raising willow… and dexter!

Tomorrow it will be 6 years since she died. Every year I am amazed that it has been so long.

I want to write about it with the depth that Melissa has, but I have done a pretty good job of blocking the memories out. It just occured to me that 6 years ago the 5th was a Monday too. My ex and I had been out all day, then I came home and went online (we had dial-up then) I left it connected, went to bed, had sex and fell asleep. We were woken by the police knocking on the door. No-one could get in touch with us all day so Dad thought that he would call the police and get them to come around and tell me.

Two female police officers came in to tell me the news. I refused to believe them at first, Mum was only 43. They didn’t know what the cause was, so of course they were wrong, she couldn’t be dead. I connected the phone and rang Dad. Sadly they were right, Poppa had found her at about 10am when she hadn’t turned up to a clearing sale she said she’d go to.

They had no idea what the cause was at this stage, but we later found that it was a sub arachnoid haemorrhage/aneurysm. When Dad confirmed that she had died, I fell into a sobbing heap. I felt sorry for the police women, what a terrible job to deliver such sad news. My ex and I made arrangements to go down to my hometown then went back to bed where I cried myself to sleep.

Death is such a funny thing. My ex was French, so it was a cultural norm for him to talk about Mum and her death a lot. This was offensive to my Dad and particularly my grandparents who are terribly English. For the most part I coped (and still do) by using denial. Elisabeth Kubler Ross talked about the 5 stages of grief, denial being one of them. I feel that denial is more of a coping mechanism for me, but after 6 years, I guess that it’s probably fair to say that it’s run it’s course for the most part.

My best friend was living in Melbourne at the time and when I rang and told her on Monday morning, she was on the first flight over to the rural airport an hour’s drive away. I’ll never be able to repay her for that.

Dad was completely devastated. They’d finally split up in December with Mum moving into a house that they had been renovating together, but from all accounts their relationship had never been better. In the time after her death I thought that he was either going to follow her soon or stick around for ages to annoy me. Sadly, he died 4 months and 3 days later, from a massive heart attack. The romantic in me thinks he died of a broken heart.

As devastated as Dad was, I think it affected my grandparents more. You are not supposed to bury your child. It’s just not something you should have to do. It aged them instantly, especially Poppa.

I have so many regrets.  So many.  In a bizzare way I wish I’d had the chance to take care of her in the way that Melissa did, but I’m so glad she didn’t suffer.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 4th, 2008 at 10:31 pm and is filed under my mum. You can follow responses to this entry through the Comments RSS Feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your site.