Like I tell my friends, if you like your folks, keep in touch. They can be gone in an instant, and then it’s too late. Don’t end up regretting a lost opportunity.
On the other hand, if you are one of those unlucky ones that had horrible parents, physically or emotionally abusers, fuck 'em. Life is too short. Let them go and never look back.
JAQ: My support group is ACNP. Adult Children of Normal Parents. Sometimes I fear it is a small group. Miss you mom and dad!
My mom died when I was a year old, so I miss her in ways I’ll never know.
My mother is still alive. She’ll be 80 next year. I’m deeply conflicted, though. She was a battered wife and deeply depressed. While she did all she could, her will to live died.
I spent the better part of my life sacrificing everything for her. In the end, she turned on me as well. I ran out of energy to deal with her. I know that her life sucked, but nothing I could do would be able to undo that for her. It all just got too much.
We still are in contact, but I just had to extract myself from her drama.
I hope she finds peace.
15 years now, since both my folks died.
I still can’t think too much about them or discuss them without getting very sad very quickly.
I had so much more to say, and now I can’t.
This is my greatest regret in life.
Six years and one week ago. I miss her every. single. day.
I was very lucky to have had a great Mom who lived to be 90 - I had her love and support and guidance until I was 54 years old. I will be forever grateful to have had her so long, and bitterly sad that she’s no longer here. I was not quite as lucky with my Dad; he died 23 years ago. I miss him terribly too.
I think you’re taking the OP too literally. Pain suppositories just eased the process of death.
My mom died when I was 6, so like other posters who lost their moms early, I miss her in a different way than someone who lost mom as an adult. I miss that I don’t remember as much as I’d like, and I don’t have enough memories.
Way too far into TLDR territory, but submitted for general perusal anyway. It’s a heavily abbreviated copy of an essay I once wrote for a lifespan psychology course:
When I was a child, John B. Watson’s granddaughter Mariette lived directly across the street from us. My parents regularly hired her to babysit me and my sister. At the time, she was a relatively unknown bit actress. Years later, she became widely recognized for a long-running series of television advertisements for the Polaroid Camera that she appeared in with James Garner. In 1990, she wrote an autobiography describing the psychological damage that Watson had done to her mother, and in turn, to herself. The very last page of the book describes her final conversation with her mother as she lay on her deathbed:
She welled up. “All I can think is that I won’t be around to watch you perform anymore. That there’s no more future. It’s as if I’ll never be able to tell you all I want you to know. I’m happy here. It’s crazy and chaotic and I’m happy. It’s like…”
“Mom. Are you trying to tell me that you want to live?”
She looked down at her robe; her thumb caressed the border.
She spoke so softly, the word was almost inaudible. Yes,” she said.
At eighty-four, my mother finally wanted to live.
I keep her biography in my professional library of books and journals related to child welfare, which is separate from the rest of my books. That passage haunts me; it’s the most devastating statement I have ever encountered which illustrates the tragedy of childhood attachment trauma. Too often as we age we attempt to retaliate against our parents for the demons of our childhood, either by ignoring them, or by treating them harshly.
This is where I regret my past behavior in dealing with others, particularly my own family. I know that my mother was to a large extent just as much a victim of my father’s domineering personality as my sister and I were. Just as Mariette’s mother suffered immeasurably from her father’s belief that mothers should avoid physical contact and verbal interaction with their children as much as possible, my own mother suffered from a lifetime of emotional deprivation. Her own father was an alcoholic law enforcement officer who worked on a Seneca Indian reservation and played no active participatory role in his children’s upbringing. He was completely dismissive of other people’s emotions. My mother had a pet goose as a child that she had raised from a hatchling. One Christmas her father killed it and cooked it for dinner without even telling her. She didn’t discover that she had eaten her own pet until the next day. Both of her parents were deceased before she was 18, so she was sent to live with her aunt and uncle in Chicago. She attended the University of Chicago for two years, and then transferred to UCLA to complete upper division studies, where she met my father, who was then an associate professor. They were married in 1957, and divorced 13 years later. Neither of my parents were ever involved in anything other than very fleeting relationships with the opposite sex after their divorce. Both of them lived their entire lives without ever being involved in a committed, reciprocal relationship. By the early 1970s, my mother had developed a pattern of alcohol abuse which persisted unabated for the next three and a half decades, right up until the day she had her stroke. Like Mariette’s mother, she was never really afforded the opportunity to live.
My sister and I demonstrated little sympathy for her as we were growing up, and as adults became even less tolerant of her behavior. My sister distanced herself from my mother geographically, but I stayed relatively close during her later years, even living with her for a several year period when I was in my thirties in an attempt to provide her with at least some human companionship. My wife and I stayed close, living only 500 feet from her so we could keep an eye on her as she aged. Even then, my wife and I were sharply critical of her drinking habits and pattern of self-neglect, which caused her a considerable amount of despair. Society tends to abuse adults, particularly older ones, in much the same manner that adults abuse children, and the obvious cause-and-effect relationship between the two behaviors is too glaring to deny. My father also died a lonely, neglected individual, and so did my wife’s mother. Her son didn’t even come to her funeral. We now have only one surviving parent between the two of us, and I expect that we will be better able to provide for his emotional needs in his few remaining years than we did our other three parents. I only hope that my wife and I will fare better than our parents did when our time comes.
I feel guilty saying it, but I always expected my father to die first (men on his side tended to die in their 60s) and that I would get to take care of my mom when she was an old lady. I would have lived with her and loved having her around all the time. As it was they lived in CO and me in NH/VT and I didn’t see them that much. I wish I had known she was sick but then I have to respect her decision not to tell me. My father moved back east and I live with him but we’re really just two individuals with a huge piece missing. When I used to visit them, when mom went for a nap we would basically be in limbo till she came back downstairs and then we would cheer and she would say “Thanks, fans” 
Now we are basically sitting here and she’ll never come back down.
Gatopescado, I laughed.
I did too, when I scrolled up to see what you were referencing. My mom would have laughed at that too.
My mom would be 92 today. She died in 1998.
About 5 years previously she had breast cancer and a mastectomy but after that she was doing well.
Then in a checkup they found lung cancer (she smoked). She had radiation and was showing some signs of improving. I was set to take my turn taking care of her at home when a tumor was found on her back - further tests showed she had cancer in in her pancreas. I visited her once in hospice, and called her the next weekend. The weekend after it was apparent that I should come again and “bring my suit”. I saw her - she was obviously not going to last long. She did that night. My sisters were there.
We had to scramble because it was holy week. She died Saturday. Funeral in the town she grew up in (church she was married at), and then a memorial service Thursday? in the town she lived in.
Yes, I miss her, but I see her in my siblings.
Brian
She’s still alive. Haven’t seen her in 11 years.
Not a single bit. (Ditto dad)
sigh Most of the time I love this borad and sometimes it kicks me in the gut.
22 years ago I was 22 and Mom was 52 and died of cancer. It sucked hard, but that last few months we all knew what was coming so it was tolerable knowing how much pain she was in for it to finally end.
Dad met a lovely lady 4 years later a widow herself. He had a massive heart attack and was dead before he hit the floor 9 months later. He had just retired and the new RV they bought had less than 100 miles on it. Before they had a chance to use it themselves they offered it to me and my friends for our annual long weekend trip out of state.
Leaving the house I was rolling my eyes and dismissive and curt about being careful and yadda yadda yadda. 7am the next morning we got the phone call. Driving home I was mostly numb. The last few miles towards the house I started to hyperventalte. Pulled into the driveway and totally lost my shit. Curled into a ball and my friends’ wife held my head in her lap hugging me for an eternity until I could function.
My Mom was a good Lady and I miss her, but Dad dying crushed me. Neither one got to see me as a “grown-up” finding my niche running my shop, restoring antiques doing what I love. That’s what I think about.
Wow, this post got really intense really fast for me, I will say this, unless your parents beat you with a baseball bat or locked you in a closet call them right fucking now.
I lost my mom only six months ago, we were very close and I still can’t believe she is gone.
Two months later I don’t know if this is a zombie or just a slow bump.
Yesterday and today I’ve been nearly overwhelmed with missing my mom, to the point of tears There’s no particular reason I can think of. It’s not her birthday or mine. We didn’t have big Easter family traditions so I don’t think the first Easter without her is going to be a thing.
She and I did speak on the phone fairly frequently, but a lot of it was unimportant. Strange as it sounds I think that’s what I’m missing most. I have other people I can talk to about big stuff, but no one who’ll listen to me bitch about implausibilities in a TV show.
I want my mommy…
The doctors said, best case scenario, with treatment on her brain tumor, she’d have two more years. That was April 2012. She had treatment, passed away peacefully that July - after a basically serene five months. The two years would be up about now. Who knows what a horror show that might have become. We were blessed, but I still miss her.
Biological mom - died in 1966 when I was 2 years old, I had not seen her since I was 6 months old. I didn’t know her. I don’t miss her.
Second mother(s) - my mom’s sister and my grandmother. They loved me dearly, but I don’t remember a lot of those first 5 years of my life.
First stepmother - not in the least. I’m sure there were some good times, but for the most part she was mean, too strict and very demanding.
Second stepmother at age 10 - yes, sometimes.
I left home at 16, though. So I have not had a mother figure in my life since then. At least not one that was there on a regular basis.
Lost Mom almost 13 yrs ago now, and I miss her every day.
My mom is still alive. She’s 73 now.
She’s a great person. But I’ve never been close to her.
Perhaps it’s me. I’m not “close” to many people. The only one I am close to is our 15 year old daughter. She’s wonderful.
I expect my mom will die within the next 10 years. I am not sure how I will handle it.
My mother died at 54 of leukemia. I was not quite 30. She and my sister were estranged, and partly as as a result of that estrangement, Mom and I were closer than we had been in a decade. When she was diagnosed, I was the assistant head nurse on an oncology ward in an NIH research site- we did phase 3 trials of then experimental drugs. (Many became standards, later). I miss the mother who cared for me during serial childhood illnesses and recurrent strep throat. I don’t miss the OCD;). When her conventional oncologist told her her remission had relapsed, and that there was nothing he could do, she turned her head to me and said “What can you get me?” What I got her, after consulting with the team at my then work, was a drug that never made it out of those Phase 3 trials. It caused heart failure…she died in my arms. It took me years to get over the guilt, but I found a therapist when in grad shcool who got me through it, and a few other issues. (Thanks again, Penny;)). Mom didn’t believe in cremation or being embalmed, so she was buried quickly, near her parents. I used to go and talk to her, and took my children when they were born. There have been times, mostly when I was ill, when the missing was intense. I’m frank about what I don’t miss, mostly control issues, but we had resolved that. I halfway think my older daughter is her reincarnation, as they are uncannily alike in appearance and personality, though Sara is far more rational;).
My Mom passed away in december last, and I am still getting used to the fact she’s no more. She suffered a great deal of pain in the final 5 months of her life. When the end neared, she slipped away into a coma, but held on to her life until I arrived home (I was away half-way across the planet on work). Hours after I arrived and announced my presence, she passed away. That, friends, is love.
She had a commanding, dominating presence, would not hesitate to pick up a quarrel when slighted, and could be extraordinarily blunt. Her tongue spared none; almost everyone who knew (including her children) her had been singed, at some point. Still, she was a loving, affectionate, helpful person. She overcame intense privations that would have sent me to an asylum.
Each one of us is a package of the good and bad.
She would often call me, for no reason at all, just to say, “I am reading the newspaper, what are you doing?” From half-way across the planet. Just for fun. Whenever my phone rings, I still think its her.
R.I.P., best mother in the world.