How Do You Handle Death?

Depends on the day honestly.

I spend some days laying up at night having these panic attacks as the realization that death is inevitable and one day my existence will just end. It's a deeply troubling thought, and it rattles me to my core, but it's also unavoidable so there is little I can do about it. Which only drives my fear of it wild and mad.

Other days I'm just like "Screw it, we die whatever"

 

Fairly well.

I accept that death is something natural and it is going to happen sooner or later.

What affects me, is that you won't be able to spend time with them and create new memories, only look back on old ones.

Death is dark, but as a dark person, it is hard to phase me with something as natural as death.

 

Well the only person I've ever had die that was pretty close to me was my step-dad. He died of brain cancer (which he had been battling with for about 1 year and a half) around July (so only 2 months ago). At first I was just in shock, and then sad and then angry that he left my mom. Then angry at God for doing that to him (and my mom). Then I just felt nothing and hoped there'd be a heaven for him. Now, I try not to think about it, sometimes I pretend that he doesn't exist, that he never existed. This helps, at least for me

 

I haven't really found a way yet. I'm an atheist, so I don't have the comfort of believing they're in some invisible magical sky castle worshipping an invisible sky daddy, waiting for my return... but what I do have on my side is the comfort in knowing that they aren't gonna burn in hell for an eternity if they picked the wrong god.

But as far as getting over the loss of a loved one is concerned, well my aunt Audrey died last year of a massive stroke, and at that time, I was a christian, so I was pretty comfortable, I cried a lot, but I "knew" I was gonna see her again, but then that hope died on January 14, of this year when I became an atheist, and I accepted that there's a high likelihood I would never see her again, and if I think about it too much, I become severely emotional, so I haven't come up with a way yet. Still looking though...

A video that I watched by a person named Hemant Mehta, aka The Friendly Atheist made a few good videos on the subject of death...

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Fortunately, I've started becoming more comfortable with my own death, which I came to terms with faster than religion has ever tried to help. Sometimes, I feel like it can't come quick enough... but I've managed to accept my inevitable end. All I want when my time comes, is that it would be a peaceful end I wouldn't know was coming... i.e going to bed and never waking up.

 

I actually don't find myself going through the typical stages of grief. I kind of just jump around emotion-wise and feel a lot of different things unpredictably- but there are definitely periods of denial and sort of being completely numb to it, and then periods of tears where it really hits hard. I try to watch some funny things/listen to music and all to feel better and to distract myself. I know people say to try and talk/communicate with friends, family when these things happen but I find that I isolate myself a lot more.

It helps that in my family's culture we very seriously honour the dead and give them an incredible funeral and everything, and a tradition of visiting and honouring the graves of passed family members every year. It means that they are never forgotten and they're well remembered.

Mostly though it just takes time for me. There is clearly nothing you can do to reverse death and it's something that is inevitable (doesn't take the sting out of it though), so it just takes periods of time that depend on how close I was with the person who passed and various other factors too.

 

I will take a lot of pills when I think I'm going to die, and drink a lot of booze, so I'm unaware of how painful it is, because I hear it is generally painful, according to medical science. I will always keep enough sedatives handy for when it is time to pull the plug. It will be like passing out, and just never waking up.

Which many days, is how I already feel....