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My adopted mother passed away on Sunday the 8th of April 2019. Her cancer had come back for the third time and very quickly spread to her spine and the doctors gave her weeks to live. I heard the news and immediately made plans to come up as soon as I could but she died the next day peacefully in her sleep at 2am. I couldn’t do anything to stop it. She may not have been my biological mother but I don’t care she meant the most to me more than anyone else in the world I know. She was the strongest most resilient woman I knew yet the kindest and sweetest at the same time. Her cancer first arrived and she had several terrible operations and treatments to get rid of it and they worked but at a high price, the second time it came around was in a smaller form this last October of 2018. She didn’t want to even tell me because she knew I’d be devastated, and I remember clear as day I had received amazing news and was delighted with myself as she sat and congratulated me while hiding a horrible secret. I eventually found out however and our bond grew and she had it removed fairly simply. But just this last week it returned in her lungs and spread to her spine killing her as she finally lost the fight after three rounds in the ring so to speak. She helped me through the hardest most confusing hormonal and painful time of my own life and pregnancy using her experience to guide me and reassure me everything I was feeling was normal, we joked and cried together, did everything together, she also helped me to realise I had feelings for the person I am currently engaged to and due to marry. She did everything a mother would have done for me in my life in half the time. And all that whilst having illness and demons of her own that far outshadowed mine, and I wasn’t even her biological child even if by almost every meaning of the word I was hers. I can’t stress enough the amount of things she has done for people helping them and now donated her body to cancer research as well. Not only being an amazingly talented singer and pianist serenading me when I was down always picking me up with her bubbly personality. She’d always doubt herself and say she want good enough and I’d scream and shout to the heavens how amazing she was until she conceded with a giggle and accepted she might just be okay. But now, that’s gone...the most beautiful soul I’ve had the honour of being able to call my mother has been taken from me and the family. And I don’t know how I can move on when I’m still so in love with her and everything about her, just so many things she didn’t get to do and I can’t see her do and be happy...I don’t feel anything now I just sit here shaking and shaking and getting angrier then sadder and crying and fine and loop and it’s endless I can’t just be calm even now the cycle in my head and body round and round it never stops it’s like I can’t function without her I don’t know what to do. The last thing she said to me before she died was “Don’t be sad, I will die the happiest woman on earth who finally found true love” and that helps to a degree, but still not enough to fill this black hole of feelings inside me from my own past that she kept for me in check and controlled which is just raging and raging and I can’t stop it...I can’t do anything now other than think about her and how i just want her to hold me again and say “I love you heaps ya know” like she always would Miss you forever mum...hopefully I’ll see you again one day, god do I hope so.

I'm having a panic attack... I don't know what to say...As I mentioned earlier, two days ago I felt this enormous pain that my mom was going through about sleeplessness, and I just felt her saying to me, "I am so sorry, I am so sorry, just forgive me, just forgive me..." I was really scared to death, first feeling all that pain, and second feeling about my mom. After that "encounter" with my mom, I started to think that it was actually okay for my mom to commit suicide. Because I really experienced her pain, and I just felt like it was okay. But how can I say that?! For the entire two years after my mom was gone, I was never, NEVER okay with her suicide. I tried so many times to feel okay about it, but I was never never okay until two days ago after that experience. Now that I actually feel okay, I feel like I'm going insane. How can I allow that to be okay? How can I allow myself to be okay with my mom's suicide? If I feel okay with it, does that mean that I'm okay with suicide in general? Does that mean that suicide is just a "normal death"? I am so confused by how I feel. On one hand, I tried so hard in the past two years to get here. On the other hand, after finally feeling "okay" about it, I feel crazy. I feel insane. I feel that I should not be okay with it. It is such a difficult difficult place that I'm in...Please please help me! Has anyone had that experience?Chen

Hey all. This is my first post. I'm 19 years old, female, lost my mom 3 months ago very suddenly to heart attack. She was 46 years old and we were all blindsighted. She had been sick but no one was expecting it. I woke up to my dad calling my name. At first I thought it was just him waking me up for work, but then something in his voice. It sounded wrong. I immediately woke up and asked what was wrong. He was standing in the hallway saying my name and staring into his bedroom. I bolted up and asked if it was mom and if she was ok. I ran into the bedroom and she was laying on the bed arms outstretched stiff. Her eyes were glazed over, she had vomit on her face. I immediately grabbed my phone and called 911. I started to panic as my dad went into hysterics in the background. I did my best to tell the operator what was happening. I put her on speaker so she could walk my dad through CPR. Air came out of her mouth as he pushed but she wasn't breathing. He told me to get out of the room and wait for the paramedics. Just as I was about to leave the room, one of my dogs walked in to see what was going on. I'll never forget that expression she had on her face when she realized. She came in wagging her tail, and then she saw mom on the floor and....Her face just fell. Her whole expression changed and she hung her head and her tail. I gently ushered her and my other dog to kennels, moving things so they could get the stretcher in and sat on the porch. I was in total shock. When the paramedics arrived I watched as they told my dad "I'm sorry buddy. She's cold. She's gone." My dad broke out into even worse hysterics screaming that she wasn't that sick and her name over and over again. The rest of the day was the longest day in the world. My grandmother came to see us. She had plans to visit my mom that day. I watched as we had the best officers get her out of there before we had to bring my brother home. My brother. My not even at his 16th birthday yet, brother. The one who my mom would never get to see graduate. The one who went to school that morning with a mom. The one who would come home without one. I watched my dad tell my brother at a church parking lot with tears running down his face what happened. The moment my brother realized he'd never see his mom again. The hug we shared in tears together. Every day I have flash backs to that day. Every day I remember her face when we found her. My dad screaming for me. My brother. Most nights I have nightmares. Before it was worse. It's not as bad now but I always wake up alert, afraid something happened to someone. Every day I think about her. Before it was always how much I missed her, how unfair it was. I was a huge mama's girl and was barely ever away from her. We were best friends, and now I will never see her again. Hear her voice, talking to me, singing songs to me, and telling me how much she loved me. I'm overwhelmed by how much I miss her and my new responsibilities in the family. I keep the family together. I do a vast majority of the chores, maintaining the house, dinner, I work a part time job, I take care of my brother, and take care of 4 animals. While it's not a lot in terms of work, it feels like it. Every day, I feel like I'm just kind of..not me anymore. Like I lost large pieces of me. I feel like I'm mom 2.0 and failing miserably. In addition to that I have an overall depressed feeling. A depressed deep down in my soul. I can smile, and laugh, but there's always a sigh following. My fiancee has noticed and she's worried about me. She thinks maybe I need to connect with other's to help me not feel so isolated. Maybe this post will help other's feel not so isolated. Maybe it will help me too.