How do you deal with your parents passing?

I lost my husband 12 weeks ago and I feel “ lost”. I know after my parents died it took a long time. Everyone is different. I’m starting a bereavement support group tomorrow and praying it helps ease the pain. Hugs to you 💜

I’m so sorry for your loss. It’s good to look at it this way: you’re sad and you miss them, but now you are free of the responsibility and difficulty of caring for them. Inhale, exhale and feel the relief of that. I’ve been through it with both parents. It took the two of them almost six years to die, and they were horrible years for all of us. When I think about missing them, I remind myself that none of us could have withstood any more of their dying. I’m truly glad they died when they did because they didn’t deserve any more pain or suffering and neither did I. Enough, finally. I wish you peace and comfort as you walk this path along with so many of us.

Sorry to hear of the loss of both of your parents in one year. That is a lot of grief to deal with, and you must miss them and their presence particularly as you said they lived with you in your home. Can you maybe start by putting all their things into one room or one space - instead of spread out around the house?

Whenever I am going through things and sorting things out, I was told to divide things into 3 groups, I think it is called the 'traffic light' sorting system. Make 3 different piles: They are also referred to as Green (keep), Red(throw out), Orange (not sure) : 1 (Green)- Things I definitely want to keep, 2 (Red) -Things I definitely DO NOT want to keep, and 3 (Orange) - Things that I am unsure of and will decide later.

My father passed away recently and I am still very sad. I am however, relieved that he is no longer suffering or in pain. I have somethings of his that I am going through (well they are actually things that belonged to his father that I found in the back of my old garage) and I feel terrible guilty throwing it away, particularly as I did not get anything of my father's when he died (my stepmother is a witch.)

So I have re-boxed these things (into much nicer boxes and storage containers) and written on the front what is contained in each box. I will go through it all again in 6 months when I am feeling better and do the 'traffic light' sorting system then.

I'm not sure if this helps at all, but I wish you all the best. It is really hard to go through other people's things and many of us feel a bit disrespectful throwing out things that belonged to other people, particularly people who meant a lot to us. I find it really hard throwing out old photographs of people I don't know (but found in boxes in my grandparents things). But sadly we cannot store or keep other peoples material things forever or we will end up like a storage facility.