Part 1

Hi Wombat,

I lost my dad to lung cancer back in May, 8 weeks after diagnosis. He was 58. Wrong as this probably sounds, I'm glad to know that it's not just me having the dreams, I've had a quite a few and one of the worst things about them for me is that I'm dreaming he's alive, even if it is with the cancer, and then I wake up and he isn't, he's still dead, my mum is still depressed and difficult and I'm still miserable. Utterly crap. I was completely numb for weeks, I only cried as he was dying (it was a difficult death) and a bit at the funeral but then I didn't for weeks. I was worried that I didn't care enough, that maybe I was some sort of psychopath oddball who couldn't grieve but in its own good time it came and when it did it could be overwhelming. I tend to keep things in but sometimes they get overwhelming and I'll blow up in a big storm of shouting and tears over something stupid. Now it's little things that make me sad, songs, memories, taking my dad's details off things and feeling like I'm wiping him out that make me cry. A row with my mum, because I know my dad was really worried about how me and her would get on without him there to act as a buffer and calm things down. And the memories of when he was ill, when he begged the nurses for help because he felt like he was drowning, crying in his dressing gown because he felt like he was useless and couldn't do anything to help us any more, I feel like all my happy memories of the past have been hijacked by the sad ones from that 8 weeks. It's hard to see how 8 weeks of memories can push out of the way 30 years of previous memories but somehow they can and I really hope that changes. Grief takes different people in different ways but the one thing we all have in common is that it's difficult and it hurts like hell,

All the best to all of you, stay strong and we'll get all get through it somehow, love Vikki x

Hi VicolaW

I also have the dreams, always take a minute or two when I wake up to realise that they are both gone.

In a way I am glad to know the grief will come, this feeling nothing is harder in a way although I bet as soon as it hits me I will want my protective numbness back!

Stay strong and you are right we will all get through it somehow.

xxx

I thank whoever that I am not alone in my feelings whilst at the same time hating that anyone else has had to suffer the same sorry to all.

Helen xxx

Hi Wombat

I lost my dad 9 weeks ago having lost my mum 8 years before that, both to cancer. I feel completely alone as if both of them have abandoned me. I have so much anger that I am in this position and they were both so young, mum 50 and dad 59.

I feel that life has stopped and I am lost. I am struggling to find myself and how I move on from here. People keep telling me it will get easier but at the moment all i can think of is my dads last few days and how he struggled for breath and how afraid he was. I have the same recurring nightmare of me sitting at his bedside. I am not sure if there is a right or wrong way to react to grief or if there is a normal reaction?!

Hopefully the pain and anger will subside someday x