# Anxiety Disorders > Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) >  >  A lot of anxiety since my grandmother died..

## I'm sad ALL the time

Hello everyone. New here and i was looking for a place to discuss my anxiety over the recent passing of my grandmother. I loved her very much and the last one and a half month of her life she was living with me and my family.. So I was present the whole time she had problems.. She suffered from heart problems and she even suffered an acute pulmonary edema while in our house.. One night I heard her falling of her bed and I ran for help.. Then she deteriorated and had to be transferred to he hospital and 26 days later she died.. It was very sudden and the loss very big.. I thought I could handle it easily but now, 15 days after her death I constantly keep thinking that I will be sick (If i am not already sick) and something will happen to my family.. I pay attention to minor things (e.g Tingling sensations on my leg, a pain in my stomach or a headache) and i think i have MS, or cancer.. I cannot sleep easily because i usually jump of in the middle of the night.. I do not know what to do..

----------


## Ms.Lady

Hi, I'm, Welcome to Anxiety Space. 

So sad to hear of your recent loss.

From how you describe events it sounds that your grandmother was very  loved, and cared for, right up til her last moments - and I'm sure the  love and attention in those last weeks made her feel more at ease.

Because grandma has only passed away 2 weeks ago - it would be wrong of  me (or anyone) to say 'you have issues' of a lasting nature. Grief is a  natural thing for anyone and how we grieve for our loved ones is a  personal thing. It can take several weeks or even months, depending on  the relationship, for someone to properly come to terms with the death  of a loved one - and even then, anniversaries and memories may still  rise up now and then.

The fears you're expressing may well be to do with coming to terms with  her passing away and, in time, will ease of their own accord. I would  suggest tho you are not only coming to terms with her death but also in  coming to terms with the end of your role as her carer over these last  few weeks.

The fears of others or yourself becoming ill are not unnatural - for a couple of reasons:
Firstly, it is the maternal instinct to protect and preserve our loved  ones health. Having been so close to someone so ill recently will have  probably heightened your sense in this area so you are now  hypersensitive to others becoming ill. The inevitability and finality of  death often makes us reflect on our own and others mortality as well as  the loss of the loved one.

The other reason, which is closesly linked to the above, is having been  so attentive to your grandmother for these last few weeks you have no  doubt become 'finely tuned' to her health needs and very focussed on her  day to day presentation. You have also played a significant role in  nursing her thru those times. In short - you had become an 'expert' in  nursing her.

Now she has gone - that role has stopped for you - but you've become  very much an expert in a short space of time - and you're now 'trained'  in caring for someone - with no-one to care for!

It's left a void in your life in more ways than perhaps you realise.  What was once your intense 'caring' role is now reverted back to the  role you had before nursing grandmother. But with all this recent  activity and steep learning curve - sometimes that can take a little  while to adjust back to - and that's what I think is going on for you  right now. 

Having taken on the role 6 weeks ago would have been a massive life  changing event - and now it has all changed again. Do not underestimate  the amount of physical and emotional effort you have put into caring for  grandmother this last 6 weeks or so.

What might help is for you to remind yourself that - yes, that expert  role was once necessary to fulfill grandmother's needs at that time -  but now you have done your role, you might need to 'switch off' your  specialist role and revert back to how you were before these last few  weeks of caring. That may take a little while to actually happen - and  it may be a case of getting plently of rest and taking your time with  things after what must have been an intense time.

The sleep problem is probably related to this too - when before you were  attentive and on 'high alert' for grandmother (like when she fell out  of bed) but now you don't have that reason to be awake or vigilant, so  it's left your mind 'alert' with no longer any reason to be alert. So it  wanders off thinking about all sorts. It may also be about your mind  making sense of all the emotions you probably had but didn't have time  to process during your grandmothers illness as you were so busy taking  care of her. I believe time will offer you much relief for these things.

I hope this offers you some understanding to what might be going on for  you right now and that this helps you to continue to greive for  grandmother with less worry.

I would suggest give yourself a little while longer to adjust - make use  of family supports whilst grieving - perhaps talking with other family  members who helped care for grandmother - and don't panic about things  being a little unsettled so recently after grandmother passing away.

If this doesn't ease for you tho in the next week or two - or you do  become more worried about how it's affecting you, I would advise you go  talk to your family doctor and ask for referral to grief counselling to  offer you more support.

Take what makes sense of this to you and use it as you need - anything that makes no sense - ignore it 

If you want to discuss more here then please do so - that's the whole reason of the forum 

Take care and kind regards

----------


## Chantellabella

I agree with MsLady. You're still grieving and the thought of this happening is fresh in your mind. Give yourself time to cry and miss her. 

I'm sorry you're going through this right now. Keep talking though. It helps to tell somebody about how you feel.

----------

