For those who have lost one or both parents...

I was 12 the last time I saw my father, and 15 the last time I heard from him via letter.

I have no idea where he is or whether he is alive. At this point I’ve given up active search, and just check obituaries every few months in an almost hope for closure.

Somehow, knowing he is dead seems like it would be easier to accept than the fact that he doesn’t want me to find him.

My dad died when he was 53. I was 29. Mother still alive but suffering from late-term Alzheimer’s. I had so many relatives but they’re almost all gone now. :(

My Dad died when he was 53 as well. I was 27.
My Mom died when she was 72. I was 49.

I am now 57. I new the day I was older than my father when he died. I expect to live longer than my Mom did.

My dad died when he was 62. I was 36 at the time. My mother left my life three months later. I haven’t seen her since. While I sometimes wish she made a different choice, life has been much more peaceful without her.

My parents are still alive, but I lost my dad about 4 years ago. Lost in the sense that he isn’t in my life anymore, and it deeply hurts me, deeper than I ever knew possible.

I was four years old when my father died and 44 years old when my mother died.

God DAMN these fathers who can just up and leave their children.

Have you ever lost someone, someone who meant so very much that thoughts and memories of them somehow become part of every thought and every fiber in you body, and part of every daydream and every night dream? Someone who you love so much, who you miss so badly that you cry at night, and you cry so hard and it hurts so bad that you feel like you’re insides are all coming out through your heart…when some nights you cry so hard and hurt so much that suddenly you fell like you have a connection with that person, at that very second, that that person must be thinking about you, too, at that very moment. Your pain is so intense that you know you’ve reached them. And then you’re crying out of their name in agony suddenly turns to a quiet question, as if they have come into your room…you say their name with a gasp, with just a second of peace, because for a second they are there with you after so long. Just before she shattered again, just before her little world crashed again, the name she whispered as a hopeful, breath-catching hello was….. “Daddy?”

I was 36 when my Mom died. Changed my life. I’m a totally different person now.

I was 30 when my mom died and 38 when my dad died. My mom’s passing was much harder for me than my dad’s…

My mother died two years ago at 96 of a severe stroke. It took her only three days to let go. I was 73. She was in comparatively good health until then.

My father was 74 in 1980 and suffering from advanced Parkinson’s disease. He chose to shoot himself in the ear. I was 43 then.

in my case, my mother restricted, then cut off contact. She is the evil one. My dad has a history of depression, and after his adoptive mother passed away in 02, he vanished. No one in his family has heard from him since.

My father passed in 1988 about three weeks before his 75th birthday. He had been dealing with lung cancer for about 2 years. He was a life-long smoker, but ironically it was asbestosis related mesothelioma that did him in.

My mother passed in 1996 close to 80 years of age.

@gailcalled unimaginable, sorry

Once something happens, it is easy to imagine.

I haven’t seen my biological father since I was 6. He and my mom split up when I was 3, but he stuck around for awhile. One day he was supposed to pick me up and never showed. I haven’t seen him since. He tried to reach me when I graduated high school but I was not interested in a relationship with him. He’s a lot older than my mom – I think he’s about 70 now, if he’s alive. I have no clue whether he is or not.

I’m sure it hurt when I was a child, but not anymore. My step-father raised me and loved me like I was his own. He’s my dad, for all intents and purposes.

I was 35 and my mom was 63 and had been living with MS since her 20’s when she passed. We were never close, but I got to say my goodbyes before she passed.

I am still mourning the loss of my precious cat who died about 2.5 years ago. I think his death has been more hurtful than my mother’s death. As I said, my mom and I were never close. I miss my baby boy every time I lay in bed. He was my constant companion.

Totally off-topic, but how can a jelly have one avatar here, then when you click on that avatar, it takes you to their profile page and there’s a different avatar?

@Mama_Cakes I have that problem depending on what I’m viewing on. On a computer I have one picture, iPad I have a different one

My parents passed away a few weeks apart in 1964 when I was 41. They were 62 and 64. They died early, compared to the rest of our family because of smoking. The usual age in our family is the late 80’s or 90’s. My brother recently passed away at age 7l from Emphysema due to smoking..

I was 17 my father was 40, I can’t say there is a day I don’t think about him. When I was turning 41 it made me think that I passed the age of my father died at and realized just how short his life really was.

Death of a parent is a hard thing and when it happens when your still growing up I think it becomes in grained in you just how short it can be and that you are not invincible.

I was 56 when my father died. He was 80½ years old. He had been sick for a couple of years with ILD but it was still a surprise. He just collapsed one morning leaving the bedroom and was dead by the time the EMT’s got there and probably long before then. He had his oxygen machine in one hand and his other arm on my mothers shoulder to steady himself. She said he didn’t say a word but that his hand just slipped down her back and he slumped to the floor.

My grandfather, dads’ father, had died at the age of 66 when my father was 40. I remember what dread my father experienced as he approached his own 66th. year of life. For reasons he could not put into words he was convinced he too would be dead before the year was out but he made it through to his 67th birthday and had another 14 years with us.

I was 55 when my Dad died and 60 when my Mom died.