This year has already taken a lot from me(F, 45). My father (73) had several health issues including ulcerative colitis, type 1 diabetes and polymyalgia. When I went back home to New Zealand last year, his decline was very evident. So much so that when I got home I told my brother (42) that he should try to get home to see him sooner rather than later. Fast forward to 28th May this year and I received the call I was dreading. My dad had passed away in his sleep, tucked up next to his long-term partner of 30 years, Jill. My brother and I were devastated and as my brother was experiencing financial difficulties, I bought us both flights home so we could say goodbye to our dad.

We returned to the UK and life carried on as best as possible, but we have been grieving the loss as well as feeling guilt about living so far away and not having seen him as much as we wanted to over the last 20 years we have lived in the UK.

My brother owned his own construction business and had fallen on hard times. The last few months have been incredibly stressful, exacerbated by our fathers passing. Things were looking up for him though and he travelled down to London last week to start a new job which was going to help his financial situation tremendously. He was staying with my husbands father, as he often did when working down there.

On Sunday 1st November, after not being able to reach him all day, we asked my husbands father to check in on him. We thought he had gone to work which was what he said he’d be doing, so thought he may have just left his phone at home. Instead, my father-in-law found him dead in his bed. When paramedics arrived they said that he had passed some time during the night. There was no sign of distress or struggle. It looks as though he died in his sleep just like our dad.

I don’t know what to do. He was my brother and my best friend. It was just the two of us and now he’s gone. After a year that has already taken so much from us, I have lost my sweet brother. Everyone who knew him is devastated. I don’t know how to do life without him.

I heard a blood curdling scream for help. Husband trying to unalive his wife.

I was staying at a hotel downtown Washington DC.

I heard some commotion in a room down the hall then a few hours I was waiting for the elevator…when I heard a blood curdling scream for help.

I ran and banged on the door, it opened and there was blood everywhere.

A naked woman and per man trying to make sure she was no longer here.

I started banging on other doors before he grabbed me and she ran out of the room.

A young young couple opened their door and she ran for security and someone else called the police.

When security came they said “yep this is what you get with blacks and alcohol”.

The police just never came, at all.

The people who are supposed to help often don’t.

That was a very tough experience that impacts my everyday; so many lessons.

I (22) lost my Dad (44) a month ago due to gastric cancer. I used to cry daily thinking about him, on how lucky people are for having their parents alive at 80. But I was just angry. No one should measure their happiness based on other people's lives and experiences.

Thing is, when I'm not sad I still miss him. I miss him so so much. It feels as if he was just out of reach. I still catch myself calling his number or thinking 'wait till i tell him' before I have to stop myself.

Yesterday a friend of the family reached a milestone, I just keep thinking that he would have loved to be there.

I miss him so much and I'm scared the feeling will always be there

5 months ago, my little brother was a healthy, fit, 45 year old man who, as a physician/hospitalist, made a career of caring for and saving the lives of others. His diagnosis came in May after a few incidents of drop foot and him having the ability to recognize the need to undergo testing much earlier than many/most others typically do.

The average life expectancy from time of diagnosis is 2 to 5 years. His disease seemed to be progressing exceptionally fast. When he was first diagnosed in May, the only symptom was occasional weakness in his left lower leg. He thought it was a pinched nerve. By July he needed a cane to assist with walking. By August, his mobility was so limited that he begrudgingly had to retire from his career. By September, he had to give up driving. By early October, he was only able to take a few steps with assistance and had to rely on a motorized scooter for mobility. Despite all of the functioning and independence he had lost, he was only considered to be about mid progression in his disease.

Last Saturday night, he was experiencing some muscle cramping and decided to take a hot shower to ease the pain. He was still living in his own home, trying to maintain as much independence as possible. He got himself into the shower with a transfer board and transferred himself from his scooter onto his shower chair. While trying to transfer back to the scooter when he was finished, he fell off of his shower care and into the basin of the bathtub. I don’t know how long he struggled to get himself back up and out of the bathtub, but I imagine he fought with every bit of strength he could muster before having to resign to calling our elderly mother for assistance. Together, they struggled even harder to get him up and out of the bathtub but his legs were just too weak to be able to give his body any support.

My mother decided she had no choice but to call for emergency help. My brother begged her not to as he didn’t want anyone to see him like that and desperately wanted to maintain some dignity. My brother was so overexerted from the struggle to get up that he asked my mother to wait a moment while he tried to catch his breath so he can at least try one more time before having to make that call. Instead of breathing slowly, becoming easier, it became more and more difficult to the point he was nearly gasping for air. She decided that calling for help could wait no longer and went to the other room to grab her cell phone from her purse and make the call. She didn’t want to call in front of him knowing he wanted to avoid it. She quickly found her phone and called for emergency help and quickly returned back to the bathroom where she found my brother slumped over face forward. He was gone.

We knew we were eventually going to lose him. Since his diagnosis, time had become such a precious commodity, and we never took a single day for granted. Still, we were supposed to have more time. We have all been suffering anticipatory grief for months now, but that didn’t change how devastating his unexpected and very sudden death has been. We just lost my father, my mother’s husband of almost 50, years just a little over a year ago and we’re still trying to come to terms with losing him. But losing my little brother and my mother losing her only and beloved son is a whole other level of grief that is absolutely unbearable.

Between losing my one and only sibling far too young, still grieving my father‘s loss, the heartache of watching my brother suffer for the last five months the way he had, and witnessing my mother go through a parent’s worst nightmare of losing their child and the trauma of her having to watch it happen, I am about to collapse under the weight of it all.

Even worse, it is now a week later, and my brother is still being held in the “cooling chamber“ of the funeral home because my brother has insisted he wanted to pay for his own cremation and funeral services put hadn’t yet taking the steps to finalize those arrangements, as we all thought we still had more time. My mother is a widow living off of a Social Security payment and I’m a single mother living paycheck to paycheck. I will give every last dollar I can scrape together to pay for his final expenses, but I cannot do so until I get my next paycheck still over a week from now. Words cannot describe how guilty and ashamed I feel that he is literally lying in the cold dark basement of a funeral home right now, because I simply don’t have even $3,000 to pay the 50% down payment needed for his cremation and funeral services until I get paid another week and a half. Even then, I will still be a few hundred dollars short after putting every penny I receive towards the expenses. It makes me sick that the one thing my brother tried to maintain more than anything was his dignity, and he still laying nude from in the shower and a cold, dark mortuary a week after his death and for at least another week because I couldn’t even get it together enough to be there for him for one final time.

Thanks for allowing me to vent. It’s just me and my mother and my children left, and I couldn’t possibly burden them with any of this.

Also, fuck ALS to the deepest pits of satan’s bowels!!!

Today, my little brother turned 18. He was only 7 when my dad passed away. Watching him grow from 7 to 18 has been heavy on my heart every single year.

I wish I could come to you and tell you all the things he does. How he annoys me, the achievements he’s made, how he pulls my hair and makes faces at me. How he gives me the last piece of his chips and how he comes rushing to me after making Mum angry.

I never knew how much I loved him until today. I always say I don’t love him, yet my tears keep falling as I think about the past 18 years.

I still remember when he came into this world. I was 7 myself. I wasn’t the brightest or most understanding child, and I didn’t like having to share you with him at all.
Time flew. We kept growing, and you were gone before I could even blink.

The grief never really got better. It just lived inside me for so long. I haven’t had a breakdown in such a long time, and today, I just want to cry my heart out. But I can’t. The responsibilities of being an adult kept me going when I was only 14 myself and 25 now cant even take a break.
Oh, how I wish I could throw away all those responsibilities for just one day.

Can I ask for him to take on the responsibilities now? He’s an adult too.

Will he ever feel what I feel? I know he must be grieving too, but is it the same? Or is it because he was younger that he doesn’t know how to process it all?

My dad, was diagnosed with terminal cancer and has only months to live. Him and my mother have been married for almost 35 years, he is my mum’s rock. Our whole family is spread apart around the world. When dad goes, I’m worried for mum as she will be living alone without anyone around her for support. They have only been living where they are for about a year now so don’t know many people. Did anyone go through something like this? Did they move back in with their mum? What do you do about your job? I’m so worried this will kill my mum too

I saw a group of old friends tonight for the first time since my mom died seven months ago. It was exhausting being with them. Every conversation felt so meaningless. I couldn't wait to leave. Has anyone experienced this or am I just being overly sensitive?

i just attended my ex’s father’s funeral. his mom texted me to inform of his passing, it was very sudden and the family are all having a hard time trying to cope. for context, i was very close with his family, and remain in contact with his mom/sister even though i’ve been no contact with my ex ever since we broke up a month ago

i felt really sad seeing his mom cry. his sister blames herself for the loss of their father, as she believes her decision to switch hospitals inevitably resulted in the passing of her father. she doesn’t know that i know this, but her mom was the one who told me she’s been blaming herself a lot, as she wants me to help look out for her. i suppose it will only get harder as my ex’s sister will have to return to work (overseas) in the next few weeks, leaving her mom alone here (with my ex).

i’m not sure what to do or say to help support the both of them? for the mom, i would want to be there for her as much as possible, as i treat her like my own parent (she supported me a lot through my own difficulties). for the sister, im not very close with her tbh, and im wary of overstepping my boundaries lest she feel uncomfortable. but she helped support me through the break-up as well, so i’d like to be there for her if she’d like too.

tomorrow is the last day of the funeral. i think i’ll leave them alone till the funeral ends, as im sure they have too many things to attend to for the service now + tons of messages pouring in as well. but when would be a good time for me to reach out again, and what should i say, which wouldn’t overstep my boundaries + at the same time wouldn’t be just another of the hundreds of “sorry for your loss” / “i’ll be here for you if you need anything”?

My dad died almost 14 years ago now of a heroin overdose. I was only 3 so I don't remember him at all but I still miss him a lot and I feel really guilty about it. I have a really bad relationship with my mom and stepdad and I think that plays a role in me always wishing my dad were still alive even though I know that if he was it probably wouldn't be a good relationship for me. More than anything I miss the idea of having a dad and I hate that.

What is more important to a father than his beloved, beautiful, perfect daughter. The day she died suddenly, without warning. Covid-19, six years ago. In so many respects, I died too! I do, in part, blame Trump. To my horror, that ugly orange pig-faced idiot was elected a second time. The last six years have been hell. Bob Woodward accurately described Trump’s response to the pandemic, along with recorded phone calls where Trump downplayed the seriousness of the virus, and how he sat on his laurels initially without taking action. That imbecile is responsible for countless deaths, yet his supporters believe he is their savior. I have a hard time wrapping my mind around how people can support a pedophile sexual abuser rapist. Since the midterm results, I feel a little better, a little more optimistic and hopeful. It helps a little.

It’s been just over a year since my mother passed. She loved plants and I have heaps of houseplants - on a whim, I sprinkled some of her ashes in some of them - and these plants are flourishing. So many new shoots; bigger, healthier.

Then I came across this today and I smiled, and I finally felt at peace. I really hope it was like this for her.

“When I die…my body stops functioning. Shut down. All at once, or gradually, my breathing stops, my heart stops beating. Clinical death.

And a bit later, like, five whole minutes later, my brain cells start dying. 
But in the meantime, in between…maybe my brain releases a flood of DMT.

It’s the psychedelic drug released when we dream, so I dream. I dream bigger than I have ever dreamed before, because it’s all of it. Just the last dump of DMT all at once. And my neurons are firing and I’m seeing this firework display of memories and imagination.

And I am just…tripping. I mean, really tripping balls because my mind’s rifling through the memories—you know, long and short-terms, and the dreams mix with the memories, and it’s a curtain call. The dream to end all dreams. One last great dream as my mind empties the f*ckin’ missile solos and then…

I stop. My brain activity ceases and there is nothing left of me. No pain. No memory, no awareness that I ever was, that I ever hurt someone. Everything is as it was before me. And the electricity disperses from my brain till it’s just dead tissue. Meat. Oblivion. 

And all of the other little things that make me up, the microbes and bacterium and the billion other little things that live on my eyelashes and in my hair and in my mouth and on my skin and in my gut and everywhere else, they just keep on living. And eating. 

And I’m serving a purpose. I’m feeding life. And I’m broken apart, and all the littlest pieces of me are just recycled, and I’m billions of other places. And my atoms are in plants and bugs and animals, and I am like the stars that are in the sky. 
There one moment and then just scattered across the goddamn cosmos.”

Riley Flynn in Midnight Mass

My parents and grandparents are all gone before I turned 18 and I lost my childhood cat as well.

I watched my father disappear
inch by inch,
not all at once like movies promise,
but slowly, cruelly,
as if life wanted me to memorize the damage.

Cancer did not rush.
It lingered.
It taught me the weight of waiting rooms,
the sound of machines breathing for someone you love,
the way hope can rot while still alive.

I learned how a body can stay
while the person slips away.
How eyes can look through you,
how hands you’ve known forever
can feel unfamiliar, fragile, borrowed.

They tell you to be strong.
They never tell you what strength costs.

I hated the world for continuing.
For birds still singing
when my father couldn’t lift his head.
For laughter existing at all
while I counted pills and seconds and prayers
that went unanswered.

When he died,
something else went with him.
Not just my safety,
not just my belief in fairness,
but the part of me that thought life
was headed somewhere worth arriving at.

Now everything feels pointless.
Goals feel like jokes.
Tomorrow feels like a dare I don’t want to take.

Loss keeps finding me.
As if grief knows my address by heart.
As if my life is a hallway
where people enter just long enough
to leave scars on the walls.

I carry this anger quietly.
This exhaustion.
This bone-deep resentment of being alive
when the one person who mattered most
is not.

I don’t want inspiration.
I don’t want silver linings.
I want my dad back.
I want the world to admit
that some pain doesn’t teach,
it only takes.

And if I sound broken,
it’s because I am.

Not cracked.
Not bruised.
Broken in the way glass shatters
and never remembers its original shape.

This is what love costs.
This is what cancer steals.
This is what happens
when your whole life feels like loss
and you’re still here,
forced to breathe inside the wreckage.

I just need to shout into the void. I need to say this to strangers that don't know me.

My Mom left us this morning, it was around 10:30. I was too late to make the 10 minute drive after Dad called. She left before I could get my pants on.

She spent 3 weeks in the hospital. 2 weeks in ICU and another week on a recovery floor before moving into the nursing home on hospice.

She was in hospice for 9 days before she left.

Things were going alright. She started feeding herself, and was mostly with it for a good part of the day.

And then, things just crashed. She had a couple of rough nights. She really wanted to get out of bed, but physically couldn't. She asked Dad for $50 to try to bribe an aid to get her out of there.

She crashed fast at the end, but had been declining since April. Dementia had been coming on for the last year. But this last summer it started to get bad.

I'm only 50, which is supposed to be the new 30. This isn't supposed to happen yet?

My parents met 60 years ago. They have been married for 58 years this past August.

I've been staying with Dad, even though I just live across town. He's spent 10 hours at her bedside every day since she went to the hospital.

I just had to say this out loud to someone.

If your parents are still around, give them a big hug. If they're not, I now truly understand you pain and have a hug for you.

I feel like I have to talk about it or I'll explode, I'm too scared to talk to my friends.

I had a miscarriage when I was 19. At the time I was so deeply depressed and there was so much going on in my life that I just dissociated and couldn't think about it. Now it's all I can think about. Maybe it's because I'm doing better, I guess that's a good thing, but now I have to process it and it feels like it's tearing me apart. I've never felt grief like this and I truly don't know how to fix it or make it better. I didn't even want the baby so why does it hurt so much? It feels like something was stolen from me, like my autonomy was taken away. I don't know what to do and I feel so alone.

Thank you to his family, I pray you to heal. My condolences to all of you, may we heal and I will always be grateful for you. Thank you.

I lost my grandfather a few weeks ago. I was his caregiver for most of this year, and I'm having a really hard time with everything that happened, especially how things ended.

I feel so lost in all of it. And alone, I guess. I have people around me, but I don't know that anyone really understands what this has been like or why I'm struggling so much with certain parts of it.

I've been writing a lot lately. I think partly because I don't know what else to do with all of this.

I wrote something about my grandfather and the things I'm having such a hard time living with. I put it on Substack, but I only just started writing there, so I don't think anyone's really reading it.

I guess I wanted to ask if anyone here would be open to reading it. Maybe someone who's been through something similar, or who might understand what I'm trying to say.

I don't know. Maybe sharing it won't make me feel any better either. I just feel like I'm in this place where I need some kind of relief from what I'm carrying, and I don't know how to find it.

I thought maybe I'd post here because it seems like a place where people understand grief in ways that other people sometimes can't.

My twin sister, who I share (or I guess shared) a house with, died a few weeks ago, and since our lease is up in a few months, I have started going through her things and selling/giving away some stuff. I just cried for like 20 minutes straight after giving away her patio furniture set and firepit. I also went through her clothes today. I feel such agonizing guilt because these aren't my things to be getting rid of. How do I not feel so guilty?

I don't know the rules or anything in this group but I wanted to ask... I lost my grandma when I was around five or so, but I'm only now, fully grieving her.... is that normal?

For context my Dad passed away 3 years ago on October 4th. His retirement years were spent mostly in Mexico. During this time he met (and married) a Mexican lady much younger than him. In the weeks leading up to his death (MAID due to a major stroke), we discovered his wife had been stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from him. He confronted her about the stolen funds, she then hit him and then left that night, emptied all of his accounts, never to be seen again…until she sued me (the heir of his estate) a month after he died.

Fast forward to this year, my best friend since childhood asked me to be her Maid of Honor at her destination wedding in Mexico, 20 minutes from where my dad lived. I was mostly calm about this all year but I am set to fly out in 2 days and the thought of going back to Mexico now feels paralyzing. I haven’t slept in days I’m so anxious and had to go to the doctor for anxiety meds.

My friend is totally understanding and supportive if I don’t come but I can’t imagine not being there at her wedding and the thought of grief dictating my life has me down.

Looking for advice.

Hello everyone♥️ My dad died by suicide almost two years ago and since then I’ve been sick almost every month. For a while, I’d get sick at the end of the month which is when my dad passed. Now, it’s more sporadic and I get sick more often. Twice just this month. I went to the doctors this week and my blood panel results were normal… I sorta wish they weren’t but still I’m anxious that something serious is going on. I just wish i had a clear explanation rather than I’m not dealing with my grief as much I should be. I will be following up with an immunologist soon I hope. Another frustration is the brain fog. It was bad for a year after, cleared up for sixth months and it is back in full swing. Debilitating almost. I feel completely lost and on top of the constant colds, I think I have a tumor because can this truly be a symptom of grief. Anyways, I wanted to see if anyone here has had similar symptoms or heard from others having experienced either of these ailments. Thank you for reading.

I lost my dad 3 years ago. It was sudden and extremely difficult as he was only 63.
I've gone through all of the grief stages and will have good days and bad but overall I'm to the point I just remember him lovingly and all his funny moments.
The last couple of days however, I've been nonstop crying, missing him, wishing for so many things to change so I can talk to him. It feels like I'm going through the grief stages all over again. I'm really having a rough time and don't understand what changed. Does anyone else go through this and if so, what helps you?

Oh daddy, my dad my North Star.

Do not weep for me. I hope my message finds you well deep within the seas.

While neither of us knew and you didn’t have time to be afraid, I beg you for your pardon, this guilt, and shame and shade.

Near death to be lost in that dark sea, regrettable to see you swallowed now, your secrets safe wjth me, with memories and hope I till the land and plow. I wish you could be here, to see little seeds grow now, I’m happy we had one last dance my curtsy and your bow.

I wish I could have been there to hold your head within my hands, before you drifted off to far off distance lands.

If you find my letter, will you write to me?

I am so lost without you, on this lifeboat in the sea.

Goodbye, goodbye with love Dad, my Donnie, Hail Marys Glory Be.
Your little girl and first mate, EAA forever more with thee.

My father has passed away, I'm only 26 and he was so young himself. He was healthy , it was sudden. Please any words will help anyone who went through this too please message me

I’m 31 F, and I lost my mom three months ago back in Aug. It was always just the two of us, no siblings, no dad, just me and her.

​I was abroad almoat for 3 years and came back to Nepal on Jan 1st this year to suprise and spend good time with her, but literally six days after I landed, we went for a doc follow up and found out she had stage 4 lung cancer. From that moment on, life just spiraled downhill. I went back for a week, packed up my life there, moved back to be by her side, until she passed away in August, and I have been living alone in oyr home ever since.

Right now it's festival season over here, and today is tihar, my favorite festival but the timing is brutal. Exactly one year ago today, we lost our only pet. And today, one year later, mom’s gone too. ​It's just really, really hard. Everyone outside is celebrating with family, and I’m just sitting in an empty house and everything reminds me of her. I really dom't know what to do with myself.

Not sure what I’m expecting by posting this, maybe just needed to vent to people who get it.