It Has Been Ten Months

Dad - some thoughts written over the tenth month without you

It’s a fact that I will be sad for the rest of my life. 

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I read that there’s no wrong way to grieve, that we’re all different, so why do I so often feel like I’m not grieving properly, or at least not grieving conveniently?

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Not being able to say goodbye to you is so hard. 

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I feel like I’m shit at everything. Autistic burnout? Grief paralysis? Exhaustion? I don’t know. But I just can’t do anything. 

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I discovered a list I wrote. I had forgotten about it. I started writing it the night you died. A list of things I remembered about you. I was scared about forgetting. I forgot about the list, but I haven’t forgotten a single one of the things I wrote down. How could I?

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We have instigated a monthly quiz night (or afternoon), where we each write a round. It’s become something I look forward to. I don’t really look forward to anything anymore, so this is a good thing. We had so much fun at quizzes over the years. We won nearly every quiz we entered! I was always in awe of how much you knew. Maybe I can train up the kids this way to be a good quiz team. 

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A butterfly landed on me. That’s never happened before. It crept onto my finger. Just sat there, resting, wings gently quivering. “Hello Dad,” I whispered. A good few minutes we sat there together. 

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Some days it’s like I have no emotions at all. I’m just an empty golem, an automaton going through the motions, pretending to be a person. I wish I could be better at this. 

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Made your tuna pizza for lunch today, with the anchovies. Everyone ate it. I didn’t tell them about the anchovies until after they told me they’d enjoyed it. 

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Miranda and Mum went with the usual crowd to see Middlesbrough ladies play. Boro lost, of course. They took your hat and your scarf. They all miss you. 

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I’ve made a fruit cake for your birthday. You were a man who appreciated a fruit cake. Must be where I got my love for it from. I remember learning how to make Christmas cakes with you. Using a straw to feed them. Precious memories. 

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Chris is going away on business. I get so much more anxious about that now. I’m scared without him. I’m scared knowing that you’re not around.

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I’m scraping the barrel a little with this photo of us together. It’s a still from a video cousin Allan took on our trip to Turkey. This was at Istanbul airport, I think. You can see how much I look like you. 

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Ten months without your twinkly eyes. You were stolen from us. Every time I remember that you would have lived if the hospital had cared about you and for you, it’s like another crack in my heart. Sure, they can treat your case as a learning opportunity and hopefully no one else will go through this heartache, but that doesn’t change anything for us. You’re still not here.

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It Has Been Nine Months

Dad - some thoughts written over the ninth month without you 

Chris is getting the kids into Pokémon Go, and we were reminiscing about how much you enjoyed it. How you had a little notebook where you kept a record of the Pokémon you had for trades. And it made me think about how you kept records. That, and your genealogy passion, and the lists of books we needed to complete series, and so on. How if you could travel back in time you’d ask registrars to use block capitals when they register births and marriages and deaths. And how deeply, sadly ironic it is that poor record keeping appears to be a massive factor in your unnecessary death. 

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I will never see your hands again. We have the same shaped nails, I think. Yours were so smooth. A beautiful shape. I remember how we laughed when I realised how big your thumb is! Next to mine it was enormous. When we came to see your body, you were covered up to your neck. I wanted to see your hands, but all we were allowed was your poor face with the endotracheal tube coming out of your mouth. You didn’t look like you. And I couldn’t see your hands. Those beautiful hands. 

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So, Dolly Parton died. That’s made me really sad. Can you say hi from me? Can someone explain why all the best people are leaving and the evil ones are still here?

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I don’t want to get out of bed today. 

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Aptly, it was pouring down with rain when I read the Coroner’s ruling on your cause of death. You didn’t have to die. “Gross failure to provide appropriate care.” At every opportunity to help you they failed. Ignored amber and red alerts. Ignored Mum’s concerns. If they had cared enough to do their jobs, you would be alive. “On balance the probability is that he would have survived.” I don’t think I will ever recover from this heartbreak. 

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The physical side effects of grief are insane. My body just isn’t working right. Nothing specific. Just so many niggles. I don’t feel good. 

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Holiday without you. Why aren’t you here? How is this our normal now? I miss you so much. 

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I’ve got a cold. That’s what my body was threatening the past week or so. The stress and the sadness of it all. 

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At the seaside. I pretend you are down by the sea with the others. That feels normal. Or exploring the rocks and caves at the end of the beach. For a few minutes you are on holiday with us. 

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We survived the holiday without you. It was always going to be hard, but your absence was so apparent. None of us can baby-whisper like you. So many times when you would have appreciated what we were doing. 

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Bertie’s struggling again. He said he gets sad because he’s realised one day we won’t be here anymore. Why should an eight year old have to worry about people he loves dying? And I know that’s reality for so many children, but it sucks. 

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Christmas planning has come around. Last year was our first Christmas without you, but we were all so in shock, and everything was already prepped. This year feels like it will be the real first Christmas and I have to start planning but I don’t really want to. It’s my favourite time of year and now it’s the worst. Tradition makes me feel safe, relaxed. But traditionally you have always been there. It turns out that surviving a first doesn’t mean the second is easier. It, in fact, makes it worse. Firsts are tricky, everything afterwards is doing that hard thing over and over again, knowing how hard it will be. 

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I don’t feel well. No idea why, and then I realise the date. Tomorrow is the 21st again. How do our bodies realise before our minds do?

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Here we are again. Another month since you died. All the inquest business has kept me in a sort of stasis, as though we’re all still stuck at the beginning of the grieving process. Still in the shock of it. Still in disbelief. Grief is the most exhausting state I have ever experienced. I miss you more each day. And I miss everything that has gone from my life because you have taken it with you. And I’m tired of platitudes, and people telling me to look after myself or take a break, and still having to fit my grief in between laundry and educating and cooking and parenting. I know it’s normal to grieve, but it makes the true normal so strange. 

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It Has Been Eight Months

Dad - some thoughts written over the eighth month without you

It was David’s funeral today. The cathedral was packed. More than at yours, I think! Another family gathering. Two in less than six months, and both so unbelievably sad. And you weren’t there. It’s so hard doing all this without you. I always struggled at family dos. Didn’t feel like I fitted in. Living down south was part of it. I guess the other bit is my autism, so that makes more sense now. But we’re having to be brave where we didn’t have to be before. I used to just follow you, listen to your conversations, chat with whoever you were chatting with. Now I have to make the approaches and have the conversations by myself. It’s hard and it’s scary but I’m being brave. You’re pushing me to be brave. I’m trying to be. Anyway, it was a good send off. And I hope you both are having a laugh together up there. And I hope David saw how loved he is.

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We went to check out a detectorists exhibition today, in Chester Cathedral. All these amazing finds on display. You’d have loved it, and chatted to them about the saddlebag you found. I remember metal detecting with you. All I ever found was some chicken wire! You had more luck. 

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Why don’t I dream about you?

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Everyone is irritable and irritating one another. Mum and Anna are feeling it too. Why are our bodies reacting this way? What are we expecting? Some sort of seven month itch?

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I’m finding it really hard to write. I don’t want to just say the same things over and over again. How many times can I write that I miss you?

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I look for bees. When I see bees I think you are near. It’s better when they’re where I wouldn’t expect them to be. 

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How is it decided, I wonder, who stays and who goes? Why does a frail old man survive pneumonia after a 3 week stay in hospital, while a strong, usually healthy, not so old man gets sent home to a virtual ward and dies in his lounge? Why are we supposed to be ok with this? The redemption that comes from suffering? It’s nonsense, surely. Where’s the plan? How can I ask this without it seeming that I wished someone else had died instead?

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I have no grandfathers left. I have no father left. Never had an older brother. Even Chris is younger than me. Are we a matriarchy now?

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I’m really struggling with my birthday coming up. My first without you. I’ve not really looked forward to my birthdays for a while now. That clash between expectations and reality. Last year was the best birthday I’d had in a long time. We went to Sheffield, remember? To see Threads through the Cross at the Cathedral. Mum was officially retired, so it felt hopeful. The exhibition was amazing. We had the Two Mates Solution at Baity, which made us all happy, then found that ice cream parlour where you finished your own ice cream, and mine, then had a nap. We had such a brilliant day. I’m very thankful that the last birthday I spent with you was a good one. That’s a good memory. I saved my birthday card and you wrote “Dad” on it. But now I have birthdays ahead of me and you won’t be there. You, who witnessed my arrival. 

Dancing at a wedding and remembering all the times I danced with you at weddings and parties. You love to dance. Remember once, we were leaving a wedding, in the car, and Hips Don’t Lie came on. You jumped out of the car and raced back to the dance floor. I wish I could dance with you again. 

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You shouldn’t have died. The hospital report says they mistook you for another patient. How?! How could anyone mistake you for anyone else? There is nobody like you. No one. 

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I am so fucking angry. 

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With the state of this planet, Dad, I think you were lucky to go when you did. “Leaving early to avoid the rush.”

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I’m trying to get excited about our holiday, but it’s hard to be excited when I know you won’t be there. I don’t think anyone else is excited either. Maybe this is just one of those things, one of those ‘firsts’ that we have to get through. And perhaps next year it will be easier? Less hard? More manageable?

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My God! I miss your face.

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Another month has passed. I still miss you. It’s not getting easier. It’s getting worse. I’m crying more. Does grief reach a pinnacle? Does it plateau? Do we get to a point where it’s the hardest it can be and then it gets easier? I’m so exhausted. The body really does remember before our brains do. Every month, as it comes round to the 21st, I find my body reacting before I realise the date. The further we get from your departure date, the more I miss you, but the less other people remember that we’re still sad. 

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