first post

[hadjer taleb]

Hello, my name is Hadjer, I'm 20 years old. I don't know how to start this. I'm here because I lost my adoptive parents six years ago to cancer and a heart attack and my twin brother, four years ago in a car accident i was also in. I like to think that I'm strong person but i can't help but think that if I let people in, they'll die. Even tho it has been years, I still can't bring myself to grief or stop blaming myself because it feels like if I do it will be as if I had accepted that they're gone forever. I just miss them so much that it hurts and it feels so alone. Sometimes I wonder why is it me? what did I do to deserve this? no one does. Everyone here is such an inspiration for being so strong and I hope one day I could be the same. 

[Edward Janne]

Dear Hadjer, you may not feel strong, but you are. Thank you for coming here and sharing your story. It takes strength to show your vulnerability. You did not do anything to deserve grief. Grief happens because you love, and to love and loose is the nature of human existence. It is normal for you to grieve the loss of your parents and brother. It is also common for us who remain to feel guilty for having survived.

I lost my husband last month and I have been avoiding telling my neighbors because I feel like it would just make it too real, as if I could go through life in some kind of limbo where I still had a home.

I, too, am fearful of getting too close to anyone else because I don’t feel I could withstand any more loss. But I have chosen to adopt the philosophy that love and grief are necessarily bound together, and I should embrace grief as an inevitable, so that I can give myself and others the gift of love. Yes, whomever we love may die, but would it be better that they died without knowing love?

[Keera Borman]

Hi Hadjer, although your story is very different from mine, one thing we can agree upon is that feeling of letting people in. I have been dealing with that struggle every single day since my Nan died. I was up at college when it happened and when I saw my dad at the doorstep of my college apartment, something in my gut knew she was gone. My dad tells me he never heard a scream so horrid come from my body. Im writing to you to hopefully give you some comfort in a mutual feeling. for you to know you arent alone. since then i have pushed many people away, and am constantly asking "why me?" your post really gave me some comfort in knowing someone else has the exact same feelings in their head, so im hoping i could relief some of that for you too.