hi all. reading through a lot of posts, I keep seeing over and over, that loosing a child is the worst. I cant really comment on that as apart from my son I havnt lost any one of any great importance . my mother is still alive and lives around the corner. my dad disappeared years ago . he could be dead. wouldn’t have a clue. my wife has lost both parents and often tells me that its nowhere near as bad as loosing a child. so I have to go along with what everyone else says on the matter.
all I do know, when I lost my son. its the single most terrible thing ive ever had to deal with. their isn’t really anything that describes how bad it is. I feel ive been on a journey to the very bottom. at times the darkness shrouds you to the point you think their will never be a way back to the light again. the pain is so intense it plays tricks with your mind. one minute you can be fine then out of the blue it completely floors you . you can be in the middle of doing something and suddenly you feel terrified or lost,
in the beginning actually believing they have gone really takes some convincing. one minute they are there and the next they have gone. you can recall their final day down to the tiniest detail… going over and over in your mind you tell yourself, well they cant be dead, I only spoke to them last night. or yesterday. . or they were due to call round today. how can they be dead. its the shock of having them snatched away from you. you were,nt ready. you would never be ready. its such a blow to your system that it hits you so hard, that you will never be the same again. when they went, so did you. the you that used to be. when your child is taken . from that moment you become someone else. I’m a lot further on than a lot of people on this site. but I,m a different person than i once was.
everyone on this site is looking for answers or rationality. there is,nt any. I look at it like this. its a double blow. the first bit is the loss of your child and trying to process that information. trying to come to terms with missing them. the second bit is . how you have changed, how it has affected you. how everything around you is exactly the same. but through your eyes its different. without realizing it you analyse every aspect of your life. what people say to you ! how you conduct yourself. how you treat others around you, how they treat you. suddenly you don’t want to do all the things you have always done. theres no point to anything anymore. about 6 months after my son died we went on a pre-booked holiday to the canaries. we went with another couple . they were trying their best to enjoy the holiday. I could,nt think of anywhere worse to be. the whole island enjoying themselves and theres me. just wanting to curl up and die. when everyone else was asleep I would sit out on the balcony all night. of coarse everything was as normal as can be. it was actually just me and the frame of mind I was in but at the time you are telling yourself, how dare these people be enjoying themselves, do they not no my son is dead. what the hell is wrong with them. I can think of a million other occasions that were just wrong!!!
your mind is completely out of sync with everything and everybody. but over time you start to align again. everything falls back into sequence. all your ducks are in a row again, apart from just one. you learn to think straight again . you can conduct yourself in a reasonable manner again.
loosing a child is absolutely terrible regardless of how it happened. ive spent years looking for answers until I finally came to the conclusion there just are,nt any. when I read posts on this site and see people asking for advice on how to make it easier or is there anywhere they can go to have the grief taken away. is there some medicine they can take where you wake up and everything is how it was. ive had times where I have really struggled, especially in the beginning. you just want the world to end so the pain will go away . it does get better, people that say it does,nt get better. I think enough time has,nt past for them yet so they don’t feel its got better. don’t get me wrong, you never get over it. but the day will come when you realise you hav,nt cried that day. or you managed to jump over that hurdle that has been in your way for such a long time. couple of weeks ago I had a particularly hard time around his anniversary. but it was,nt like it was a few years ago. I remember once telling my wife, we were out shopping and I said , I have the urge to jump through a plate glass window of whatever shop we were in. or stand on a mountain and scream my lungs out. I hav,nt felt that way in such a long time. so that tells me things are better. I still get up every night in the small hours and sit in the dark thinking about my boy. sometimes it makes me cry. but it does,nt suffocate me like it used to. as corny as it sounds you have to have , hope. that’s all we have left in the end. one day you will get there. ok thanks for listening.
jim
