Hello Lou, sending you a big understanding hug.
So sorry to hear about your dad. The feelings you describe sound almost exactly how I felt when I lost my mum in 2017 and found my way here. I was her carer for many years too and I know how devastating losing a parent you have lived with for so long is.
It's very early days for you and I am not surprised that you are feeling anger, pain, lost and despairing. Sadly, that's what loss, well, love, does to you really. If we didn't love them so much, their loss wouldn't hurt so much. Like you, I felt like the world should have stopped turning and couldn't understand how life could be going on around me as normal. I found it a struggle to get through every hour, every minute at times. All you can do is try to get through each day, one at a time for the moment and if you manage to make yourself a cup of tea, that will be an achievement.
I know it is difficult to stop reliving those last days and that is normal too, but just to give you something to hold on to, it does get better as you begin to recover from the shock and the pain does lessen as time goes by. I know that is hard to believe at this point, and I am not saying this will be a fast process. It was eighteen months before I really began to feel like I was getting a handle on it all and I still have difficult times. This last few weeks have been difficult. But you will find a way forward. You will probably have to work at that. I did. Grief doesn't disappear or become manageable without you working at that, but it does get better.
Talking helps, so keep talking to us here and to anyone you are close to who genuinely wants to help. Use anything that helps you feel better. It helped me to have flowers around. It felt calming to know there were still beautiful things in the world and their scent helped raise my spirits a fraction. Getting out and walking in the park helped a lot too. I would read the inscriptions on the benches there from others who had lost people they loved and that reminded me that those we have lost are not forgotten by those who love them and love goes on.
Life will never be as it was and neither will you, but it does go on and it does get better. I think the thought to hold on to is that your dad loved you as much as you loved him and would want you to make the best of your life now, but isn't here to help you do that, so hold on to all the memories he left you and dreams he had for you. They will be your treasure and your strength in the future. It's up to you to make your life what he would have wanted it to be for you now, for him and in honour of his memory and all those years he put into making a good life for you, so don't give in to the misery and the pain. The good memories will come back in time and the bad ones will move into the background.
You have a future and a new you to get used to in this new reality. You might not like the new reality, but you will find your way forward into it in time. Be gentle with yourself. Let yourself grieve, but don't let it drag you down as it so easily can. Remember to eat and drink enough, hard as that is at the moment and just take it one day at a time for now. We are here for as long as you need us. Sending strength.
