I lost my nan to lung cancer on 24 November 1995. It was not a sudden death as she was diagnosed in March 1995 but her death was a shock to me nonetheless. She was more like a mother to me than a nan and spent everyday apart from Sunday in her company.

10 years on I feel as though I should have dealt with the grief but it is so raw today. I have sufferred from Depression on and off since her death and have had other issues which have prevented me from accepting and dealing with her death (mostly because I did not want to acknowledge and feel the pain her death caused).

I went from spending my whole life with her to being with a family (mum, dad & sister) that are not emotionally close. My nan was my safe place and I now no longer have that nor anywhere to go where I feel loved and safe.

I know that it is now time to deal with her death as it is preventing me from living and loving others but I do not believe I can survive the pain and lonliness I am currently experiencing. I feel as though I cannot go on another day and have expressed the wish to die myself so I no longer have feel this pain.

I expect everyone who loves me to leave and therefore destroy the relationships I have with others.

Is there hope that I will come through this? because all I currently see is a big void, feel a hole in my chest and an iron band under my ribs.

I want to talk about this with people but feel that they will not want to listen as it happened so long ago. I have also recently begun a relationship with someone younger and feel that if I talk to him about this he will reject me.

I do not feel good enough to live, or that I can live without her presence in my life.

Lisa

Hello Lisa... I’m always sorry that when I frequent this board there are not more answers for those who post here to get responded to. I was never that close to my own Nan like you, maybe because I was a bit frightened of her. She was a tough woman who brought up ten children and had lost my Grandad in the First World War.

But your feeling of ending your pain by taking your own life is something I have experienced first hand. I actually looked on the net to find the easiest and most effective way I could do it. Every site I went to more a less said the same thing, instead of giving me the way to do it, they were actually giving me the reasons not to.
The thing that stopped me from that way of thinking was that they said that if you take your life to end your suffering here, you still take it with you as a spirit forever. Now the thought of them being remotely right about that was indeed a deterrent from such a course of action. To bear such pain for eternity was unthinkable. What they did suggest was to see a councillor and share with them all these pent up emotions going on within your body that are making you very unhappy.

Ten years twenty years theirs know time limit with grief Lisa and that’s the way it is I’m afraid. I do hope that this new relationship will blossom into something special for you and in time with a love that will develop from it. You will find that he is a rock and a wonderful support for you.

Dave (Site Creator) dav.boy@btinternet.com

lisa-
grief is a bugger. It's not simple or quick. It's 24 yrs ago this year that I lost my mum. The grief is not constantly strong but sometimes it catches me off-guard and I have to try to sort out why i'm suddenly crying or sad. 10 yrs is not a long time to feel still hurting if you've lost your main source of emotional support.
If you can, speak to a counselor because sometimes it lets you express things you aren't even aware you're feeling because they're so deep down inside. Make sure that you make time for things you enjoyed before your gran died and make a point of actively living your life. (knowing depression myself, it's easy to shut the world out and start existing rather than living). Try to live the sort of life you want and that would bring joy to your gran if she was alive. I think that's one of the best tributes we can make to those we love who have died. I know recently that I've put up several pictures of my mum and gran and light a candle in front of them when I can as my own affirmation that I love them and never forget them. For me that helps.
Hang in there because beyond surviving there is life!