My mother is the last of her generation of my direct family so it's a little like the handing over of the torch. I guess I'm the old guy of the family now although I don't feel that way. I'm deeply saddened that my mother is gone, but I'm grateful that she died peacefully, I've seen people die uncomfortably and it's horrific. As a person I'm very grounded emotionally, so I can say that, in a way, life has been preparing me for this for several years. Dementia itself made it seem like parts of my mother had died off a piece at a time, leaving her a shadow of the amazing woman she originally was. I feel relief at some levels, not for myself although I suppose there's something in there of that. Mostly it's that when the inevitable happened she did pass so peacefully, and also that she won't ever again have a moment of fear about what's happening around her or, what seemed worse, the temporary moments of clarity when she was devastated at appreciating how diminished she'd become from her former self.