My girlfriend's [23] mum has died unexpectedly. How do I [25, F] support her through this?

Hello everyone. Hope you are all taking care of yourselves.

My gf's mum has died unexpectedly of a stroke. They lived in separate cities, but were very close. My gf on her way to her mum's city right now with her father and brother. Here, she lives with her father, who doesn't know she has a girlfriend. The death of a mother is horrible, but the fact we're going through a global pandemic makes it even harder. I tried to go visit her on the days prior to her death, while her mum was at the ICU, but my mother wouldn't let me because it's too much of a risk to get in a public transport. We live 45 minutes away, I don't have a car, she doesn't own one either, so I'm forced to either take a train/bus or ask someone to drive me. To make matters worse, my mother doesn't really like my gf (there's plenty of jealousy and a little homophobia there) and isn't really an empathetic person.

I saw her today for a very short while before she traveled to her mum's city, because a close friend will be taking care of her cat and we met outside my house. I hugged her and told her I love her and I will be there for her anytime she needs (I always reassure this), and gave her kind of a "care package" with a letter, an envelope with cards filled with reassuring words that I wrote, water, food, a blanket, and other things for her to take care of herself. I also haven't turned off my phone, I sleep with it in my hand so I can wake up immediately if she texts and if she needs to talk. But I feel like I'm not doing enough.

How do I go along with this? I love my girlfriend very much, we've been together for seven months and I want to build a life together, and I want to be there for her. I will try to visit her once she returns, but I would appreciate some advice as to how I can be of real support during these times, which I imagine will be terribly hard.

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TL;DR: My girlfriend's mum died unexpectedly. I want to be there for her but the pandemic and social distancing makes it harder.

Submitted April 25, 2020 at 12:12AM

Hello everyone. Hope you are all taking care of yourselves.My gf's mum has died unexpectedly of a stroke. They lived in separate cities, but were very close. My gf on her way to her mum's city right now with her father and brother. Here, she lives with her father, who doesn't know she has a girlfriend. The death of a mother is horrible, but the fact we're going through a global pandemic makes it even harder. I tried to go visit her on the days prior to her death, while her mum was at the ICU, but my mother wouldn't let me because it's too much of a risk to get in a public transport. We live 45 minutes away, I don't have a car, she doesn't own one either, so I'm forced to either take a train/bus or ask someone to drive me. To make matters worse, my mother doesn't really like my gf (there's plenty of jealousy and a little homophobia there) and isn't really an empathetic person.I saw her today for a very short while before she traveled to her mum's city, because a close friend will be taking care of her cat and we met outside my house. I hugged her and told her I love her and I will be there for her anytime she needs (I always reassure this), and gave her kind of a "care package" with a letter, an envelope with cards filled with reassuring words that I wrote, water, food, a blanket, and other things for her to take care of herself. I also haven't turned off my phone, I sleep with it in my hand so I can wake up immediately if she texts and if she needs to talk. But I feel like I'm not doing enough.How do I go along with this? I love my girlfriend very much, we've been together for seven months and I want to build a life together, and I want to be there for her. I will try to visit her once she returns, but I would appreciate some advice as to how I can be of real support during these times, which I imagine will be terribly hard.​TL;DR: My girlfriend's mum died unexpectedly. I want to be there for her but the pandemic and social distancing makes it harder.