I took care of my Mother-in-law for a brief time before her death. Afterward I stayed with my Father-in-law, taking care of his daily needs until his death two months ago. The reason I mention all this is because I think the feelings you are having are quite natural. I do it all the time, Maybe if I had done this or that, I could've done more, I should've done this or that. Sometimes I think we punish ourselves because we are still on this earth and they are not and it makes us feel quilty and are afraid to enjoy life thinking it shows a lack of love and respect. They would not want that for us. I have to tell myself quite often just how much I did for them, that I did everything in my power to show them how special they were and how much they were loved. I know in my heart that I gave them the best treatment possible. I know God knows this and thats all that matters really. I have had other re-affrim this but no matter what it still creeps in my mind that maybe I could have done more. I just try to chase that thought away. I know my loved ones have just made a trip ahead of me , are waiting for me to join them and one day we will be reunited. Take care and know in your heart that you did all you could do.

May I also add that eventually you will need to quit mourning their death and start celebrating their life. For each idividual it is different but this is what worked for me. One day I decided I wasn't going to dwell on the saddest day being the one when they left us. I had so many wonderful memories of their life, why was I concentrating on the worst. It was at that moment in time that I decided that they were such wonderful and loving people that I would start celebrating their life of the years and many memories that out weighed that one day. There was way more to them than just that day so why focus on just it.

So well said, Sid!  I lost my dad only three weeks ago yesterday and I'm still, very much, in mourning.  But what you said, makes a lot of sense.  Thank you for posting it.  And I'm sorry for all of your loss. 

my father died yesterday. he was 89. i’ve taken care of him for over 6 years (every day). i would do it all over again in a heartbeat. it was hard at times (i have a daughter and am a single mom). but, the last 6 1/2 years were some of the best memories i have of my dad. maybe it was because he had dementia, but he was more open. he shared himself more. he became more real. he was a great man. he was an independent man. he had his own business, paid for his retirement and his employees’ retirements (without the government). he didn’t expect his government to take care of him. he chaired the finance committe. he was a pilot (flew all over the world). he was honest man, a strong-willed man. i truly believe that his was the greatest generation. he worked hard. he played hard. he supported his family, community, and state. he was appointed as head of the aviation board and made frequent trips to washington, d.c. he was respected by all. he graduated top in his class. he strongly supported education. he would say that “you can never get enough education.” he loved his family. he believed in family. he was a perfectionist in everything he did. he was my dad. he was the best.

i'm trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together, and it's a big puzzle with complicated pieces.  i can't seem to sleep.  just when i'm about to go to sleep, i wake up, wide awake.  i'm exhausted.  does anyone have any nondrug ideas?

Hi logan,

I'm so sorry.  How heartbreaking.  I was in your shoes just a few weeks ago.

I think I still sometimes live in "wide awake" world.  It was bad for the first two weeks, but now only happens a night or two a week. 

It feels like time should stop to commemorate your loss, yet it doesn't.  It felt like those night-time hours were mine when things were still.  It makes no sense because I just ended up more tired the next day and, thus, more miserable, but I sometimes feel like those nights help me get a grip.

It will get easier.  It gets less raw.  We're here for you.  My heart goes out to you and makes me miss my own dad.  *hugs*

i am sorry for your loss, missy.  thank you for your kind words.  maybe those night-time hours are to be embraced rather than feared or resisted.  maybe in the stillness of the night my dad's spirit would be felt if i would just stop fighting his death.

my heart goes out to you.  we were lucky to have such great dads.

I lost my mom in 2004. she was 39 years. i know what is the pain of losing mom .... i don't have words for mom . MOM i love u 

My mother died two months ago yesterday. I have taken care of her in some fashion since my father died around 20 years ago. She lived with my husband and me for over 10 years because she was too frail/unsteady to take care of herself and during the past year we became her full-time caregivers. She had a stroke last year, wasn't able to walk anymore and developed vascular dementia. It was difficult, but we made it work. The last several months were not difficult, they were HARD, and with the bad weather we had in February I thought I was going nuts. My mom got really bad after Christmas (sleeping most of the time, getting "mean," fighting with me -- and I am embarrased to say I fought back -- and talking to "people" or yelling for me all night). My husband was having a had time lifting her (she fell twice) and suggeted that it might be time to think about placing her somewhere. I had PROMISED my mother than I would NEVER do that but our hospice nurse suggested that we might look into respite care for a few days. My mother was LIVID and said I was a horrible daughter...But that same day she suffered another mini-stroke, our electricity went out, which means her oxygen machine didn't work, so we took her to the hospice facility (where I stayed overnight with her the first night). She ended up staying there 5 days because our weather was so bad and my aide was snowed in. My husband, who was working nights, was unable to get home in time for me to leave for work in the morning, so I asked if she could stay at hospice until the snow stopped. There were 3 days when I couldn't get out to see my mom, but they kept telling me she "was fine." All she wanted was to come home...They brought her home by ambulance on a cold and snowy Thursday night -- she now had a catheter and was sleeping. She slept all day Friday and when she woke on Saturday morning I gave her some water and told her I was going to the grocery store and would bring her a "prize" (she loved prizes). My husband and our aid were with her -- she said she was hungry and after the aid gave her breakfast she started turning blue...my husband called the paramedics even though we had a dnr on her, but she was dead by the time I got home from the store (I had missed her death by minutes...) I feel so guilty for sending her away from the place she loved for 5 days, I feel so guilty for not visiting her every day while she was away, I feel guilty for leaving her the day she died, I am so angry at the hospice nurses who kept telling me she was fine and who NEVER came to the house to examine her the night she came home or even the next day -- and by the time the nurse DID show up on Saturday, she had already passed. To this day I have not heard anything from anyone at hospice. So to you all who have nothing but wonderful stories about hospice I am happy for you, but I am bitter. So many people have told me that my mother didn't want me there when she passed, but I KNOW that is not true. My mother ALWAYS wanted me me her, and I ALWAYS WAS with her...and I firmly believe that if one of the nurses had been over to check on her, they would have told me that we were nearing the end and I would NEVER have gone to the store. I am praying that she was not mad at me at the end...

After having said all that, my only advice to all of my grieving friends out there is to pray. Pray every day and keep on praying. In the end, God is all we have to comfort and consol us...

I feel and understand your anger at the medical community. Hospice? We'll talk about that another time. I am not going to say time heals all wounds, as people have told me. I am going to say that GOD heals all wounds. You need to know that I understand exactly what you are saying. Every day I have said what if? even though I know that I did not possess the knowledge needed to intervene. To stop the medical community in their tracks. Our mothers know. Be angry at yourself until you can work it out. .I do that every day.. She went dancing in heaven on 3/26/2010 and I had a funny feeling she was going that day in particular. Of course I will remember that day. It is the day I arrived in America in 1956.

Deep inside I know that there is a Book of Life and destiny is written. So intellectually believe that everything happened EXACTLY as planned by the universe. You left at the precise moment..just like someone I was talking to --and her mom told her not to leave to go to the pharmacy. She told her mom she wasn't but she went anyway. Here is the thing. Our mom's know..and knew.. I find it strange that your mom turned blue after breakfast by the hospice aide?- mine had some strange white stuff under her upper dentures..for a fleeting moment I questioned it..I should have kept it and had it tested. not saying..but wondering.

My mommy seemed mad she got tight lipped...however my understanding from the dimension of the "Soul" is that they are free from a constricted body, that they see the rest of the family that is in the cosmos..I had never really seen death..but I was at peace. This is for you: Your mom is not mad at you at all. All of that is forgotten. Accept that.

Mommy died in her bed, I had placed the rosary in her hands earlier, I called he Priest, put oil on her forehead (anointing her head with oil) I said James 1 chapter 5 verse 13, I kissed her, they are not so cold, she was stiff and I looked at her for the millionth time...she took her last breath between 11:30 p.m. and 4:00 a.m. when I didn't hear her breathing. I came downstairs and her SOUL which is the part I want to help you with had left.I must've be in shock. I realized that her shell was there.

So we are a shell. Only a shell. In different colors. The soul is what gives us "life" --she could have lived to 98 instead of 94 -and if her other daughter cared she could have helped me and lived to 100. Nobody cared but me and God. I couldn't do it alone. I cried out a hundred times to God, to please help me.. so you cannot have done more than you did. Accept that we are human beings with limitations. Accept that we make mistakes. Accept that we resent the pressure, the sleepless nights, the tremendous obligation, the work, the smells...you had your husband I had no one..with minor exceptions when friends helped.. I guess I wanted to be God..to do all things for my mom...WE are only human,we cannot.

What is done is done. Thy will be done. What we can do is warn, others, teach and share...my aide said she was calling her nurse...and I wondered why? how is it my mother suddenly went from ok to dying? Do I now distrust the medical community? you bet I do. I am fortunate in that the last five years were like the first five of my life should have been. I grew close to my mother and continued to learn from her just by observing. I am fortunate that I am a cultural anthropologist and have a breath of knowledge of culture,psychology and religion. But all of that cannot save me from the dog gone guilt of "I should have" "what if I had " I should have never put her in the nursing home even for rehab therapy,so dumb of me, why did I trust these people to take care of mom.. I did stop them from giving her morphine for no reason,to ease her pain?what pain? I asked..oh when they are like this they have pain, said the wonderful nurse.

What pain? how would she know? did she die and resurrect? no. It is a protocol. A method the medical community concocted. So I am now in law school at past 60. Because there is something I need to do..to deal with the errors made. Both on their side and mine. I am now firmly in the oppose anything they say camp..and keeping up on my research no matter what they tell me.We need to use organic herbs and foods. Mommy was right.. it is all about the food. Did she say that to me ? no I watched her body fight the medical invasion until they flooded her body with chemicals. She had eaten well all of her younger life. In order to keep her alive I would have had to stay awake around the clock 24 hours..taking care of her continuously...to keep her alive. Impossible --but it still does not ease my pain, my anger and sense of hopelessness at being deceived.

Take the good with the bad...our mothers weren't perfect.. and neither are we. Sending you love whomever you are.

To me, it's ironic that the siblings who moved out of state and weren't there at all for our moms get off just "missing her" while we, who stood by them and tended to them night and day are left with a load of guilt at what we did or didn't do, decisions we made, things we said, etc. We made mistakes because 1. we aren't perfect, as the Prof. pointed out, and 2. we were THERE. They were appointed a time to die, and they kept their appointments, as we saw when that death process began and nothing we could do could stop it...they have forgiven us, and we have to forgive ourselves too. The pain gets less but I lost my mom in 2007 and there are still days I am reminded of some incident and find myself in tears. Hugs to you hon...I'm sure you did your best and she knew that.

I know you did your best..and that is the greatest gift you could have given to her. Don't feel bad or guilty, feel proud..you did good.

I lost my mom on October 3 2008. She was my best friend. I still cry almost everyday. I don't know what to do to feel better. I'm ashamed to tell people that I'm still a wreck over it. I just miss her so much. I used to call her all the time when I wasn't with her at home. I lived with her all my life and watched her die a painful death for 6 years. I didn't even get to say goodbye. I was in school when she died. It just hurts to much. I'm 26 years old. I lost her when I was 24. I feel like a part of me died.

There are no limitations on grief and loss. There is no set time to stop missing someone. I could also tell you to not be ashamed, but you know that the message we all get is "Aren't you over that by now?"

Does your belief system allow you to talk to her now? To maybe not say goodbye, but to say, "I'll see you later"? If it does - talk to her, let her spirit warm and comfort you. Ask her to help you and listen with your heart. You know she only wanted love and peace for you.

I also understand if this is not within your belief system. You also didn't say whether this is stopping you from enjoying the things your best friend would have wanted you to enjoy. If this is the case, maybe it's time to talk to someone. See if depression is weighing you down.

Through personal experience, I think anyone that impacted my life will stay with me as long as I remember. The emptiness of loss does begin to fill with warm memories rather than harsh ones. This doesn't mean the old ones don't surface...they do. But then the warmth returns...each time offering more peace than before.