Fear of Death

[Frankie123]

Hello I hope you can help. I have just reached 80 years of age and my fear of death has become overwhelming. So much that it occupies every hour of my day. If anyone give advice on how to overcome this devastating feeling I would be most grateful.

[Frankie123]

I can see that 55 people have read my post but there have been no replies. I guess I was expecting to much from this site. Thank you all anyway.

[nomorepanic]

They are not necessarily "real" people - they will be "robots" that scan the site.

Maybe some sort of counselling would be helpful for you?

[Scass]

Sometimes it’s difficult to know how to reaping Frankie. I’m sorry you are feeling like this, but some counselling might be really useful. Could you speak to your gp or do you have a local age UK you could ring for advice?

[BlueIris]

Agreeing with Scass here, sometimes it can take a while for the right person to read your reply. We're all amateurs, and we're here to help one another, but it's been a Bank Holiday weekend and people have been busy.

Yes, death is scary but it's also inevitable, so it's important to find acceptance somehow. I think help from a professional would probably be in order.

[Carnation]

Frankie, I started a thread 'Fear of death' which has some interesting replies if you want to look up in the search facility. There are quite a few threads on this subject, some may be listed below. x

[Frankie123]

I thought I would let you know that I have had a long talk with my GP and she has put me on sertraline and diazepam. I am hoping that these are going to help me. So wishing they will take effect as soon as possible but she says could be 2 or 3 weeks before I feel any benefit.

[Carnation]

I hope you feel some relief soon Frankie.

[Frankie123]

Thank you Carnation and thank you for talking to me. Coming onto this site is the only comfort I get at the moment.

[Munki]

Sorry to hear this, Frankie! Hey, listen - its one thing thats inevitable for each and every one of us. Just yesterday, I read about an 18-year old coming to a very sad and tragic ending. You're at a wonderful age! It's a time in life that you own the world and deserve the freedom to do exactly what you want! My Nan is 93 and shes more sociable than I am, no word of a lie! Just own it! Definitely get some talking therapy too, but glam yourself up like Joan Collins, don some leopard print and get yourself feeling fabulous! <3

If theres one joy of the 21st Century, its that age doesn't matter! Tomorrow you might just end up on Vogue!

[Carnation]

It can be very lonely when you feel fearful.
I hope the forum is some help to you. x

[peg54321]

Hi Frankie. How are you doing? My last job was as a pastoral carer working in palliative care -about 5 years ago. If it helps any - many people - including staff, have fear of death. While I was working in the role I tried to research as much as I could about fear of death to help the patients as well as myself - and there's quite a bit out there written on it - and the condition common - and generally people either try to push it away, become unconscious of their feelings and seek help, or project their fears into other behaviours or seek help outright as you are doing. I remember reading in an article many cancer doctors working in the field of death and dying also have these fears. So, its common and there isn't really a magic answer for it. Depending on your nature you'll find the best approach. Some use their faith, some use counselling, some do self help. Personally - having the experience of seeing how common it is was in itself quite soothing to me. Having said that - ALOT of people are in denial about dying even right at the end of their lives. Many can't face it and don't want to talk about it. So, I congratulate you on being lucid to this fact of life and wanting to talk about it. From memory there are some really good books out there on the subject. One is actually called "Denial of Death" by Ernest Becker - which from memory was a good read. I also found autobiographies on the subject also helpful - one is particular Christopher Hitchen's book that he wrote at end of his life.