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Comment by zwegner | Hacker News Reader

It's pretty weird. My mom just died of cancer a little more than a week ago. I thought it would be a bad idea to read this article, as it would just pointlessly make me (more) depressed. Yet, at the end, I really just felt numb to any emotion. There was just the same distinct sensation where nobody has any idea what I feel like, even this guy who just lost his wife. The more I think about it, the more it seems I don't really know what I'm feeling myself.

All the grief, anger, and beyond that, the feeling that any emotion I have is absolutely useless. I search for an explanation, all the while my brain is telling me that I'm stupid for even looking. What's the point of explaining what I'm going through to anyone? What can they do?

I don't really know what my point is. I'd be tempted to just say "life sucks", but I'd rather not be unreasonably pessimistic.

But then again, my mom just died.

Life. Fucking. Sucks.

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I was fresh out of college. I had just landed my dream job. I was living at home making really good money so I could get myself on my feet and pay down college debt. My dad was a runner and healthy as can be. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in late winter and was dead before Christmas after chemo and surgery ultimately failed. He was 46 and I was 23.

At the time I was almost numb. I was sad, but not as sad as you think ahead of time you would be in a situation like that. It was only with the distance of time that I realized how depressed I must have truly been.

I don't know how old you are, or what else you have going on in your life, but even if you think people can't help you, surrounding yourself with people that care about you is vitally important. I don't have any great insights other than to invest time and effort into the relationships with people who care about you and whom you care about.

In time, the loss of my dad has become a part of who I am. If there is one positive outcome it is that it has certainly helped me set priorities in life. I realized through that experience that possessions, money, promotions, career, etc... all the things that we think are important are so meaningless in the grand scheme of things (though it's shockingly easy for me to get complacent and forget this lesson). People are what is important. Love and caring for our families and friends is one of the only things we have that transcends time and space to make a difference in another human being.

This comment was deeply moving. Thanks for sharing your experience.

At least he went fast from the time of diagnosis. If I get cancer, that's how I want to go: in a few months time from diagnosis. I don't want to spend several years being tortured with anxiety and fear and pain.

Unfortunately, it was not all the gradual, "smooth" downward progression of slowly coming to terms that one might imagine. Cancer is a cruel, cruel roller coaster ride. He responded to chemo + radiation really well and in the August before he died they went in to remove the tumor. I have a photo of him beaming ear to ear when we went out to dinner a few days before. He looked perfectly healthy and normal. We were all in high spirits that he'd be one of the few lucky ones that makes it through the death sentence that is pancreatic cancer. When the docs at Johns Hopkins opened him up to start removing the tumor, they realized what they thought was scar tissue left over from radiation was actually embedded inoperable tumor tissue embedded in the hepatic portal vein. So they closed him up and that was that. We went from an unbelievable high of thinking he'd beat this thing, to the very low reality that it was all over. They offered all sorts of exotic treatments, but he had lost the will to fight it anymore. He went home after recovery resigned to death.

So while it was certainly rapid, the highs and lows of it all made it much more emotionally wrecking than you might think from the timeline. But it was certainly quick. He was also fortunate to feel mostly fine for the vast majority of it.

Depression doesn't feel like grief or anger. Depression is the emptiness, the numbness of not feeling anything.

You don't "recover" from the loss of a loved one. You don't get back to where you were before. You don't "get over" it, nor should you want to. Your life has changed and there is a big hole in it. But you do adjust to it. You do learn to cope with it and find a new way to live with it.

Sorry if that's not uplifting, but it's what I found.

> Depression doesn't feel like grief or anger. Depression is the emptiness, the numbness of not feeling anything.

Depression is different between people. I myself find I have a mix of emotions.

> You don't "recover" from the loss of a loved one. ... You do learn to cope with it and find a new way to live with it.

This can be applicable not only to losing someone to death, but also to the end of any relationship, especially if you did not truly want it to end. It changes you, and you learn to cope.

The uplifting part in this is that you grow as an individual, and you are more hardened to handle difficult things in the future.

I've found that any complaints about small things in my life generally go unsaid. Before my Mom died of cancer I would have perhaps talked about, "I can't believe this happened on <favorite reality show> last week, <rant />," I now let a lot of unpleasant things wash over me, knowing that there are fewer truly important items in the world worth getting riled up over.

This reminds me very strongly of an approach described (in a very personal way) by the Dalai Lama - when talking about sorrow and regret he says

    We have this idea that we either have it or we get rid of it and the
    question came from that point of view….But there’s an ability to be
    pierced to the heart by the sorrow of the world and your own regrets
    without it dragging you down.

http://lenski.com/dont-let-it-drag-you-down/

I really don't agree at all, based on my own experiences (personal, though they may be, and with absolutely no desire to be a snarky contrarian). Depression has been all but numbness to me.

Deep seated regret. The aftermath of an anxiety realized. The period after my worst fears come to life. Isolation. Abandonment. Powerlessness. Set adrift in an ocean of problems no one created, and no one can solve, never to return, never to set foot on dry land again. Perhaps with a meager ration of hope, that looks like it's going to burn off in the blistering sunlight of ordinary day-to-day struggles, amidst the windless doldrums of routine, before a sea of bad luck swallows me whole.

The way out is through, though we don't always make it home to normalcy in one peice.

My mom died to melanoma in August. The first days and weeks are the hardest. It gets better, but the article's last paragraph really hits the nail on the head: it's those random, special moments that you had that will get you. Whether it's a movie that you used to watch together or an activity she loved doing, those moments are the worst because, like you said, no one knows how you feel.

Life isn't fair and it does fucking suck, but you've got to look forward. Live your life now and in the present. Reading stories like this help and I find them therapeutic almost. It's not an easy experience losing someone too young to cancer and being able to relate to someone's story helps/helped me feel less alone about it.

When my mom passed, I felt like I was supposed to feel a certain way - overwhelming grief.

I felt that, plus a bunch of other things. Even some "selfish" things like feeling glad the ordeal was over. I felt bad about feeling things like that and had a lot of "internal arguments" about that.

A breakthrough came when I gave myself permission to feel whatever I wanted to feel, even if it was "stupid" or "selfish" according to arbitrary moral standards. And that those things didn't mean that I loved or missed her any less. Less judging, more feeling.

Everybody's story is different. That was just part of my story in case it's helpful to somebody else. Maybe you can work a little bit of it into yours, or not.

I hope your story gets better - I think it will.

You have to figure out how you feel, so that these feelings do not rule you forever. It will take a lot of time, a lot of pain, and even more patience, but you have to remember that a hard year or longer is little compared to your whole life.

Life does suck, and there is little you can do about that, but it is also wonderful. If you manage to live with all the bad things, you will be able to spend your energy on making life more wonderful for yourself and people you care about. Not only is this what your mother would have wanted, it is also what you want, under all the pain.

Good luck. I'm very sorry for your loss.

Unfortunately, I have some experience with this topic, although a decade ago. Much like parenthood, you'll find everyone has very well meaning, yet typically useless advice, so don't take it personally when they won't leave you alone or they sound out of touch. And, here's my contribution in the genre:

"There was just the same distinct sensation where nobody has any idea what I feel like"

Oh, I bet your family has a glimmer of an idea. Spending time with them, just doing "stuff" with them, even just talking or emailing, will help. The funeral-industrial complex is heavily monetized and optimized for massive profit simulation of what you actually need. So don't expect that wearing a suit for two hours while paying multiple kilobucks will have much effect, or worry if it doesn't. Then again, however pitiful it is of a simulation of whats needed, funeral rituals do at least imply the right track, "increased familial interaction" for awhile seems to help quite a bit. TLDR the funeral will be a waste of time and money, yet it is none the less sorta pointing in the correct direction, so whatever you normally do with your family, do more of it for a bit, you'll feel better.

Also its your head, don't let people tell you what it should be thinking, as long as its not hurting you. So don't sweat not following the grieving steps in the precise order for the correct amount of time at what they claim is the correct intensity. Whatever path you take, you'll get there your own right way eventually.

Hang in there. If she were anything like my father, then one thing your mother likely worried about was that you would feel this way when she was gone. The more positive you can be looking forward, the better she would have felt.

Here's a great story about Alexis Ohanian who had to endure that pain as well. It was really helpful for me to be able to relate to someone like that who I already highly respected. http://fourhourworkweek.com/2013/09/17/alexis-ohanian-reddit...

I'm very sorry for your loss.

Yeah, it's pretty crazy, I know that's just how she would feel. There's definitely lots of hope and love in me, but it's just really a lot for my brain to handle. I think it's going to take a while to fully process (if I ever do). When I was staying with her near the end I somehow managed to kick my not-coding streak and start a coding streak I've been keeping up with. Kinda helps to just keep my mind cranking along...

Thanks for the kind words. Even though there's the part of me that is saying all these emotions are pointless, it still feels good to hear things like that.

The only thing I will add is, take your time. I never anticipated how long it would take. I tried to fight grief (nothing to do with parents), now I realize it was unnecessary. You will have good days, you will have bad days but you will make peace. Its just that nobody knows how long it takes.

....and yeah mutagen, promising stuff, I remember it from a discussion long past.

It's been 4 years since my mom died of cancer. She fought it for 4 years. You will recover from the grief, but it takes time. I remember the numb phase clearly. Grieving is a process. A professional psychologist can help it go faster.

Life sucks for you now, but it will get better.

My Mom died of ovarian cancer 1 year 11 months and 1 day ago.

What did I learn?

* Quality of life teeters on the edge of a nail. One day things can be great, the next you're looking into the abyss. Although this can seem dreary, this is more reason to enjoy the health and quality of life you have today.

* There is never a wrong time to go after the things you feel are important. When I found my Mom was diagnosed, I disengaged from work for a good couple weeks thanks to a great manager (and, thankfully, a pretty convenient lull in strong deadlines). After much soul searching, I knew that life was too short to work at the large company I was working at, and it was time to pursue my dreams of being self-employed, something I knew I wanted to do full time since I was ten years old. Seriously, I knew I wanted to be self-employed even back then. That was over 2.5 years ago, and I am still happily self-employed. My Mom's illness gave me the perspective I needed to stop worrying too much about certain types of failure, especially since I had been saving up a reasonable emergency fund in case my self-employment experiment failed. Thankfully, it has not!

* Steve Jobs's fantastic Stanford commencement speech lucidly talks about this realization: "Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart." To be clear: that does not mean YOLO, nor does it encourage making unwise decisions. But the death of my Mom was the ultimate in sobering reminders of the importance of this thought, and since that reminder it has shaped many parts of my life.

As someone else commented, whatever emotions you feel are okay, as long as they are not hurting you. Surrounding yourself with any friends and loved ones is the path to healing, even if they don't understand what you're going through. Find those that will stick by you and not judge, or at least will listen to you.

I'm sorry for your loss. My father passed away in December of 2012 (after a 9 year battle with cancer). In fact, I posted on here mere hours afterward in regards to a goodbye blog post someone wrote to their father that was submitted here. While things have been difficult, life will continue as it always has. Try to remember the good parts and celebrate their life rather than mourn their loss.

I went through this when I was 18. It sucks and you will always miss them, but life will get better. Not the same as before, but as good. All you can do is put one foot in front of the other and keep plodding on. It's a cliche but time really is a healer.

I was declared in remission from cancer in April 2013.

My stepdad died of cancer in April 2013.

My mother-in-law died of cancer in August 2013 (we had gotten married exactly one week prior so she could be there)

It's not the same experience, nothing can be. But I felt what you describe. Empty. Numb, but distraught at the same time. Happy that they were at peace and horrible that I felt that way.

New things fill up some of the void, but there are still days where I want to curl up in a ball and just stop for awhile.

You've been emotionally wounded. You'll heal. There will be scar tissue, and it will take a long time, but eventually there will be days where all you think about is the good memories and not the bad.

I lost my mother two years ago yesterday and can sympathize. The first few days/weeks are the hardest because in many cases the pain is too fresh and it hasn't hit home yet. It takes time.

I found myself depressed and found that speaking with someone and working out like crazy made a massive difference--other than getting me in shape. Working out helps w/ serotonin production.

You should give yourself some time, but after a few weeks, think about seeing someone if you find yourself getting angrier or sad than you usually do. I would have never said it before, but it makes a difference.

> Life. Fucking. Sucks.

I'm going to be reinforcing your feeling that no one understands how you feel.

I'm really sorry about about the death of you're mother. Death however, is part of life. People die, and people close to you will continue to die at an increasing rate until it is finally your turn. I understand that you are grieving and that losing a loved one (especially a parent, child or partner) is an extremely painful event. But that doesn't mean that all of life sucks.

>I'm really sorry about about the death of you're mother. Death however, is part of life. People die, and people close to you will continue to die at an increasing rate until it is finally your turn.

That's a pretty lousy thing to say, considering his mother died of cancer rather than old age.

I don't understand you. I mean, until medicine becomes perfect, then is sickness an any more unreasonable cause of death than old age? Perfect medicine would also cure death from old age, right?

>I mean, until medicine becomes perfect, then is sickness an any more unreasonable cause of death than old age?

Yes, of course. It's much better to die peacefully and in full possession of one's self than of wasting sickness or mental degeneration.

As in, several people in my family have living wills to this effect, that kind of better.

>Perfect medicine would also cure death from old age, right?

Once again: yes, of course. But we're nowhere near there yet, so what we can do is make sure people can die without suffering overmuch.

I don't know the details of his mothers' passing. Regardless, cancer and old age are not mutually exclusive, and whatever the case here, the statement I made still applies. Death by illness or by car accidents is as much part of life today as is death by old age. In fact, very few people die of old age alone.

But all of life does suck. It's also all beautiful, and amazing, and completely meaningless, yet full of meaning. To me it's all a big joke. Nothing makes sense.

Basically, yeah, it's more complicated than what I expressed in my comment. I used some poetic license.

But thanks, though.

> But all of life does suck. It's also all beautiful, and amazing, and completely meaningless, yet full of meaning. To me it's all a big joke. Nothing makes sense.

That's something I can get behind! Good look processing your loss.

So if yourself, or Sammi (below), experienced a partner or loved one gradually rotting away from terminal cancer, you would of course be as perfectly detached and rational in examining life while you were grieving over the event?

Responses to threads like this are why I always eventually regret being a frequent reader of hacker news. These comments can only come from people who have never experienced this kind of loss and think its appropriate to rationalise away the emotion of the event; or who are genuinely blunted enough emotionally that you cannot empathise with someone and appreciate why these replies aren't considerate or even remotely civil.

I refuse to believe that someone could experience this kind of loss and still genuinely hold the point of view that challenging grievers as to the correctness of their world view is a constructive or compassionate thing to do.

Of course death is a part of life. It doesn't mean it should be trivialised. It is one of the most significant events that will occur in your life, and grief absolutely shapes the way someone perceives the world while they recover from it.

Yes, "Life fucking sucks" is a statement that doesn't take into account the whole scope of life at that point in time, but I would estimate that from the grievers perspective it is a very accurate summary of how things feel.

Every time I see a topic on here relating to something other than technology or money I cringe before opening the comments section, because while a minority of participants, it is almost guaranteed that someone will be trying to rationalise away the significance of death, gender issues, class imbalance etc. It really wouldn't hurt some people here to step away from their collection of technical domains and deal with some people outside of their bubble once in a while.

I've got no grandparent's left, having lived through watching/caring for several of them go through protracted dementia/alzheimers with my mother and our family as carers and the associated joys of that.

My cousin killed himself a year or two ago. My mother got a cancer diagnosis last year.

I'm not trying to rack up a body count, or post that to measure my e-penis, but it might stop you and other's like you dismissing this out of hand.

I think that guy up there you're responding to is spot on.

Death is part of life. My parents, and my wife's parents, are probably going to waste away, and probably get mistreated in a nursing home/hospital just like my grandparents were shuffled off and hidden from the living because we're all (i.e. our entire society) so chicken-shit scared of talking about this or dealing with it like adults. Instead we prod it with kiddy-gloves and pretend it doesn't happen.

Truthfully, i find your response more insulting and condescending than the person you're responding to. I don't mean that as a flame, its how i feel. I don't think your post should be downvoted. Its a valid perspective that you're obviously sincere about.

But one that needs to be taken with a counteragent like myself to point out that you're just telling us all there's one way we're all supposed to feel about and treat grief, that its your way, and the rest of us are wrong.

Then I missed the intent of my post a bit - I'm not calling out the coping style, I'm trying to address the lack of empathy in the response to the Op. The guy is clearly grieving and depressed over what has happened, it's not a hard thing to interpret, so why address him as if he's failing to understand the logic in the situation? This isn't a technical topic, I'd like to think there's a capacity to switch gears and actually deal with people in a more complex way than "death happens, this is sensible, get used to it"

I don't consider your response a flame - I've just worked with people who are in grief and shock before and would never consider responding with my own beliefs on the topic if I thought it would injure them during the initial stages of grieving. Yes, in the mainstream we don't acknowledge it, and in the west we get people out of sight so they can die without us dealing with it, but it doesn't mean people just pretend it away when it happens to them. Some people just choose to deal with the topic indirectly when talking in public forums or with people outside of the family but I've certainly known the majority of people I've worked with to be very direct about the topic when they feel like they are in the right situation to do so.

Again, it's perfectly fine to have your own coping style but when you're engaging with someone else on a subject like death there has to be some measure of empathy towards their situation. They are not you, they have different processes and philosophies towards these events, it's not just a case of standing there and shouting your ideas at them until they "understand".

Why is it that posts about someone else lacking empathy always themselves lack empathy?

If someone ranted at you, telling you that you are a bad person and unable to relate to others, like you just did in these two posts, how would you feel?

You insist they couldn't possibly have lost anyone close to them, but of course you don't know that. You're merely imposing your style of coping on them. What if they have lost someone? Go back and re-read your post telling them they're coping with it all wrong.

I would understand that something about how I'm communicating to other people might not be working as well as I think it is, at least with the person making the rant.

What I insisted was dramatised but the issue that I'm taking here stays the same - everyone is entitled to their own coping style, but the way you communicate to others has to take them into consideration.

Yes, I've done a very poor job at demonstrating that, I'm a bit outraged but not professing that I'm much better at any of this myself, but I want the point explored - where's the line, even online? Where do we stop ourselves short in terms of how we handle someone else's situation when there is a desire to shout "shit happens" at them from behind a screen?

Again, I've probably done this here. I've got a virginal, unused account and I'm anonymous and all of the usual factors relating to this kind of screwed online communication, but it just feels like a common theme in the responses here. Logic works! Logic works in programming so logic works in people! This person isn't being logical, the colour is outside the lines, quickly, correctness!

Seriously, HN taught me everything I know about a lot of the technology that I earn a living from but it's starting to feel less and less appropriate to make reference to around company that is over 25 and has more life experience than grinding in a SV startup. Yes, jump all over this statement, tear it to bits, ask me to reflect, etc. I'm speaking just in my own case, as someone who volunteers to come and read this, but it's definitely at a point where even though it's a vocal minority of very strange responses, it's an accepted minority that reflects on the rest of the community.

The parent comment isn't saying that death isn't a part of life. He's saying that it was pretty rude to say that in the context of the grandparent's comment. He's not telling you, or anyone else, how to feel. He's trying to tell you that sometimes you should look at the social context you're in, and not say the wrong damn thing. Ironically, he failed while chastising someone else who deserved it.

embm * engage mind before mouth

My father died of pancreatic cancer and it was a rough seven month from the time he was diagnosed till he succumbed and a difficult time afterwards. I sympathize with your numbness and lack of explanation.

The only answers that experience left me with are:

1) Life is fleeting and I want to jealously take advantage of every day with my loved ones.

2) Were life not so fragile, we would not appreciate it like we should.

> What's the point of explaining what I'm going through to anyone? What can they do?

I'm a little late to this party, but this is really important: it's not about having the other person "do" something that will magically make you feel better. It is the act of explaining how you feel that is in and of itself therapeutic. I know it doesn't make any sense, but it's true. It has to do with how we are wired to be social creatures. The act of talking to a fellow human being and having them listen is woven deeply into our psyches. That's one of the reasons that the internet is so addictive. But it is also helpful to have an actual living, breathing human being doing the listening instead of some abstract entity on the other end of a TCP connection. So go find someone -- anyone -- and tell them how you feel. Trust me, it will help.

Loss of a loved one is so very painful and difficult.

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