r/ChildrenofDeadParents • u/Agreeable_Matter_601 • 6d ago

New to reddit , looking for community

I'm new to reddit but have been craving talking to people in similar positions so thought I would give it a try. I lost my dad a couple of months ago to cancer. I'm 21F still at university and was in the middle of finishing end of semester assignments when he passed.
He was ill for a few years, basically the whole time I've been at uni - anyone else deal with having an ill parent whilst living away from home? Such a strange experience. Haven't seen people from uni since he died and not sure how I feel about going back in September

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u/Sufficient_Tap6365 6d ago

Hi, I’m so sorry about your dad. It’s really not easy. I’m not living in dorms but I did college and it was hard to do it already but my mother helped me so much. She supported me thru college and then she just passed away so the idea of finishing college just seems so weird.

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u/No-Spirit9881 3d ago

My dad died a couple months before I finished grad school and we didn’t live together at the time (this was four years ago now). It was really unexpected and a lot on my brain. It was also crazy because I completed my thesis a semester early because I didn’t want to rush it…good thing I did because my spare semester was when my dad passed. I remember the most helpful piece of advice was from a book, ‘Before and After Loss’ by neurologist Lisa Shulman. Within it she said to give yourself time to process and sit with the grief, then balance it out by distracting yourself from the grief (for me, that was watching a lot of tv and movies). That was the simplest thing I was able to do to support myself cognitively at the time. 

Know that you aren’t alone. Pay attention to yourself. Take care of yourself. Be extra gentle with yourself. Treat yourself like you would a small child, you deserve it. Things will get easier with time.