6 years on

[Karola]

A few of my friends have lost parents this year and I tell them that, for me, the first year was the worst, after that, I knew I could get through all the anniversaries because I already had once. That's not to say they are easier, but just that the next day would come. Now, I am 6 years to the day since I sat with my beautiful Mum while she slipped away from us after 13 years of this horrible disease. Of course, this means that I didn't lose her 6 years ago but in a much worse way, painfully slowly over the previous years. I miss her every day but I have got on with living as best I can. But today has hit me like a freight train and all I can envisage is her actual death. It was mercifully peaceful, at home with Dad and I holding her hands but it was still horrible and painful and unfair. I know tomorrow will come but right now, as I sit in my office trying not to cry, it doesn't feel like it.
I found this poem I wrote a few years before she died. I have never written poetry before, nor since, but wanted to share it.

The clock ticks by, I want my Mum.
My birthday, a day of celebration,
My mother no longer there.
Where is that woman, full of life?
She sits and smiles and laughs
Like a cuckoo, she's not my mum.
Where is the fire in her eyes and heart?
Where is the woman whom I loved?
Where is the advice I want now I'm older?
The advice I thought I could do without.
It's all gone, killed off by fire
A fire that has decimated her memories
It is relentless, ever growing in force
The debris is there with slivers of remains
She hugs and kisses and says she loves us
She's not the same.
Where is my Mum?

 

[MTM]

A few of my friends have lost parents this year and I tell them that, for me, the first year was the worst, after that, I knew I could get through all the anniversaries because I already had once. That's not to say they are easier, but just that the next day would come. Now, I am 6 years to the day since I sat with my beautiful Mum while she slipped away from us after 13 years of this horrible disease. Of course, this means that I didn't lose her 6 years ago but in a much worse way, painfully slowly over the previous years. I miss her every day but I have got on with living as best I can. But today has hit me like a freight train and all I can envisage is her actual death. It was mercifully peaceful, at home with Dad and I holding her hands but it was still horrible and painful and unfair. I know tomorrow will come but right now, as I sit in my office trying not to cry, it doesn't feel like it.
I found this poem I wrote a few years before she died. I have never written poetry before, nor since, but wanted to share it.

The clock ticks by, I want my Mum.
My birthday, a day of celebration,
My mother no longer there.
Where is that woman, full of life?
She sits and smiles and laughs
Like a cuckoo, she's not my mum.
Where is the fire in her eyes and heart?
Where is the woman whom I loved?
Where is the advice I want now I'm older?
The advice I thought I could do without.
It's all gone, killed off by fire
A fire that has decimated her memories
It is relentless, ever growing in force
The debris is there with slivers of remains
She hugs and kisses and says she loves us
She's not the same.
Where is my Mum?

Bless you. My Dad died a year ago in May. Mum was holding his hand, my brother and I were on the M25, stuck in traffic. That’s what happens when you die on a bank holiday, Dad. He had Alzheimer’s for 14 years, although it was only diagnosed in 2012 and they only told us in 2017. Now my Mum has dementia, although I’m not sure it’s Alzheimer’s, it’s different to Dad’s but equally grim.

I can’t offer you any help, or advice, but if it helps to know that someone understands that feeling, hello, (waves) and also that someone understands how much it costs to stay close beside someone as they walk the path to insanity. We’d never do it any other way, right? But blimey it’s quite harsh, isn’t it? I did grief counselling with CRUSE which really helped.

So have a virtual hug from me. I sincerely hope it helps. Good luck, and God bless.

xxx MTM

PS This poem really helps me ground myself when everything’s a bit overwhelming. It’s a bit Victorian and la-di-da but I love the basic message, that we all suffer, often in similar ways. That, since time immemorial, there are certain troubles that nearly every human being has faced with us. That, if you take out the gaps in time, we’re not alone, we’re united in our suffering, together, with a whole bunch of other people. And that all will be well ...

Wenlock Edge, by AE Houseman.

On Wenlock Edge the wood’s in trouble;
His forest fleece the Wreakin heaves;
The gale, it plies the saplings double,
And thick on Severn blow the leaves.

’Twould blow like this though holt and hanger
When Uricorn the city stood:
’This the old wind In the old anger,
But then it threshed another wood.

Then, ’twas before my time, the Roman
At younger heaving hill would stare:
The blood that warms and English yeoman,
The thoughts that hurt him, they were there.

There, like the wind through woods in riot,
Through him the gale of life blew high;
The tree of man was never quiet:
Then ’twas the Roman, now, ’tis I.

The gale, it plies the saplings double,
It blows so hard, ’twill soon be gone:
Today, the Roman and his trouble
Are ashes under Uricon.

 

[Karola]

Thank you. I am not good at talking when the grief hits as I feel like I will break completely so I force it inside but I have found this forum in the past, and the truly amazing community who are here, a real comfort. There is something comforting about typing my fears/grief/desperation that gives me that little bit of distance that allows me to say how I am feeling and accept the kind words of others that would destroy me if they were from someone standing in front of me now.