My mother died back in July of this year. It was time - it was a blessing. She had struggled with Atypical Alzheimers/dementia (nobody really knew what is was exactly), for 7 or more years.

Its been hard for me to grieve.

First of all, extended dementia is difficult to grieve I think - there is a certain amount of relief surrounding the death after a person is just in a vegetative state for so long.

But its difficult for me to know how to feel too, because my mother was my first abuser (emotional, physical, sexual).

So how do you feel about that?

I feel a little more free - for one thing. And then I feel guilty that I do.

No, did not want my mother to die. Nobody really does.

But when your mother hurt you - when you did not bond with her - when you don't know what a real mother is like -

Well, my therapist calls this "complicated grief".

Its complicated all right! And I don't know if I grieved her passing or not?
I am supposed to be journaling about it and have some - but find that difficult too.

Musica91

PS - and one more thing, in therapy I discovered that my mother probably also abused my older brother too, and since he later died by suicide - the first comment out of my mouth was "she killed him". (that was a very tough day for me in therapy - on the drive home, I pulled over and vomited. No joke).