When my mother died, it felt like the world was moving but I had stopped. Life was spinning around me as I stood still trying to make sense of what happened. My earliest, raw grief was filled with waves of sobbing–a keening, wailing cry that swelled louder and then lulled into silently streaming tears. It hurt all over. I cried until I fell asleep, then woke up to cry some more. I wanted to undo it. I googled “my mom just died”, as if the internet would supply me with answers, but what I found seemed like party planning tips for funeral events, with well meaning but flat advice like “be sure to give yourself a break!” 

I didn’t need a break. I was already broken. If your mom or dad just died, you might be feeling this, too. You might also be feeling or experiencing some of the following:

• You might sleep. A lot. Grief is exhausting. Sleep is an escape. The waking world, without your mom or dad in it, feels wrong. Raw grief is the space just after an exhale, when you are empty and still. You could also be the person who doesn’t sleep, who keeps busy and gets all the things done. There is no wrong way to grieve. 
• You may not feel hungry or thirsty. When my mom died, I didn’t see the need for food. The idea of chewing something felt like a bother, and I knew food would feel foreign and taste bad in my mouth. Someone set an iced green tea next to me, and I worked on finishing it for about twelve hours. Sips of room temperature water were tolerable, and in the evenings I ate a small amount of something that required the least effort to put on a plate. Eating was mechanical, a thing I did to keep my body going. Everything tasted like tears. I was sick from crying and endless nose blowing. 
• People will say “I’m so sorry”, which may feel to you like empty, useless words. I didn’t know how to respond. I couldn’t bring myself to say “thank you” to an “I’m so sorry”. I simply didn’t have energy in the raw grief phase to extend thanks to anyone, as if by saying they were sorry that they were giving me something helpful. I only nodded my head with my mouth pressed together or simply replied “Me too”.
• You might instantly catalog all of the things you need to say. The moment I realized I would never talk to my mom again, I suddenly had a list of things I needed to tell her, as if somehow she could turn around and come back. You might see and feel transcripts of those lost future conversations or things you wish you would have said. My mom didn’t know I’d found a better chocolate chip cookie bar recipe or that we were changing schools for my oldest. I didn’t get to tell her how much she meant to me. I didn’t get to say how sorry I am for not calling her more. I felt the regret and pain of every hurtful thing I said to her over the years, and wished so hard like a child that I could take it all back.
• So many things will remind you of your lost parent, and this will trigger your raw grief. Everywhere you look, there they will be–something you bought together, their favorite house plant, a television commercial that annoyed them, or music you heard them play. The littlest things will get you. Each time I added cream to my coffee, I noted that my mom drank hers black. These things may stop you and wound you, again and again. 
• Other people will bring up big feelings for you. You might be unexpectedly angry at others. The world has stopped for you, and yet they keep moving. Other people will still laugh and talk, or deliberate about dinner options or have petty arguments or discuss any number of seemingly stupid or frivolous things. When my mother died I was on vacation at the beach, and when people were still sitting poolside sipping cocktails, I felt like slapping the drinks from their hands. I was angry at them for living in the world, for moving and existing when for me everything had come to a grinding halt. If you can lean on people around you and accept help, do it. Let them in if you can. You may also want them near you, and yet suddenly wish they would go away. 
• You will need to make plans. It is the worst, in the midst of your raw grief, that you may be expected to stand up, get moving, and make plans to bury your parent. This aged me. I expected my aunts and uncles to step in to put pieces into place, to do the grownup things, to make the decisions that needed to be made, but none of them did. One of my aunts offered to bring a dessert. This gutted me. When I had to make decisions about which coffin, burial details, funeral mass arrangements, turning off my mom’s cell phone, and closing bank accounts, she offered to bring a dessert, as if this was a backyard summer party. It occurred to me that she meant well, but I was the grown up. Even though I wanted a responsible adult to stand behind me to make sure I was okay, I was no longer anyone’s child, and this horrible task was mine to do. If you have trusted people who will help, who can take a task and manage it on their own, let them.   
• You will have these feelings for a while. I can’t tell you when your most raw grief will subside. It may be a long time. It will almost certainly be longer than those around you are comfortable with. Other people will be ready for you to feel better and may not be able to keep talking about your mom or your dad the way you need to talk and remember and keep them alive in this way. Those other people will just have to wait. Talk as much as your trusted people can take, and if you need more, seek out a therapist or counselor. I didn’t do this after my mom died, because I felt like therapy would simply be me sobbing for an hour, which seemed pointless. I should have done it. I should have found someone to share my grief, who would let me offload it and who could have held the weight for me, even for that one hour. 
• Grief will move you. It will change you. It is a force that will move through you and come back again and again like tidal waves in the beginning. You can’t rush grief. You can’t push past it. You can only let it in. Your grief is equal to or greater than the amount of love you had with your lost parent–their love and yours combined. There is no pushing that aside. When you feel the worst, try to remember that what you’re actually feeling is love. And you are certainly not alone.