Hi everyone,
I’m reaching out because I’ve been struggling with the sudden and traumatic loss of my mum in March. My mum just said she didn’t feel very well and collapsed i instantly dialled 999 and had to perform cpr until the ambulance arrived. To be honest it was all a blur I don’t even know how I done it to this day. Since then I’ve struggled with anxiety panic attacks and the overwhelming grief. It’s trauma I struggle with the most, I’ve been in counselling ever since but considering trauma therapy aswell as suggested to help with it.
Just wondering if anyone else had this kind of traumatic experience and ways to cope with it?? And to know I’m not the only one this has happened too, grief itself is a lonely place but this experience makes it feel so much worse.
Hi, you have had such a traumatic event and I would have hoped that your counselling would have helped even just a little. As you say bereavement is difficult to deal with but such a horrible situation is even more difficult to deal with. It all takes time to comes to terms with and we do expect to ‘get over’ the situation quickly but our brains are not wired like that. The only other thing I can think off that may help is group therapy and alternative therapies which would help you to relax. Please take what ever is offered in the therapist’s range, they really do help but takes time. Also don’t beat yourself up thinking you should be doing better, we are all different, no two people react in the same way also be kind to yourself. Sending you blessings. Sxx
Hi susie,
Thank you so much for your reply. Yes I think other people expect us to just get over it also when we can’t, that part is still a learning curve for me, grief not being linear and I’m far harder on myself than if it was somebody else I’d be telling them exactly what they need to do but can’t follow the advice myself.
The counselling has helped me loads and she has said there has been improvement in me since the first time we met which is reassuring, yesterday she suggested maybe going back to gp and asking for a more specialised trauma therapy to help with that side of it, which I’m definitely going to do. She also to suggested groups to find people with similar experiences aswell. I have definitely been taking everything I can, I’ve took up yoga and meditation to help with the anxiety side of it and it’s definitely helped me. Thanks again for the reply. Kady xx
@Kadyleanne so sad for you my lovely, what helps calm me after losing my beloved Mam 6 weeks ago is listening to podcasts that feature julia samuel she is a grief counsellor and she is amazing. Really helps in understanding grief. Take one day at a time like I do. I feel like I will never be the same person again now I’ve lost my best friend 
@Jane36 thank you for your reply. I’m so sorry for your loss too, no one truly understands until they’re there what it’s like. Thank you for the podcasts suggestion I’m definitely going to do that, anything that can help. That’s so true I’ve lost myself throughout this process I don’t even recognise myself and lost confidence in everything, that’s what I struggle the most with losing myself and not being that same person I was. I see glimmers of me but I’m just not the same. My mum was our only parent so the bond was like no other. Kady xx
Yes totally understand I lost my dad 18years ago so it’s a strange feeling, the smallest most random things come into your thoughts that are so upsetting, I was thinking the other day I’ll never get a birthday card saying daughter again 
just miss my mam so much, I’m worse when on my own… sometimes I could just scream. Not fare is it @Kadyleanne
So pleased to hear that things are improving and like you I do yoga, it’s not only the jogs but meeting with other people, very beneficial. Keep going with everything and you will get through this and be stronger. Take care. xx
@Jane36 for us my dad is around but we’ve never had a relationship since we were kids so my mum always done the mum n dad thing and now all of a sudden there’s no one there. We do have close family which have been great but it’s just not the same. Yes it’s those little things that mean so much. So many times I’ve wanted to tell her gossip I’ve found out or something like I normally would. We’ve just had her birthday aswell on Tuesday just gone which I thought I’d got through fine until yesterday when the complete breakdown came.
I find sometimes aswell even when your with people I just wanna scream because no one understands it they see you functioning with work or down the shop they think your over it and moved on no idea what it’s took to even get up to go to work. If u need to scream, scream and let it out it can’t be bottled up that’s something I’m learning bottling it up just makes it worse, scream cry write it down whatever u need to do just let it out . I used to love my alone time but now I hate being alone and I just feel vunerable all the time which is not me at all. No it’s not fair at all that’s the cruel thing about it how your whole life can flip in a split second.
@SusieM yes definitely I’ve tried yoga before few years ago and if I’m honest thought was abit hippy like and meditation too but now I’ve come to this point I get why people do it it’s such a calming thing and being in touch with your body channels a lot of your thoughts away from you. You take care of yourself too. Xx
@Kadyleanne yes I’m finding that now, I try function I wouldn’t say normally yet but I try but then I’m always thinking friends family think your over it, my mams on my mind from the minute I wake till I go back to bed on an evening. I worry she’s getting forgotten about, I even ask my 2 children " do you still think of nan" of course we do all the time… nobody seems to really understand and I don’t think anybody can unless they’ve lost there mum them selves. If I do happen to smile at something or laugh at the kids I feel so bad with guilt 
@Jane36 I think everyone goes through the are they getting gotten stage, for us we always talk about my mum all the time the funny things she done or said but even then sometimes I think are people forgetting her, like at work have they got someone to take on her job which if they have I get because it’s a business but still it hurts too much, she worked in the coop near us I haven’t been in since because it literally just reminds me of her because it meant so much to her. I’ve recently gone back to work to try and get some routine back in my life after losing control of everything I’m trying to take it back by going back and it’s not been easy Infact harder than I thought, it’s strange how it can even change that aspect of life.
No that’s very true you don’t get it until you’ve been through it but it’s just frustrating that people can’t see what your going through and understand it.
Don’t feel guilty for laughing or smiling which I know is easier said than done because I’m sure if she was anything like my mum she would want u there smiling and laughing with the kids. Even through all the pain and heartache it’s okay still to have them moments of laughter.
@Kadyleanne yes true and I know for a fact my mam would hate to see how I’ve been, she hated if I was upset about anything. For the first month I slept on the settee I’m in bed now but in my daughters bed ( she’s normally always at her boyfriends) my husband is up early for work and doesn’t like the telly on, but I need the telly on to fall asleep too as listening to it helps me thinking to much.
@Jane36 that’s exactly the same as is it would kill my mum to see us how we’ve been especially with me because she only ever saw me cry a handful of times and now that’s all I do and in front of anyone aswell now. I’m the same I have to have the telly on to fall asleep so I can’t hear my own thoughts and my concentration is on something else or I try fall asleep downstairs aswell so when I get in bed it’s straight the way. We moved our lounge round to give it a different feel because that’s where my mum passed and gave me flash backs everytime I went in there so I needed it to feel different and it has helped it does feel different. Sometimes I feel like people will think I’m trying to erase her by moving things or changing things but we’ve got to live in the house and make it function for us, even though we’re losing the house aswell as if my mum wasn’t enough that’s added pressure and stress I can do without.
Hi
I am so sorry for your loss which is incredibly similar to mine.
My mum died unexpectedly on 25th March. We have always lived together, always just the two of us. In recent years she had a lot of mobility issues and had a heart valve and knee replacement operation as well as fibro.
I’d made her a downstairs bedroom as she was bed bound for a few weeks upstairs and we were planning to get her other knee fixed. That’s where we were meant to be that day. She woke feeling sick, we put down to nerves but had a massive cardiac. I did cpr and ambulance etc were very quick but there was nothing we could do. What was meant to be a great day, starting to get her some quality of life back turned on an edge to the worst day ever.
Like you anxiety I already had has worsened and the expected grief and bereavement that comes with it.
I have been using an app called grief works, you do have to pay to subscribe, but it has helped as has the Megan Divine journal “how to carry what cannot be fixed”
Posting here has helped and I’ve met some lovely supportive people. The thread “created a shrine for my mam” has a number of us in the same position with Lodi g our mothers, please feel welcome to join us there.
The lonliness is the worst feeling. Feel free to pm me if you’d like
Beki x
@Kadyleanne totally understand why you would want to change your room round, your losing your house now did you say that’s terrible
Hi @Beki
Thanks for your reply.
For me there has always been me my mum and brother living together the bind we had has always been so tight. My mum passed on March 3rd I was actually off work sick as i had shingles but actually was the first day I’d felt well and got up and got down the shop. The day was just normal my mums day off work. Then I’m the afternoon she got up to check on something in the kitchen said she didn’t feel well then that was it. I dialled 999 instantly then they talked me through cpr. When the ambulance arrived they worked on her for longer than they normally would but just nothing they could do. The cause was ischemic heart disease which she didn’t know about but upon research it’s possible to not know and apparently can be common with diabetes which she had. There’s just so many unanswered questions there which won’t ever be answered like was there signs and she didn’t know or ignored.
Since then guilt has crippled me what if I didn’t do it right or quick enough or just enough because I didn’t know what I was doing it was just Adrenalin I can’t even remember most of it just the ambulance turning up and them taking over.
I’d never had anxiety before this then the week after when we had cause of death it just kicked in and has crippled me since and panic attacks. I’ve took up yoga and meditation which really help. Along with counselling aswell. But she has suggested maybe trauma therapy which I’m going to seek from my gp to deal with that side of it. I also went to my gp for blood tests and wellness check to ensure nothing wrong with me because I had become that consumed that something was wrong with me. All this stuff I never even worried about before. No one understands what I had to do that day and the impact they see me grieving not what I went through and the trauma for me surrounding it.
I will definitely look into that app because I’m willing to try anything and everything I don’t mind paying I pay for counselling because the nhs is a long list and I don’t want to get worse than I am.
Yes my counsellor suggested finding somewhere when u have common ground and people who understand and have been through what I have, posting in here has been a massive step for me because before I wasn’t a talker or sharer about anything I just dealt with my stuff and kept it moving but now this has just changed me so much.
I’ve got my brother but we grieve so differently and he wasn’t there that day he was at work and I don’t want him to have to live what I did in that period of time by hearing me talk about it so we talk about it when we need too but with what happened our experiences are so different we’re both affected by the same thing but in our own journeys which is okay.
Yes thank you I may join into the other thread aswell just feels good to know there’s people that have had my experience and are experience the same things I am.
Kady xx
@Jane36 yes we are we live in a council house so after my mum passed A week later I informed them of her passing so could swap it to my name to carry on paying the rent etc. The next day they rang me and told me that we wouldn’t be able to stay in the house now because it’s a 3 bed and now there are only 2 of us here and they would rehome to a 2 bed house/flat. Then said would ring after the funeral and literally rang 9am the next day. I’ve sought advice from a solicitor but need to wait for the notice to get it going. The council then informed me 4 weeks ago that they wouldn’t be rehousing us because me and my brother both work and earn over their threshold for housing so his answer was “buy or rent somewhere good luck with that bye” We do both work and we do earn a decent wage but this is our home we’ve lived here since 1994 it’s our home. It’s just so frustrating that firstly there’s no compassion even when I’ve said I’ve been struggling he asked me what with. So I said my mum passing obviously. And secondly ever since we’ve lived here we’ve paid rent etc all on time sometimes In front I’ve continued to do the same aswell even when it was fresh I still paid everything on time. It’s just an extra layer adding to everything else I’ve got going on.
@Kadyleanne it’s so true you don’t get compassion at all now, so sorry for your situation on top of losing your beloved Mam it’s so unfair for you all really feel for you