I know someone with an alcohol problem and he is the sweetest guy, always. He will get it under control for a while but when life gets too heavy it’s all that will help him cope. It’s such a worry and he hates himself because of it but there is nothing he can do and can’t seem to get any proper help . When you start to open up to people about it you find lots of people seems to know of someone with a drink problem to one degree or another, but it is true people can be so judgmental when they have not got a clue. It’s an illness not a life choice and not a simple one that you can just take a pill for. If only it was that easy. Louis Theroux Did a very sympathetic documentary on the bbc about it some years ago that I saw, it just broke your heart to watch.
It doesn’t matter how you lost your child, what matters is you lost your child.
No one wakes up one morning and decides to become a drug addict, it’s not a choice.
Unfortunately my son was using drugs but he did try to get help to stop but the help he got was the doctors telling him he has to stop and that was it, he did manage to stop taking drugs by himself but unfortunately he replaced the drugs with alcohol and I truly believe it was the alcohol that clouded his rational thinking on the night he ended his life because I know he loved his family and no way would he have done what he did if he was sober 
I read on the Samaritans website that people with suicidal thoughts don’t want to kill themselves, they want the situation they’re in to end, not their lives.
You could be right, alcohol does cloud your judgement and if your son had been sober maybe he wouldn’t have gone ahead. It’s getting the help to ease your situation.
It’s a desperate place to be in, thinking no one can ease your pain.
Ive read that statement as well and it makes me feel worse that my son didnt seek help, he festered for 2 years in a studio flat at uni telling us it was his choice not to socialise, when in reality he found it easier not to and he was really lonely and sad ( he told us that weekend) and he decided that his degree had taught him that no one can help him ( he did a psychology degree so im assuming the neurodiverse module told him he couldnt change). If only he had told us, and that he hadnt ( hes very black and white) decided he should have made 'connections ’ and found a life partner by end of uni ( hed been googling age you meet partner).
It must be so hard when you have so many questions around help.
No matter how our children die we always feel guilt.
The want if’s and if only’s
I feel so guilty at how hard my daughter fought to survive because she knew how broken I would be if she died. No matter what we do or how hard we try we cannot escape those feelings of guilt.
I feel it like a pressure building inside, I can’t sit at home, I can’t go out, I can’t be alone, I can’t be in company. So I sit in coffee shops for hours on end.
Watching other people’s lives, wondering what it must be like to not know this pain. I wonder do they know? Can they see the grief? Do they notice my pain? Mostly I think I’m invisible.
I used to sit on the bed and look out the front, I live in a cul de sac and think why are others able to get on with their lives and I can’t. It has got bit easier in time but such along way to go. Minute by minute . You are not alone, this site is a lifeline xx
My son would go from drugs to alcohol, alcohol to drugs, but he could do it and stay away from both. January he did dry January and said how good he felt and no drugs, I believed him as I could tell he wasn’t on either. So many unanswered questions mainly why, but addiction is an illness x
Addiction is an illness and unless you’re living it you can never understand it. If it was easy to give up there would be no grieving parents.
I live in a cul de sac too! It’s full of pensioners, I used to feel bitter about old people having lived so long but since she died it’s the young I envy. How come they can live when my baby died. I don’t feel any compassion now either, or fear. The worst thing in the world has happened, there is nothing left to hurt me. Nothing can ever feel as bad as this.
I think this site is really helping me. I can write down how I feel without fear of judgement because the people here are living my grief too.
I live in a cul de sac, they have been good one neighbour saw the police car outside mine at 2am, (since covid weve had a cul de sac whatApp group so we could help each other) amd checked in with me and told her, she was straight round, within 30 minuites two were helping searching and they did that wed and thurs, i was asking them not to as by then i knew he wouldnt be found alive. On the Friday my weekly veg box arrived so i asked if anyone wanted it as i couldnt cook, the box dissappeared but over the next few days i had ready cooked food delivered. They are now back to here if we need you so ive not seen anyone since the funeral. My living room is at the back of the house so i dont really see anyone.
I think it’s a huge misconception that when the funeral is over you just get on with life.
I have those messages from friends, not many, and none that I would ever feel comfortable asking for help. There isn’t anyone I can ask for the help I need.
My neighbours haven’t been good, think they don’t know what to say, they watched her grow up, she was born here.
We left when I had to get out and her dad wouldn’t let us back in the family home, even when she was diagnosed. It wasn’t until he knew she was dying that he let us home, her last Christmas was spent living with me in my my older daughter’s flat, it wasn’t great.
My Lou he is at the back of the house, it sounds you have some lovely neighbours and are there to help you, it’s just difficult asking for help sometimes. I’m exactly the same.
Meant to say my lounge bad typing
Think thats the point, people say we are here for you but you don’t ask do you, I would like some company but not for people to just sit there talking about what their families are doing, or just take me for a walk but dont talk.
I know that feeling so sometimes think it’s easier to have your own company even though I don’t always think that’s healthy for us. It’s what is best for us at the moment. I feel today I could cry at anything xx
Having new front door today, a door my son will have no key to, everyday seems to get harder and harder
It’s such a horrible feeling, I’m on the verge of crying again. It will be 6 months but today feels like six hours. Back to minute by minute. Hope the workmen are pleasant. X
I can’t face doing anything.
The house is as it was the day she died, I haven’t changed the bed, I can’t clean or iron. I can’t even part with her wheelchair and commode, even though my house is tiny and they’re blocking the hall.
I know it’s only 2 weeks but it feels like yesterday but also it feels like a lifetime since I held her.
I hate the mornings facing another day without her.
We still have the funeral to come next week and I am visiting her everyday so I am still able to see her.
I don’t want to survive past her funeral.
I am such a coward, I want to die but I don’t want it to hurt.
You are not a coward but a Mum which is grieving. You don’t have to do anything unless you want to. We are all so different in how we feel and how we cope….no set rules, just go with it minute by minute. I have just been for a walk with my friend and cried all the time we were out. Do t think ahead to next week. I found it easier to say celebration of life, than funeral, maybe that could help but I’m not sure. Take care xx
I think that your funeral director will ensure that only the people you want will come to the funeral. That is what happened when my husband died. Talk to them (or get a trusted friend to) and I am sure that you can get your wish. I wish you all the best and, most of all, some peace.