Knocking On Death's Door

I miss my mom. It has been twenty-seven years since his death and not a day goes by that I do not think of how my life would be different if she was in her.

It was about a month after my sixth birthday when someone knocked at the door this morning, very early Sunday. I stood on tiptoe to peer at the side window and saw a man holding a clipboard and wearing a solemn expression. I opened the door and said "hello". He asked me if my father was at home. At first I shook my head because I was trained to guard the place of my father as if he was a CIA agent but something about the man's face made me change the opinion. He said it was important that he speaks of him so I told him to wait a moment. I padded down the hall to wake my father's drunkenness, and very bad mood out of bed.

My sister and I were sitting in the kitchen while my father spoke to the strange man. She told me that I could not open the door. I ignored it and waited for my father at the end of his talk. The expression on the face of my father was a mixture of shock and horror that has turned the corner. I had never seen him cry before that day and now he wept bitter tears as he told us my mother had taken her own life.

I'm thirty three years and I never got over the loss of my mother. My sisters and I find it difficult to lead a normal life after that, but it was hard. Suddenly, we were very different from that of children who had both a dad and mom. To add insult to injury, the local newspaper published an article that says the city exactly how our mother was dead. There is a stigma that comes with felted suicide. It is unfortunate that your loved one's death was both unnecessary and avoidable.

Recently, I read stories about ten year olds who took their own life after being mercilessly teased by their peers. A beautiful teenage girl hanged herself after being tormented by other students. Young lives full of promise and hope - were brutally cut short. Their temporary problems have been solved by a permanent solution.

How can we move forward after such a horrible loss?

I remember my grandmother's funeral great when I was 12. She was my favorite person in the world and someone who always loved me unconditionally. Looking up at the sun, I wondered how he could continue to rise each day, without grandmother Emma in the world. Going without it does not seem possible.

Mourning is the worst feeling I've ever known. He can knock the wind out of your lungs and reduce the strongest of us all to nothing more than a pile of humanity tears. Death may be the cloud on the head that dissipates completely. It can make you feel like tomorrow is not important and is now just something to endure.

But it need not be this way. There are positive ways we can do without pain and become stronger for the experience that we are experiencing. Here are some suggestions on how to handle life after losing someone you love.

Take time to grieve.

When my father died I was twenty-three years. I had just been laid off and I was not in very good health. My life was lonely and only aggravates the loss of all the upheavals in my life. I was taught to "suck it and go." In other words - do not cry, do not feel, keep moving. Not being allowed to grieve for others has served to prolong my sorrow and pain Then, when my father died, I sat in my bed and cried for 24 hours straight. In the days that followed, I cried when I felt I drown myself in sorrow of it. (Keeping in mind - I have done in the privacy of my own house.) Crying helped liberate my pain and gave a lot of pent-up emotion. It also shortened my period of mourning.

Be angry.

Once you've cried until you wanted you had bought shares in Kleenex.