Search the Community

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 came across this site right before my moms death as I was searching online for grief groups. This group gave me comfort when I couldn't find it around me. Well, its been over a year since my first post and a year as of Thanksgiving that my mom departed this earth. Life has gotten "easier" in the sense of the word that I'm no longer dreading each daybreak. I hit a point where I started working out more, taking care of myself, and forcing myself to find joy. After her death, I moved back where I had people who could hold me accountable. The road was difficult and forced me to feel a ton of emotions that I didn't want to. Yet, a year later. I'm still alive. I got married and found happiness, and even though I'm still grieving, I've gotten to a point where I can cope, because I know she's with me. I can feel her and find solace in that. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone on this board. I wouldn't have gotten through those crucial first few months.

My mother died on April 10, 2015 and while I'm a little better, I feel like I have a really long road ahead of me. I have all the classic grief symptoms: weight gain, increased alcohol use, trouble concentrating at work, trouble sleeping, difficulty finding the joy in life, crying at the drop of a hat, etc... It's been a tremendous struggle. As I begin this topic, I realize there are so many issues going on, I don't even know where to begin. First, I'm frustrated about the circumstances surrounding my Mom's death. She died from the radiation treatments, not from the lung cancer she was diagnosed with. Her death certificate actually says she died from "radiation pneumotitis" (sp?), but her radiation oncologist never stopped by the hospital during the six weeks she was in there dying from her treatments. I feel like they killed her with their drugs and treatments and there are no consequences for them; they just get paid a lot of money. I've read a lot of literature during the past six weeks about how there is a higher incidence of cancer treatments killing patients versus the cancer itself. Yes, I'm playing the "bargaining" game. What if we'd gone with a natural cancer treatment? What if we'd gotten a second opinion? I was the one who took my Mom to all her doctors' appointments when she was diagnosed with cancer and I'm the one who weeded through all the medical jargon to help her understand the suggested treatments. Of course, I feel guilty for leading her down the path that ultimately led to her death. Why didn't I question the treatments more? Why didn't I do more research on the ineffectiveness of chemo and radiation? She might still be here today ...