Depression Dementia Dad

@Former-Member pic says it.

@Former-Member I am so glad you have @Owlunar to share with.

How do we put grief behind us ... acknowledge it and let it be, but not consume us ....

we need to get back on a journey that is more about our lives.

ThanksThanks @Appleblossom

You know grief well too. Though its not so easy to move on - to make the thoughts & images not count, Trying.

@Faith-and-Hope - are, so that's what 'gaslighting' is. Guess there's a long residual from emotional abuse. You would know about that.

@Owlunar, that's lovely of you to say the death had nothing to do with me. I wish I could believe it..

@Former-Member. - rocky roadvindeed.

This is a talk about grief that I found helpful @Former-Member

https://youtu.be/TxSd8f2Utpk

Aw @Former-Member - sweethheart - you did not have a role in your daughter's death - it says in Ecclesiastes -

There is a purpose for everything under heaven ... a time to be born and a time to die

God is in charge of all of these things - not us - and I am going to tell you it's okay to feel the way you do about your daughter's death but it's not truth. It's okay to be angry but be angry with God - he can take it

I was so angry with God after my son died - now I know that he was doing the right thing for both of us and it was my son's choice to die - and I have felt angry with him too - but not now - I have forgiven him for what he did - he meant to but he was only a scatterbrained teenager and I am sure was unaware that was he was doing was irreversible

You know that anger turned in is becomes depression and I am sure with your mother and her MI and your crappy sibs and your ex-h gaslighting has contributed to the depression you feel and I am so unhappy all this has happened

And I want to hold you close and care for you - you mean so much to me

It wasn't your fault - none of it has been your fault - someone took your self-confidence away and left you damaged but God know

Dec

Hi @Appleblossom

I was able to put my parents' deaths behind be in a reasonable time - my father was a man of faith and went with dignity when the time came and that was easy to leave behind - my mother was tougher to deal with and I had to see a therapist but that is a long way in the past now too

Also my cousins - two of them - and and other people aging and even other people who were too young when they died and one of them was a close work mate - the natural order of things takes place and we can get on with our own lives - changed yes - but we go on

Our children though - this is not normal at all - and a huge piece of our future goes with them.

Sometime we need to put a lot of the emotion behind us though - the anger at the situation, the tearing depression that causes so much of a struggle with life and how to continue

How do we get there though? It varies with every person - we are allowed to have our emotions though - we need them - we must not deny the truth because whatever we feel is part of us

Sheesh - more philosophy - hard stuff - too much for a Wednesday

Dec

Unfortunately something that made the deaths of my siblings harder to take, was being told that a mother's loss is greater than a sister. It happened quite a few times, even once on this forum. My mother harrassed my sister for sleeping with her bf the day before her suicide. Mother's defensiveness about her guilt made it like a brick wall. I never thought the abandonments. the mental illnesses or the deaths were ALL her fault but she would go into many sweeping statements. In the end their deaths did take a lot longer to get through. It took over 30 years for me to put my sister's death in proper perspective. The time someone told me she was on my mother's side on the forum, was so casual and out of order that I could eventually dismiss it, but it felt like more unjust accusations.

Attention to the experiences of siblings is coming relatively late in the psychotherapeutive context.

In saying that I do not want to discount your experience @Owlunar and @Former-Member. Maybe my experience is just unusual enough to be an exception to the rule.

Hi @Appleblossom

Thanks for the heads-up - I did not think about sibling grief when I wrote this morning - your experience was different and not one I had thought about

But yes - Lapses' son is pretty prickly about his sister's death and my daughter doesn't want to talk about my son's death - I get it - I left the conversation in the past and it's up to my daughter to raise the subject again but I have never closed her down on the subject

I know The Compassionate Friends have room for sibling grief - I don't know how much - I haven't had much at all to do with TCF in all these years - the time comes when I move on through life - it stopped working for me I guess

Personally it seems to me that you have been a sort of parent to your siblings and this would make it seem more like parental loss but to me - the loss of a brother or sister is a major loss because one might ask where they fit in the family now someone is missing

EG - my daughter said to me after her father remarried: "First I was the youngest then I was the only one and now I am the oldest" - perhaps this experience is common but outside my reading so far

But everyone is entitled to their experience - they have the right to it - they have "earned" it and I have been seriously annoyed if anyone tries to take it away from me

Your sister died a long time ago and I am pretty sure your brother died recently - it must be fresh and also it must open a scar from your past

I am really glad you have brought this forward Apple

Dec

Thanks @Owlunar yes my sis died a long time ago.

Both of my brothers are dead now. One suicided 9 years after my sister. It was a very heavy 9 years as he was out of control with grief for the whole period, and in the end did what he did. The other brother died just over a year ago of cancer, but in such a crazily rich non functional family, it had to be related to his abandonment at 6 months. He had always said he was normal and we were the poor ones... lol .. The concept of normal can be measured against whatever norm one can imagine. That is why finally in my grumpy old age, I am less impressed or frightened of madness and normality. He was into computers and his best mate was also a Schizophrenic computer constultant, like my ex husband, but different.

So there was also both brothers' responses to grief, not just mine. The effect was cumulative.

I can feel for you and your daughter's comment about her family position. It is one of the most basic identity statements. I was both an oldest and an only child for 2 years, before the others started to return home. Maybe she felt it was the best way to both honour the changes his death brought into her life, but deliberately keep communication low-key and least provocative of angst for either of you.

I could not go to Compassionate friends because my sister made herself a bit high profile there, and became hostile to me. I went once but felt wiser to retreat with her behaviours.

2 years ago I went to a siblings of suicide workshop. met 2 sibling groups who had a suicide, but were hanging together.

Hey @Former-Member I am going to look at @Former-Member youtube soon.

Take Care, little c compassionate friends.

I'm not sure how to respond @Appleblossom - every situation is unique

I have lost both my siblings - not to death but to deep seated resentments stemming from our mother's behaviour which has scarred all of us - I have forgiven my mother but not thought about my siblings that much - I guess I have found a way to forgive their behaviour - I have gone my own way for such a long time and when I think about it I am really unhappy things happened the way they did but - ah - why rehash what I cannot change? - it would take a lot for me to have them back in my life now - touch love

It has been hard for you too - I think my mother had excessives fears and was co-dependent and I for my own sake forgave her but your mother had MI and what I read here in these forums that there are a lot of members whose mothers had MI and caused untold suffering - I can only shake my head at what people suffer

And in my grumpy old age I wonder I have found a time of peace - how did that happen? - I have no idea actually but it is true that in spite of my grief I have found a better time of life even if I do bark at badly mannered children and rude teenagers in public places but then I am endlessly patient with disabledd or elderly people even when they are unaware of my delicate spine - I have learned at lot with my long years

We are all unique Apple and I am glad - very glad - to know you

Dec

Actually - my years are not longer than anyone else's - there have just been more of them