My mom died humiliated and sad.

I’m struggling with the circumstances of my mom’s death. I feel overwhelmed with guilt about her passing.

Throughout my childhood and into my teenage years, we were incredibly close. I saw her as a close friend. She loved me deeply and cheered me on through my bachelor’s degree (I was the first in our family to attend college). She and my dad divorced when I was 14, and she remarried in my early 20s. Her second husband was the love of her life. She was so incredibly happy. They bought a house together, which was a huge milestone for them. Both had grown up in poverty, so this was a dream come true. They were deeply happy together. She kept the house cozy and warm, with pictures of all their kids and family covering the walls.

In 2019, my stepdad died unexpectedly of a heart attack at 45. My mom was devastated and never recovered. She became an alcoholic, and people moved into her house to help her pay the mortgage. When that wasn’t enough, I helped by covering a couple of months’ mortgage payments and the car payment. The car had been my stepdad’s prized possession.

Over time, my sister, who was struggling with heroin addiction, moved in, along with other people who used hard drugs. My mom nearly died several times from alcohol poisoning, choking on her own vomit. I spent countless nights on the phone with her (I live five hours away). She frequently expressed suicidal thoughts. I begged her to get help and even tried to pay for treatment. Each conversation left me devastated and in shreds. This went on for years. I drove home multiple times, trying to get her into treatment.

I grieved my mother for three years—who she was before and the relationship we had. I begged her to get help and felt hurt when she found trivial reasons not to. Every conversation with her ended in tears. Eventually I created distance between us. I created boundaries so that her late night calls wouldn't get in the way of my ability to function. My therapist encouraged this.

Meanwhile, I earned a master’s degree and bought a house. I still feel immense guilt for leaving my family in poverty while I found success. I would have done anything to get her well again.

At the end of her life, she had lost her home and moved into a trap house. When I visited her, she had her door nailed shut to keep the men who lived upstairs out of her room. She told me about cooking meals for the other drug addicts to keep them friendly toward her. She weighed less than 100 pounds. She had started using meth. She was humiliated in my presence. I could see her shame, and it was utterly heartbreaking in every sense of the word. I hate how she felt embarrassed in front of me.

My mom had asthma my whole life and developed heart issues in recent years, likely due to her meth use.

She died on the floor of the trap house, unable to breathe during an asthma attack. Nobody helped her. My sister was there, and it’s still unclear why she didn’t intervene. The other addicts assumed she was overdosing, so they gave her Narcan and dumped water on her.

Paramedics arrived and performed CPR, bringing her back after 15 minutes. By the time I got to the hospital, my mom was having seizures, and her brain was no longer functioning. I had to give permission to take her off life suppor after 2 days of watching her in body shake.

I am crushed by the way she left this earth. She was an amazing mom, and such a good person.

I miss her deeply.

How do I even start to reconcile the fact that she died so humiliated by her own life? Nobody wants to die..but she never would have dreamed of leaving this way.

(I originally sent this as a DM, but I finally worked up the courage to post it here. Apologies if the same person sees it again—I’m not sure what the etiquette is. I’ll probably delete this later once my courage fades.)

Update: Reading every one of these replies. It means a great deal that so many strangers are thinking of my mom with love and compassion. I am a bit floored and don't know what to say. Crying is certainly one way to ring in the new year.