Given Up On Life Overwhelmed by Grief

I hope you can find a therapist. It might help, maybe a lot to have someone to talk to. I understand what you’re saying about where you live. Maybe you can find a house you can afford out of the city?
Please don’t give up. It’s a new year. I’m from CT. Look for something you can afford there or other places away from Manhattan…
Best of luck! Keep writing.

Your story is very intriguing and touching. I do hope you are able to reach out and speak to others in order to get support. Others do care. Others can help. I’m certain of this. I sometimes think we underestimate our peers. They most likely don’t know how to approach someone and offer a soft place to fall or shoulder to lean on. Sometimes, I listen to music that inspires me. The words and melody give me solace and inspiration.

I’m learning now about the mind/body connection. And, I’m treating both simultaneously and supplementing it with hypnosis soon. I think there is room for many ideas on how to heal and find peace. I can’t rely solely on one type of medicine. We have an amazing ability to respond to different stimuli.

I’m over 60 too, and it may sound silly, but I’m preparing a vision/inspiration board! I believe it will help keep me focused. We all need love, companionship and purpose in life. I believe it’s doable.

I hope you can find help to recovery and peace. I’ll look forward to seeing more of your posts. You are a gifted writer! Please take care.

I needed grief counseling after my mother died, following ten years of dementia during which I mourned her loss daily while she was yet alive. LIFE IS DIFFICULT, as you know all too well. Both group and individual counseling brought me back among the living, as well as a dog which forced me to get out of bed each day. When that dog passed, I was inconsolable until we rescued another "senior" dog. (No fenced yard, which means we are required to walk the dog for miles each day and are in better physical shape as a result.)
Your experiences make you valuable to others in all sorts of ways. Please find a way to connect with those who need you: others who have lost a child to suicide; a child who is struggling in school, or who is without a caring parent or grandparent; a place where you can be around horses again; habitat for humanity, where you can use your home improvement skills; visit a dog shelter; check out volunteer opportunities in your area through volunteer match dot org or similar website. My grandmother, at 98, was still delivering meals for Meals on Wheels. You are still you: discouraged, yes, but by your own acknowledgement, you are a courageous, strong and determined individual, with reserves of love to bestow on another. Find your next purpose. You are an inspiration to others. Please take care of yourself.

Like @njoys, I am inspired by your story, and I think that has great value to others, and, hence, to you.

I would like to know more of your story, and so I think others would, whether they had similar experiences to yours, or can - and want to - relate to how a strong, centered, accomplished individual - particularly a woman - persisted, endured, and advanced through their challenges.

I suspect you are as articulate in person as in your writing, and I sense that you reaching out to others - through some kind of group dynamic in an organized, professional (whether medical or academic) setting - would be a welcomed and even heralded experience for many.

And, though it need not rise to this level of organization or effort on your part - would a foundation (existing, or that you spearhead) be an outlet and even haven for those with unending struggles who would be inspired by your outreach, and you would benefit in great measure too?

I welcome your thoughts on this, and maybe you've considered some or much of these options, but I would like to know what you think.

The value you have is beyond what you can value alone...it takes (some kind of!) village - just not the one you're living in right now!

Many warm thoughts, some hugs, and looking forward to continuing the effort.

Sounds like you tried your best in an impossible situation. My older brother in his 30s sounds a lot like your daughter: multiple suicide attempts, no positive response to the drugs. For some strange reason, he stopped trying to kill himself, but, at 60, lives a horrible life. He'd be better off dead.

I'm sorry, but I don't have any good answers to your problems.

I live with a lot of regrets and difficulties, too, and try to console myself with the fact that at least I've got it better than a lot of folks, like those poor souls in Gaza right now.

Hugs to you.

Hang in there.

I am so sorry for your loss. That seems like a very trite & superficial thing to say. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t true. You poured yourself into your daughter and lived your life for her. She was taken from you and you feel as though your life has been for nothing. What you have gone through / are going through is unthinkable. Parents should not outlive their children. (My own daughter has stage 4 breast cancer and I don’t want to imagine what you have endured.) You say your life has been for nothing. That is NOT TRUE. You are still here. There HAS to be a reason for that. I do have faith in God and would be open to further discussion on that if you’d like. In the mean time my hope and prayer for you is to find a reason for being. You are in need of some peace and fulfillment.

Since you’re feeling so bad and so emotionally wrought if you haven’t gotten to a therapist I suggest you try very hard. I’m concerned about your situation and as you describe you have no one to turn to. Please before you consider doing anything to harm yourself call 988.

Your story has so much of my story intertwined throughout it. My son was diagnosed with Schizophrenia 20 years ago. He was found dead in his apartment over a year ago. I did everything I could think of to help myself during his illness, and now to manage the grief from his death. A story like mine and yours that cover many years cannot be told in a few paragraphs. I know that you and others in this group have experienced similar experiences, and we are all traumatized from the experience.

While my son was sick, I continued my personal and professional life, as well as I could. I regularly saw a psychologist and psychiatrist that helped save my life through their continued support as my son declined year by year.

There is no one road to healing oneself, but finding something you love can help. Ten years ago I walked into the music building of a local community college, and heard the sounds of music flowing out from all the rooms. I started to cry; the music touched my heart in a way that matched the feeling that I had for my son. It's a long story to where I am now, but learning to play the piano and sing in my 60's helped me in so many ways. Music soothed my tormented brain, and the students and teachers helped me connect my brain, and heart together.

It's been a long time since that first music lesson, and I don't know what might help you, but there is something out there for you. I hope that you will stay right where you are, and look a little harder. In my experience, what will help you may be close by waiting for you to find it. Thank you for writing your story. You helped me today.

I sung avocationally as a lyric soprano in my 30s, with an orchestra in front of me. My voice teacher was a Master Teacher and one of the first woman conductors, some of her students were at the Met. I clearly remember hitting high D# with no effort at all. I used to have dreams of singing, it was such a glorious experience. I'm glad you found music and that it's been able to help you transcend the horror even for just a few minutes at a time.

I've done so many things in my lifetime that there really are no more roads to travel, literally or virtually. If there were something that could change what's happening in, and to, my mind I would intuitively know it. I've tried them all, world travel, learning to ride, volunteer work, engaging others, nothing helped me. I've literally given up.

People tell me to write a book, because I'm already a published author in fiction and poetry (my chapbook won an award in 2000). But honestly, who wants to read this? And what do I have to teach anyone? How to survive the worst day of your life? I wish I hadn't. My daughter adored me and left me a beautiful letter which has helped me to keep alive to be honest, but sometimes I wish she had come home and shot me first. In fact, I wish that every day. Should I write THAT book? And self publishing is an absurd waste of time and money. I published a novel in 2006 and just the search for a literary agent or publisher is daunting to the point where I really have no motivation for it. No one wants to read my life story, it's a tale of survival and struggle and the only reason I didn't end up dead somewhere in Manhattan where I grew up is because I was literally given everything: beauty, great intelligence, keen intuition, a psychic ability, glowing health, courage, strength, determination, hope, and a joyful connection to other living things, and more than that. It's as if "someone" knew what I would be facing and sent me into the battlefield of life fully equipped. Remarkable, really, but ultimately my downfall because I can't defeat it, I can't circumvent it, I can't put an end to this and I really want to.

People tell me to do this, or that; advice is constantly flowing if I tell any part of this story, there's no end to it. I understand people are trying to help but it honestly doesn't help. I've done more than most women, seen more, achieved more, and certainly lost more. There's nothing left to try. It's become obvious that this mental torment is with me until my last moment and I'm going to end my life missing my daughter. And I no longer believe that we'll "meet again", I think death is final, the end. The very thing that gave me such courage and strength, the tenacity to keep going because there was a "purpose", and there is a "creator", is gone, and it's not coming back.

Well, you have already done it...survived one more day. You looked around and replied to my post. That is the first step. What will you do today?