My mum passed 3 weeks ago tomorrow, I’m absolutely devastated, really struggling, and lonely.
I’m 41, my mum was 77. She was my everything, and other than when I went to University we’ve lived together my whole life. I have no other family; my dad died when I was a toddler, I’m an only child, there’s no extended family, I’m single and have no children.
I do have some friends who have been amazing with things like coming with me to appointments and sitting with me, but they all have their own busy lives & families, and I can already feel them pulling back. I think my grief is so intense they’re struggling to help me, and one of them said they knew this would affect me but they weren’t prepared for how much.
I’ve got a lot of shame and regret for how I let my own mental health slide and wasn’t helping mum as I should have been. I work full time in a job I can’t stand and would just want to veg at home whilst she was struggling to keep on top of things. My poor mum deserved so much better. She had chronic leg ulcers amongst other things and was in a lot of pain, and I also think a new treatment the district nurses tried that wasn’t applied properly was the catalyst for her heart failure, but I don’t know what to do with that in terms of making a complaint. I also have regret for not getting her looked at sooner. She’d been in hospital quite a few times with infections so I knew the signs, but even though her o2 reading was low I didn’t force her to get seen sooner. I’m trying to remind myself she was stubborn too and didn’t want help, but she had agreed after a hospital stay with flu in April that she would listen to me more. I should have forced her and she might still be here
To top it all off it’s looking most likely that I’m going to lose the home we shared for 37 years as I’ll be under occupying in the eyes of the council. I’ve so many regrets about not sorting myself financially, nor looking into what would happen with our home after she passed (I can succeed her tenancy but not the actual property).
I’m only keeping going because we’d spoke before and she said she wanted me to carry on because life is precious, and I don’t want to risk not being in the same place as her if I did something to myself. She would say I kept her going when she was struggling after my dad died, but I haven’t got anyone to keep going for so it’s hard.