Now the grieving process kicked in and the guilt! If I only did more… if I only told the doctors that she was an alcoholic, if I had pushed her to go and get help she would still be here I would still have a mother and my dad would still have a wife.
"What if"ing yourself won't change the situation. But if you're going to play "what if", I have some other scenarios.
What if you had attempted to intervene and your mom said no. What if you kept trying and trying and trying and trying and still she said no, she would not seek help because she didn't need help. What if you had to stand by, doing everything in your power to get her to stop drinking and it didn't work? What if you told her doctors and they said there was nothing they could do unless she voluntarily asked for help?
What if you did everything you're feeling guilty for not doing, and she still did exactly the same behaviors that eventually led to her death?
What, then, would you feel guilty for? I would guess that you would feel that you didn't try hard enough, that you didn't do more, that you should have locked her in a basement and fed her bread and water.
Here's the hard truth: your mother didn't want help. The scenarios I've listed above have shown up on this forum over and over and over again. People here have tried just about every way imaginable to get their loved one's to stop drinking. It doesn't work unless the alcoholic WANTS to stop drinking. They drive themselves insane with worry and repeated failed attempts at getting their loved ones help.
The sad reality is that there really wasn't anything you could have done to help your mom. I am in no way diminishing your grief - you've lost someone who meant a great deal to you. You will grieve. For many people, guilt is a part of the grieving process. But please be careful about blaming yourself for your mom's death. You did not pour the alcohol down her throat against her wishes. She made those choices.
I would liken it to a smoker who dies of emphysema. Would you hold yourself accountable had that been what happened?
Grieve for your mother. Be angry, be hurt, be sad, be untethered, be all the things that people are when they're in the throes of grieving. But please please don't blame yourself. That path leads to crazy.
I feel very much for your loss. Losing a parent is difficult enough, losing a parent when you're young is harder, losing a parent to something preventable is even worse. Just because it was preventable does not mean YOU could prevent it.