I wasn't going to comment on this but it's been gnawing at me. It does not matter whether a child loses their mother when the child is 10, 20, 40 or 60 - and it does not matter if the mother was 20, 40, 60 or 90 - a child has lost their mother whom they were very close to. You are always your mother's child no matter your age. Of course it's sad for a younger child, orphaned or left with another parent or relative, to lose their mom, but it's insensitive to suggest that if your mother was older (mine was only 65) when she passes, and you were older (I was 35) that you should somehow "get over it" faster or feel differently because of the age
Absolutely.
The thing is, with that poster, is that you don't know until you know. I had friends growing up who had lost a parent, and I thought it was sad, but I just did NOT get it. And I'm a sensitive, empathetic, sympathetic person!!! But until I knew what it was like, I had NO idea what it was like.
My mom has been gone 7 years now. I met my now-DH 8 months after she died. Sadly, he had gone through cancer only utilizing non-Western medicine (macrobiotic diet, enzyme treatments, and barometric chamber got rid of his inoperable, benign, BUT growing so fast the diagnosing MDs "gave him" 6 months), and he would have been a PERFECT person for my mom to know (she died thanks to the medical procedures she endured, she was in remission at the time).
DH thought he got it, but he didn't. Now he's closer to getting it, as his dad died the day after Thanksgiving. I'm so sorry that he knows.
The thing with grief is that it doesn't matter that the person next to you might have "more" to grieve. Your grief is still your grief. If you try to happy your way through it, if you push it away...it will still be there, waiting for you.
I'm glad that everyone rejected what that poster said. A healthy lot, I say! Oh, and all my friends thought the same way...and they still have all their parents...it was really hard for me when they were all asking me "aren't you done being sad yet?" only a few months afterwards...
And the reality is...with time, you get, well, more time. More time between bouts of sadness. When the sadness comes, it will still be as strong as ever. But the time between is the gift that time gives us. That's what those around me, who KNEW, told me to help me make it through, and it's absolutely true.
Hugs to us all.
