• stiephel@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I definitely started to see my parents decline in my early 20s. They’re still going, but age is coming for them fast.

        • theangryseal@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          My daughter had to experience this at 13.

          She and her mom didn’t get along at all, and so she’s got that to deal with. She’s a kid so she probably would have done things differently if she could have managed to actually believe it was the end. It wasn’t her fault, her mom was mean, but she still has to carry on with that thought.

          Life would be great if it wasn’t for the end being so unpredictable. It really gets to you when you think about it.

          I seen a picture of my mom in her 20s when I was about 25 and it just slammed me for like a month. We rarely talk and there isn’t much I can do about it and time just keeps slipping away. I look at my fiancé’s family and they’re up in the morning calling each other right away. Every morning either she calls her mom or her mom calls her. Our children sit down with her and talk to grandma. Her sister calls not long after that.

          I know that we should do our best to stay close with the people we love, but personalities are what they are and my people are extreme introverts. We call each other when we need something and we never say no, but that’s about it.

          I’m sorry about your mom.

          When my grandfather was dying, there was a moment I will never forget. He was a very religious man and raised very religious children. I was the only atheist in the room. We had been told that it was over, there was no hope, it was the end. He had survived heart attacks and cancers, and he believed that he survived those things because god renewed him.

          Any way. He was laying there on that bed, surrounded by his children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren.

          My aunt was drinking a tea. Out of nowhere he sat up in the bed, took off the oxygen mask, smiled from ear to ear, grabbed her tea and took a drink. He got up on his feet, took another drink, started to walk forward and then fell back on the bed looking like he’d just been completely defeated.

          Being religious, my family interpreted this as something divine.

          I seen a man who believed that god would save him jump up with a rush of faith only to be knocked down by reality. He believed with all of his heart in that moment that god had “delivered” him. All he had to do was get up and make it so.

          He didn’t put the mask back on and took his last breaths shortly after that.

          He was a great man, and he died surrounded by almost all of the life he created. I’m glad he got that. I hope I get something like that.

          The last thing he ever said to me I couldn’t understand through the mask and I pretended to hear him because of how hard he was struggling to say it. I’ll probably be wishing I knew what that was at the end of my own life if I have time to think about it.

          I hope you’re doing well. Take care bud.

            • theangryseal@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              At his age you definitely have came to terms with loss.

              One of my closest friends was in a horrible relationship for 24 years. All she wanted was for him to marry her and give her the life he promised over and over again. She was so scared to lose him. He’d cheat, she’d forgive him. He’d do it again, she’d forgive him.

              He was the only man she had ever slept with. She never even thought about being with anyone else. She just sat there and suffered. He was 15 years older than her and a very prominent member of the community. He started preaching and he stopped having sex with her to “be right with the lord”.

              In less than two years her whole world collapsed. First her baby brother died, then her mother, then her father, then her older brother. Her only other sibling tried to rob her older brother’s daughter of her inheritance. She helped the daughter win in court.

              So in less than two years she lost her ENTIRE family.

              One day she called me, like she had done a hundred times before, “I’m leaving him.”

              I said to her, “You ain’t gonna break it off with him. You’re just upset with him because he’s the same jerk he’s always been.”

              She replied, “angryseal, I have lost. I have lost and lost and lost, and you know what? Life goes on. It’ll keep going on until I die too. I have learned that I can survive loss, that I will always be facing loss. It’s just around the corner. I’m not scared to lose him. I’m not scared to die, and you know what? This won’t kill me. I’m going to forget the whole relationship and find someone and just have sex. No strings. I swear to god.”

              She’s had a friend with benefits for over a year now. She’s totally flipped into this person who is 100% in control of what she can be in control of.

              She’s 51 years old, looks 35, and she’s having the time of her life.

              I thought this related somehow but my toddler is crying in my lap and I can’t remember my point. I can’t focus enough to go back and try. Sorry if this don’t connect and sorry for any mistakes. I can’t proofread at the moment. :p

      • Capt. Wolf@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Life is short. Time moves quicker and quicker and you always think you have more… It just occurred to me last month that my mom will turn 70 next year and just how little time I have left with my parents.

    • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      Yeesh that’s a dark hard truth I’ve begun living. All three parents on their own glide slope and it’s just one mild crisis after another.