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Here is my story as it is still relatively fresh in my life, in hopes to find insight from both sides as to how I should continue with my situation. I am a 19 year-old college sophomore and about 3 weeks ago now I was left by my girlfriend after a beautiful two-year relationship. And, yes, it pains me how cliche my situation is. However after some complexities, it becomes more unique. After two years of being together- meeting in high school, both going to college down in LA (she's a grade below me)- her dad was diagnosed with lung cancer and soon passed two months after his diagnosis. She's 18 years old. I tried to be as supportive as I could possibly be. I drove 8 hours to be with her while her dad passed. I brought her family closer to mine to give support during their grieving process (invited them to our Thanksgiving). In every way I knew how, I was there for her. It was difficult for me to be with her every second as we went to schools an hour apart. Long distance is no stranger to us, as we maintained our relationship when I was 8 hours away from her in LA for my first year of college. And during the past 4 months we have been both happy maintaining our semi-long distance relationship at different schools. When the holidays came around, I was offered the opportunity of a lifetime to climb Mt.Kilimanjaro for free. I did the trip, but felt incredibly guilty not being with her in support as she went through the first Christmas and New Years without her dad. While I was away, we talked whenever I had internet connection and were both excited to see each other. When I got back, we spent a great few days together before I invited her to come on a vacation with me to Tahoe (in hopes it would both bonding and therapeutic). In the last minute before leaving, she told me she needed to be with her family and couldn't go. When I got back from Tahoe, she sat me down and told me she couldn't continue our relationship anymore because she needed to grieve her dad alone and valued the opportunity to be alone more than the opportunity to continue our relationship. That to me is something that is hard for me to fully understand. It hit me like a train. That night was sleepless and filled with anxiety attacks. I had 8 days before we each drove down to LA again. In my head I thought back to the 6 days prior when we were still together and everything was seemingly great, Only in retrospect do I realize she had been wearing a thick mask to hide her sadness, but I still am lost as to when the love slipped away with it. The dynamics had changed in our relationship after her dad, but my perspective was I was giving her the chance to be sad without me forcing her to be happy. Again, I didn't know how to handle to situation as I have never been there before. For the next 8 days, I spent time with her, cuddling, laughing, wrestling. She made it clear we were still broken up and used this time as a chance to easily transform our relationship into friendship. I saw it differently. I saw the 8 days as a chance to fight for our relationship. She would openly say she was confused, to the point that on night 5 she slept with me. From my perspective, there was hope and I wouldn't accept the idea that the relationship was over. When I tried to confront her about it, she would tell me I needed to forget about her and move on. And of course that’s the last thing I wanted to do. My mind was split between fighting for what we had to rekindle whatever had been lost, or to give her the pace I knew she needed. Still, the entire week I suffered anxiety attacks and cried excessively. In the last days before we parted to school, she became stern with her decision to split up and I truly began to mourn our relationship. On the day of departure, still a wreck, she kissed me goodbye and told me she wanted to stay in contact. My mind was spinning with the never-ending question of “why.” After she had expressed her desire for me, she still kissed me goodbye, told me she cared about me, and went on her way. I texted her on good terms as we each settled into our lives separated in LA, but told her to reach out to me when she wanted to talk. After a few days I never heard anything from her. It was so difficult to see her continue with her life so effortlessly. “Business as usual.” I used social media to see that she was having fun and still in contact with her friends, but I somehow had been cut out of the picture. I still loved her, but it was impossible for me to move on. I was an emotional wreck, lost in our memories and attempting to take my first steps towards recovery. I finally had the courage to call her after a week of silence, knowing that by giving myself a week I would get over the initial blow of emotions I would go through in the first week of separation. It was hard. Like withdrawal from a drug. My chest always carried around an aching pain, while my mind went on autopilot throughout the day. I would take advice and keep myself busy, meeting with friends, getting out of the house. I even picked up running. By the time I called her I thought I could begin to foster a friendship, knowing that giving her space would be the best thing for her. Deep down, I hoped she would turn back and say that she was wrong, but of course she didnt. We made small conversation about how our weeks had been, acting as though we were friends with no history. My mind was ruptured. It hurt that she never reached out to me in our week of silence, but boy was it good to hear her voice now. I quickly realized she didn’t want to get into the relationship. She made it obvious she was over with me, but my mind still hung onto this idea of hope from the kiss, sleeping with me. My mind seeded this idea that she was confused and still in love with me and there was some hope deep down. I knew it wasn’t healthy for me to cling on. But at the same time the last thing I wanted to give up on something that was so good. Finally I mustered up the courage to be direct about the situation. I understood she needed space, but was there any way I could be in the picture for that? No. Why did you kiss me goodbye? Closure. I want you to tell me you don’t love me anymore. I don’t love you anymore. We took a few minutes discussing why she felt the way she did in a blunt conversation. In the end she told me she needed space to be independent, not worry the stress of our relationship. But how could you give up on we happiness we had? I expressed my passion for our companionship, how happy we were together. A bad tactic, I know. At the end, I told her that for my sake we shouldn’t talk for several months. A peppy “OK. I understand.” Today I find myself in a situation where I know the healthiest thing to do would be letting her go and moving on completely to enjoy my time here in college. However it’s difficult to ignore the potential our relationship our had and the incredibly unique experiences we shared at such as milestone in our lives. My head has moments of clarity where I see the future as a single person, where I can develop myself, be with other people. But I am constantly reminded of the amazing memories we share and still not entirely understanding why it had to end with me out of the picture. My heart is suffocating from the anxiety and withdrawal of having a best friend. Where I need guidance is to assess where I stand in her life and how much should I be part of that. All I want to do is talk to her everyday and support her in such a difficult time in her life. The irony is before I didn’t know how to support her because I had never gone through any major grief in my life, and now that she’s left me, I see through her mask and can recognize the pain she must be in. I have several anxiety attacks each day, almost a month after she left me, each one inspired by a rabbit hole of thought as I think about how she is fine without me. I am reminded constantly of our past and am intimidated about the future. I’ve been told to support her from afar, but how do I do that without hurting myself? If I don’t talk with her will she drift too far and I then lose all hope of us getting too far? I want to give her space, but keep me in the picture as support. Should I fight or fall back? How do I cope with the anxiety? If anybody has lost a parent, what has been their experience with their relationships? What is it that she needs and is there anyway I can be in her picture? I know I am 19 and the story sound like the classic first loves drama. But the pain that I am going through gets harder every day as I think about her drifting. TL;DR My girlfriend left me after the passing of her father for reasons pertaining to her needing space to grieve. She fell out of love with my, however gave me strong signals of hope after we had broken up. After confronting the hope and beginning my first steps into acceptance, I am lost on truly understanding why she left me and how I should best allow the situation to play out to foster the potential for getting back together. The pain is overwhelming and I want to be there to support her but she has kindly told me she needs to be alone. How do I cope? How do I fight? How do I let got? What have been your experiences in relationships when losing your parent?

Hi, I am not quite sure why I am posting this, I guess to vent out as I have no other outlet. My mother was 62 type two diabetes and suffered from hypertension for many years. She developed Chikungunya infection according to our family physician on 24-26 Sep and on the 29th sudden back and abdominal pain, however fever had subsided. There was dengue and chikungunya epidemic in India at this time and the Physician who had been treating her for nearly 20 years went by her symptoms. The Initial blood test which he finally took on the 29th after her condition deteriorated revealed low platelet count 95,000 which he said was still 'safe', the only thing he said was that it was important to keep her hydrated so she needed a drip at any local hospital. By this time she could barely move and her abdominal pain just got worse and it was badly swollen, all this time she kept saying she was fine and that she will be fine. Our father was abroad and it was only myself and my younger brother, we had no other friend or family except an aunt who herself had suffered chikungunya. By this time we really got worried because mum could not even move to use the bathroom. She had not passed urine for a day not had a bowel movement for a day, but this we thought was because she was not eating and drinking for two days and also because she was extremely weak to get up and use the loo. We finally convinced her to come to hospital as she was not getting better and the fever usually lasts 5-7 days and people start getting better while she didn't. We took her to emergency at a large private hospital and they ran tests saw her low platelet report which was worrying they said and found that her creatinine and potassium was too high she had electrolyte imbalance and her kidneys have shut down, also she had acidosis. They put her on dialysis and she kept getting worse although levels did come down. On second day in ICU they found air leaking from her intestine, they said she needed emergency surgery with only a 10% survival chance, she made it through surgery they said she had perforation peritonitis. The next day morning her BP dropped. They gave her meds to increase BP but nothing worked, last resort was blood transfusion but she passed away in septic shock. We are not aware of any diverticulitis or similar problem, she didn't have any abdominal pain recently only she went to to toilet a lot, this was not unusual as she always said she has soft bowel. How could we have saved her? They diagnosed perforation after 36hours in Hospital through x-ray. What might have caused the perforation? Was chukungunya responsible? How soon if we had taken her to hospital she would have survived? I lost the most amazing person in my life, I never ever expected that my beautiful mum would just leave like this, on the second day even though she had all the tubes, central IV, food pipes etc, she believed me when Intold her that they were only going to clean her blood because she had bad toxins that were causing her problems, she listened to me and that's it, that's the last time we spoke and she heard me, after that she was sedated because she she was on ventilator, we didn't get the chance to say good bye, she is only 62, none of us are married, she will never see anyone's wedding if that at all happens, i never expressed how much she meant to us, that i valued every single sacrifice she made for us, i was recently frustrated as everything in my life especially work had taken a turn for the worse, I was isolated, I have no friends, I look after the house also and I get frustrated with household duties and responsibilities, I barely had time for myself or to sit and reflect over things with my mum, I did break down a couple of times and she had promised me that she will support me in anything I chose to do in future, I feel guilty as I should have not complained to her about anything and pretended that all is well like I had done in the past, I didn't express my love and gratitude as much as I should have. We had come to India and we're meant to go back to Uk in july, however a wedding on her side came up which she wanted to attend so much, I hate weddings I had said no but later I consented because she'd said they won't go without me, so we ended up changing reservations. After that Diwali was so near and I said since we are staying back maybe we could celebrate it together and then go back. This is the biggest mistake of my life, it turned out to be the darkest Diwali because she passed away two weeks before that! If I had not said this, we would have gone back in August and none of this would have happened, perhaps it was chikungunya that caused kidney failure and perforation, which eventually led to sepsis and ultimately she died of septic shock. I kept looking at her while she was sick but I had never imagined that between the 26th and 3rd she would just not live! Even with viral it takes 3-4 days at least until people get better, I was ignorant, i should have opened my mind and my eyes and taken her to hospital as soon as she developed abdominal pain but I didn't and she would have not consented, she had more trouble getting up because she was overweight, nearly 100 kgs. We left it too long, my negligence killed her, all education etc went waste because i behaved worse than anyone I know. I hate myself, it's just horrible how I feel now, she just left us so suddenly and abruptly, my brother is in depression, I am pulling things together and I see darkness everywhere, life has no meaning, no purpose I wish She would have taken me with her, i can't bear this loneliness, it's awful. I could have saved her if I had taken her to hospital even two days before, I could have saved her if we had taken her to a good gastroentologist to check why she went to the toilet so much. But we took her to a reputed gastro last year and he was awful and my mum felt very depressed, he had ordered some tests which she never took. We could not force her because she had improved. Before the fever her August bloods were perfect her creatinine, potassium etc were all in perfect normal ranges. I fail to understand how she deteriorated in literally 5-6 days and was deemed critical as soon as we reached emergency. I never ever thought I would lose her like this, she didn't even talk to us before going, she loved her children more than anything and anybody in the world, she was completely selfless, I just wish I could have expressed more and had the peace of mind that I didn't leave any stone unturned in trying to save her, but the fact that I didn't haunts me all the time, I keep looking at forums, at diagnosis of the disease to understand what happened to her and why so quickly that her body didn't get any chance to recoup. Once a person dies, he/she just dies, it's a lie when people say she is with you, that her soul is with you, I don't have any such feeling all I know is that she is dead, I held her cold feet in the ICU watching as her blood pressure dropped but at the end I could not beat it anymore when they said she will not make it, I left the room eventually so our father and her brother could be with her. I simply didn't want to have the picture of her dying for the rest of my life, perhaps I hurt her she must have looked for me, because they say that even after you pass you can hear.. I hate myself, I wish I had taken better care of her, never complained about silly things and showed her more that I love her and that I'd need her no matter how old I grow. We celebrated her birthday 12 days before she left us.. it's horrible and unfair, she had a blind faith in God and this is what she got. There's so much I could have possibly done to prevent what haooebed, if only we'd gone back in August she would have not fallen sick or if we had been in london the doctors are more efficient and they would have saved her rather than ignoring her perforation symptoms Pls help as these answers will put my mind to rest and give me some clarity. Heartfelt thank uou

So last week was a pretty rough week for me. I found out that student in my program, who sat directly across from me, had "died unexpectedly." I was devastated! Since my dad had died, I wasnt afraid to have conversations about death because I feel that we need to be able to talk about it but when I found out that this guy had passed away, I freaked out! He had passed about 3 days after finals. I put it in quotes because I completely believe that he had killed himself. He was one of those students that everyone else was afraid of or thought was weird. I talked to him because he was there and Hell, Im a little strange too so why not? He had later told us that he was going to kill himself after his mom died. My lab partner and I tried to talk to him but he was having none of it. I knew he was serious. He wasnt religious and his dad had killed himself when he was just 2 so its not like suicide was new to him. I knew he was serious but omg. Its just so sad to believe someone was that sad. Secondly, I gave myself a concussion feeding my dog. Funny if you ask me and not a sad event but wow! I had been watching my dog behave weird and finally took her to the vet and found out she had kidney failure. Oh it was awful. I cried hysterically since I knew we needed to put her down. Later, found out she had a seizure/cardiac arrest and was ready to go herself. We put her down on Christmas Eve. Very sad but its better and Im dealing with it okay. The point of this post is that I just want to withdraw. Im feeling suffocated being around my mom, which makes me feel awful! And I just want to be with my thoughts. How do I grieve over my dad and my dog fairly? Im not really mourning over that student because I feel like this is better as he can get the help he needs now. I do plan on talking to my friends more and trying to prevent that sadness though. I had been watching a video about this guy who had lost his dad to cancer as well. He said not to pull inside yourself and sit with your thoughts because its rough that way. I kind of feel that its true but thinking those hard thoughts is how I deal with them. I am very good at "ignoring" things and just going until it catches up with me. Im just not sure how to handle this correctly.