A Middle-Aged Orphan

dlowan- Thank you for saying that. I think that that concept will be helpful to me, for what is going inevitably to come.

I have had the same experience with my mother's death. She passed a few months after Elvis did. That's how I keep track of the time passed, idiotically enough. I did not know abot my father's death in 1948 until a few years ago. Even that knowledge has had its effect on me. I have spent quite a bit of time trying to learn the circumstance.

I understand that urge, Edgar.

When my sister died, things were very different, thank heavens, from how they are now.

Neither she nor I were told that she had a fatal illness. When she became too ill to nurse at home, she was taken off in an ambulance to hospital, where she stayed for a couple of months, until she died.

At that time, children under twelve were not permitted to visit other children in the Children's Hospital!!!!!!!

This meant that she went off to hospital - supposedly, as far as my parents told me, to get better. I never saw her again - no goodbyes, no chance to be with her (we were extremely close) - and her death was never discussed. I knew it was taboo to mention her.

At some stage soon, I will get her hospital records, hoping they will give me some picture of the last months of her life.

I thank heaven for the people who worked hard to make things so different for people facing the same situation today.

Midle-Aged Orphan
I can't speak to knowing how a young child feels about losing a parent, but I do know it's every bit as hard, though undoubtedly quite different when you lose a parent as an adult.

My father was lucky - he died instantly of a massive heart attack. My mother slowly drained away over a four-year nursing home stay. I must say, the home couldn't have been nicer or kinder to her, difficult though she was.

What was the worst was not the recognition of being totally orphaned , but the fact that, having lost my only sister some years earlier, I was now the only one left. As someone said earlier in this thread, it's the loss of connections and shared memories that makes it so hard. Note the use of the present tense, BTW.

We do go on, and we do enjoy our lives, and so we should, but it's different, and a great adjustment. But I guess maturity could be defined at least in part as being able to adjust . . .

Tomkitten - I think that all our lives, we think of ourselves as "the younger generation". All of a sudden, when our aunts, uncles, and parents are gone there is the realization that WE are the older generation. I think that this takes quite an adjustment, and dealing with the reality of our own mortality.

My father died in 2000, my mother in 2001. That first realization of both of them being gone is heart-stopping and for a little while, you really do feel alone, uncomfortable in the world, a little bit frightened even but, as Tomkitten said, we adjust. Those feelings do eventually pass.

Here's another aspect of it for me: I am the only sibling with my surname to father any children. Of those children, only one has a child thus far to carry on the surname. I shouldn't be nervous about a thing like this, but I can't help it.

Many of your comments are hitting home. I didn't realize there were that many "homes."

Diane, Yes, I never was the person my mother wished I could have been. Fact is that she wasn't the mother I wished I had had. So I guess we're even. As for staying crazy, don't worry about a thing.

Phoenix, The challenge of becoming my mother's mother was exacerbated by her resentment of my interference. She punished me emotionally for everything I did for her, until her reason was gone. I did less than I should have but more than I wanted to. And as she deteriorated in the nursing home, my visits became less and less frequent. She didn't know who I was, and I saw a shell of the woman I knew. I would visit and flee.

Deb, The reality of it is far more potent than the idea of it. Despite the sense of relief, hearing the clods of earth hit my mother's coffin in a hole in the ground was a bit more reality than I was prepared for. What a horrible, hollow, FINAL sound that is. Despite being with a few family members and good friends, I never felt so alone. And the ambivalence of my feelings toward my mother made the whole business messy in my mind and heart. Not so when my father died. No ambivalence there. I adored him, and he me. This made losing him harder but dealing with it easier. Does that make sense?

edgar, I can understand why you want to know the circumstances surrounding your father's death. I hope you will eventually find out. As for passing the name along, I understand that too. My father was the youngest of seven children, all all the boys had girls, except for one nephew, who has a son. This was on my father's mind--only one person to carry on the name.

Tomkitten, I'm an only child, so I do understand about being the only one left. A strange, isolated feeling.

eoe, I guess my mother's death is still too fresh for me to have adjusted yet. It's going to take a while.


When the realization hit me that I'm an orphan, my first reaction--I want to be adopted! Hey, Diane was right when she said I'm nuts. What are my chances? Maybe I should open a Web site: Adopt-a-Kvetch. What do you think?

Adopt-a-Kvetch. What a concept. I love it! :-D

Middle-aged orphan
Yes, the difference in your reactions to your parents' deaths is perfectly reasonable. You had a single, strong tie to your father, but an ambivalent relationship with your mother. This certainly would carry over into your feelings after their deaths.

Take your time, my friend.

Yes, rings true here.

This sounds terrible, but I looked forward to my father's death. I truly hated him and thought that when he died, all of us would be free. It was sickeningly apparent after a few months, that he was still with us in many ways--in the way we reacted to certain things, to the automatic fear response in certain situations. I realized that his death hadn't made him disappear.

It has been mentioned a couple of times that losing a loved parent is much easier to accept than the loss of a parent who was feared and hated. Odd, isn't it?

So much left undone.

I felt as does Diane about my step father. My big regret before he died: I did not get to confront him after I grew up. He died first and there now is no closure for me.

My father died ten years ago yesterday. I started feeling more & more tense & couldn't understand why until I realized the date. Practically the first thing my sister & I said to each other after he died was... now we're orphans.

The worst feeling, for me was that I no longer had anyone who would applaud my successes and cry with me over failures. You do something great, the first thing you want to do is tell your parents, right? Ahhh, that was very hard... still is. The 21st anniversary of my mother's death is coming up at the end of the month... I'm hoping that I won't have more emotional upsets. It has been, after all, twenty-one long years. I could easily get myself to cry though, if I started thinking about all that time that she could have been here, enjoying her grandchildren and her life.

I'm really sorry that now you're an orphan. Sadly, as far as I know, it doesn't really get better. You accept that this is life... but there it is: wasted years, missed moments and things that you shared, gone. Who'll remember? Despite all its glories, life sucks. That's why I always say, for this new year I want to have more fun.

(((((Roberta)))))

Edgar and Diane, I tried very hard for a very long time to accept the fact that things were unfixable between me and my mother. It was harder to accept when she was alive. Was there still hope? No fixing now. And the bad feelings will remain with me--along with the good ones.

Perhaps it was fitting that my last visit with my mother was a disaster bordering on farce. I'd been very sick--I'd had a major asthma attack. Rushed to emergency in an ambulance. The works. I was informed that my mother had pnuemonia the day before I called for the ambulance. About a week later, I felt that I absolutely had to see her. I managed to get to the nursing home and went to the nurses' station before I went in to see her. I was coughing and panting. I was told that I had to wear a mask or I would not be allowed to see her.

I put on the mask, and couldn't breathe easily. All the panting steamed up my glasses. Then I couldn't breathe and I couldn't see. I stumbled into my mother's room and saw through my misted glasses a frail shell of the woman I knew. She didn't know who I was when I wasn't wearing a mask, but the mask and the panting scared her. I stayed a few minutes and stumbled out of the room. I was dripping in sweat, panting for air, and very upset by the whole experience. The nurses wouldn't let me leave until I had caught my breath. That was the last time I saw her.

When I got the call that my mother was fading, the doctor told me that I couldn't come to the home. There was a flu outbreak and it would be too dangerous for me. And then it was over. Sigh.

That's an awful way to have to say goodbye Boida...


My father sort of made me laugh at the end.....

Two stories:

I was teaching a bunch of medical students, and Peter - my friend, our then team psychiatrist, and the co-ordinator of the unit we were teaching the li'l smeggers - came into the room, took me outside, and said the hospital had called to say dad was dying - in a deep coma - and to get there. he took over the students...

I called a friend, cos my weird half brother was threatening to kill me (I hadn't seen him since I was 3 - don't ask! - so didn't know what he looked like! and I assumed the hospital would have called him too - and my friends said to call them if this happened - man, it was spooky visiting my father, and not knowing what on earth this nut case looked like) - and I couldn't get her boss, who answered the phone, to tell me where I could contact her, since he was so full of a message he wanted me to give her when I saw her!

In the end I got him off the phone, got her, and we went in together.

The doctor greeted me looking very odd and a bit sheepish - seconds after they made the call, my father who was sinking fast and comatose, sat up and asked calmly for a cup of tea. They had been going to move him to a hospice, and were about to put him on the barouche for the trip when he became so ill. needless to say, they didn't try and move him again. They were embarrassed at having dragged me from work - but I was amused - I assumed my dad hadn't liked being moved and had managed - consciously or unconsciously - to stop it from happening!




Very near the end he was doing his usual "I've been a bad man/ father/everything that ever went wrong was my fault" thing - that would briefly replace his more common "you are a bad/stupid/hopeless/incompetent/daughter/ person/employee/friend/wife/etc etc that was his more usual song.

I was assiduously trying to help him feel better by being very positive about him - hoping this might help him let go more peacefully. I asked him - in this vein - what was his proudest achievement.

He said something that I did not really catch, "caught" himself theatrically as you do when you have said something nasty, but want to pretend it was a mistake - and put his hand over his mouth in "horror".

I was amused becasue I knew whatever he had said was meant to be nasty to me, and I thought it funny and kind of nice that he was dying as he had lived - so I asked him to repeat it. He did so, more loudly, complete with the fake "catch", the look of horror and the hand over the mouth, barely concealing his smile of satisfaction at having managed to be mean. It was, indeed, a nasty dig at me - quite ineffective becasue I was not at all sensitive about the criticism (he said he was glad he was never so hopeless that he had to work for the government - as I was doing).

As I said, I found it very amusing that he was so himself at such a solemn time!

True to form, huh, Deb? I'm glad you can laugh. What happened to the step-brother, or shouldn't I ask? And why would he want to kill a wonderful bunny such as you?

LOL! Half brother. Just nuts - had a bizarre fixated relationship with my father - went nutser as it became apparent dad was dying - transferred it to me, with bizarrer interest!

Dunno where he is. Once dad died, I made it clear he would threaten/harass etc me at his own risk - ie that I would not play his games, and I would respond legally and harshly to futur ebad behaviour.