During the time between Martins death and funeral, I was on
autopilot and felt quite numb most of the time.
I had visits from friends and acquaintances, dropping off gifts, cards,
flowers, offers of help, taking me out for a coffee, everyone was lovely. I had food dropped off, chocolate and
biscuits for the kids. The support for
us was amazing and we were (still are) so incredibly grateful. After the funeral, one of the most helpful
things received, was from my work colleagues, they had put together not only a
very generous collection of money, but a huge hamper of food, which was amazing,
we were coming up to Christmas preparations and I hadn’t organised a thing, the
hamper included some basics including tea/coffee, tinned food, crackers, crisps,
biscuits, plus more which meant that I didn’t have to go out for those things,
chocolate selection boxes had the kids eyes popping out of their heads, bottles
of gin (always welcome) and bath/pamper products. Another group of friends sent us a cinema voucher which was fab, we used this to go and watch 'The Rise of Skywalker', the last Star Wars film, devastated that Martin wasn't there to watch as he was a massive Star Wars fan, but there was an empty seat next to me at the cinema and I like to think he was there with us afterall.
We also received another food hamper nearer to Christmas, I
have no idea who this was from, it was delivered, and as I answered the door, I
was pre occupied trying the keep the dog in and I assumed it was an Amazon
parcel I was expecting. I realised after
bringing it in, it was hand delivered from someone local and I have no idea
where/who from. But again, we were so
grateful it all helped a lot.
Around the time between the funeral and Christmas, I bought
pictures to make it feel like Martin was around us all the time. I had the living room redecorated as we had
planned on doing this anyway and I needed to keep busy, I chose wallpaper close to what we were looking
for just before the Stroke happened. I
had it all done before Christmas, and bought a painting which was personalised with silhouettes of a family under a tree in Autumn which represents us and what was our last
season together, and we used his hand print that was done while he was in ICU
to make a heart with mine and the kids handprints all together. I used a lock of his hair and put it into a
heart locket on a necklace, which is meant to contain ashes but as he wasn’t cremated, a
lock of his hair could stay with me, along with his wedding ring on the same
chain. I placed a lock of his hair for
each of the kids in a miniature glass jar with a poem and presentation box for
them to keep, and we each have a heart pin from the transplant team which was
sent to us after his organ donation. We
had heard just before the funeral that Martin’s Kidneys had successfully been
donated to 2 ladies in their early 40’s and had been on the transplant list for
over 2 years. I have since received a
letter from one of the recipients letting me know how it has made a huge
difference to her life, which is very bittersweet.
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| Family silhouette under a tree in Autumn |
I had to make Christmas special for the kids, a family
occasion was going to be so sad without Martin and had to make up for it
somehow to them, and how on earth was I going to make Christmas dinner on my
own? I can’t do roast potatoes like Martin
did; roasts were his thing probably because I don’t eat meat. I had
an invitation to have Christmas dinner at my sisters, which I refused but
agreed to go on Boxing Day. Nearer to Christmas
Day I agreed to have dinner at my parents, as I was becoming a bit overwhelmed as
the day was approaching.
The thing I have found with grief that has surprised me, is
that one day you can be walking around feeling like there is a huge black cloud
hanging over you, you can feel a mix of guilt, anger and sadness. The next day you can be fine all day and be folding
towels and suddenly feel like you’ve been kicked in the stomach and struggle to
breathe. You can also be getting through
a day perfectly fine and suddenly realise you have tears streaming down your
face for no apparent reason, obviously there is a reason but you don’t remember
specifically thinking of it, as if that makes any sense. Then there are the flashbacks, vivid images
of events that you couldn’t stop but wish you could have which are so
upsetting. My worst days were Sundays because
this was the morning we found Martin having had the stroke, and Mondays because
it’s the day he died. I counted the
weeks at first, before it turned to months, I still hate Sundays and Mondays,
but now it is a monthly anniversary of dread on the 6th and the 14th
of every month.
I have found the build up to some occasions worse than the
actual day, I was dreading Christmas day, but the day was a good day, the kids
were pleased with everything they received and we got out of the house for dinner. Boxing day went well at my sister’s, the only
upset was during dinner because there were Christmas songs playing in the
background one minute and out of nowhere ‘Purple Rain’ came on, as though to tell us that Martin was with us.
The kids had coped amazingly well. Jamie tried to go back to university after
the funeral, but he was experiencing some flashbacks
and not sleeping which was not helpful while trying to catch up on work that he
missed. Being away from home I think he
felt quite isolated dealing with his grief but he thought it would upset me if
he didn’t try to stick things out, but we agreed it would be best for him to
come home and postpone his course as he didn’t want to leave permanently. We sorted the paperwork and paid up his
accommodation fees and he came home just before Christmas. Taran went through a phase of appearing ok,
emotionally he was doing fine, but his little body was struggling, he became
ill, couldn’t eat and wouldn’t sleep in his own bed. He slept in my bed with me for a several
weeks. We had to get back into a routine
after the Christmas holiday though, with me going back to work and him back to
school. I put a shelf in his bedroom
with his new Star Wars and Marvel pop head figures and a framed superhero handprint
picture using his dad’s print with his, I also bought a photo fleece blanket
for him to sleep with, with his favourite pictures of his dad. It all seemed to help, he managed eventually to
sleep in his own room and gradually became physically well again, although his
appetite has never been the same since.
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| Photo Blanket |
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| Family Handprints |
My middle 2, have coped differently, I don’t think it would be fair to them to write openly about that though Kiera threw herself back into schoolwork to keep busy. But that’s the thing you see, everybody grieves differently. The difficult thing for me is trying to help them with their individual grief and manage my own. But, to try and create some positive chaos and distraction in the household, straight after Christmas I collected an 8 week old Cockapoo puppy, much to the annoyance of our almost 13 year old Jack Russell. 😂
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