God it never rains but it bloody effing pours.
Less than one month after my darling dog dies the woman who brought me up dies too. Yes, my beloved granny, the woman who saved my life on so many occasions I can’t even count them all passed away 13th March 2008.
I think I got to her just a second before she passed away, I think she heard me say I was there, touch her arm and then she went. It’s still to raw for me to talk about it in detail, I have many issues with my sweet granny’s passing and although my philosophy is that when your time is up, it’s up, I still can’t shake the theory that she could have lived longer had certain circumstances (that I can’t mention here) been different.
I’ve been haring about trying to get involved in Granny’s funerals, I say funerals plural because there will be one in Surrey next week and one in the Caribbean the week after where she will be laid to rest in a family plot in Barbados, alongside my granddad, the husband granny adored her whole life.
I’m not looking forward to the trip, yes it’ll be 2 weeks in the sunny Caribbean but I usually went there with granny, plus I will be leaving her behind and to be honest the place seems empty now granny’s gone. How can I enjoy my time there when I’m there to lay the most important woman in my life to rest? My whole life has the most massive, enormous gap now that Bert’s gone, there was an almighty huge crater when my dad went 14 years ago and now a totally immeasurable chasm now that granny has left my life.
I can’t believe the two people who kept me sane for either all or most of my life have gone so close to one another, how shit must I have been in a past life to get that break in this life? I must have tortured and killed kittens or something. I dunno maybe just one kitten then cos I still have my two boys here. Lincoln and Simon have been a godsend, without them I think I would have quite simply have gone mad, no joke.
Sorting out the funeral has meant that I’ve been burying my head and holding off proper mourning, the last two days of peace and quiet due to the Easter holiday has been calm enough for my feelings to creep back in and depression is knocking on the door. I think the health visitor is slightly concerned because I was showing signs of post natal depression before everyone starting popping off to heaven around me so I guess when I’m back from Barbados I’ll have to keep an eye on myself, when the funerals are all over is when the silence will get me. I’ll be on my guard, as will my health visitor I’m sure.
In other news (in an attempt to post something other than death) Lincoln is being weaned now, he was screaming the house down for about a week till we realised that he wasn’t going to wait for the World Health Organisation’s recommendation of six months exclusive milk consumption before trying some food so he’s wolfing down a jar of baby rice, baby porridge or banana yogurt a day, along with regular hungry baby milk, and he’s been unbelievably contented since. He’s now sleeping right through for 12 hours solid and being the smiliest baby I’ve ever seen in the day time. His weight is perfect and he’s thriving so he’s doing well. The only small blip is thanks to teething he discovered a certain type of screaming two days ago, it was awful and he made the noise even when he’d had his Calpol and was ok (he had no tears and was easily distracted which meant he wasn’t really upset just having ‘fun’ with the screaming noise) we tried to stop him doing it but to no avail, and now he’s lost his voice - quelle surprise! So it’s off to the doctors on Tuesday to get his throat checked over, but in the mean time he seems to have given up attempting that particular noise (not that he could make it that well now anyway) so thankfully that’s a relief to us all.
Then after the docs I’m off to see granny at the funeral director. I chose her outfit which should be on her by now, and all I have left to do is her make up and hair. It’ll be a closed casket but I want her to look nice, if you know what I mean.
Simon and I designed her coffin, it’s lilac with purple flowers all along it (granny’s favourite colours) and I helped choose the flowers for the funeral, plus the hymns, readings etc. Granny was a catholic and I’m agnostic but in respect of granny’s religion I’ve tried to do the best for her with the utmost respect.
I’m still quite numb to the situation to be honest; I’m typing this all out in a bit of a daze. I have moments when the armour breaks down and then I’m pretty hysterical, crying and shouting for a few minutes, but then soon it builds back up and I’m seemingly normal but totally numb again. I must sound like a basket case, it’s just hard to explain it all really, I’m just trying to cope for Lincoln cos he needs his mummy.
I’m quite scared to feel emotions at the mo, to lose granny and Bert is too much. If I feel the pain right now it might be so great that I reckon I could almost die from it myself, if that makes any sense. I need to live for Simon and Lincoln, so for now I’ll live with the internal struggle, keep the armour up till I feel I can deal with it all.
It took me a year and a half to deal with my dad’s death; I have no idea how long this one will take.
Time will tell.
M. M. B. 1922 - 2008 R.I.P
