Dealing with grief – it’s four years since my dad passed away
Just now on Facebook a ‘memory’ popped up from four years ago when I thanked my clients for their understanding after I was called away to my Dad’s bedside in hospital in Cardiff. Not that I actually needed Facebook to remind me. When someone you love has been struggling with an illness like cancer for a long time, it’s still the phone call you dread, that call that says you’d better come right now.
And even as I write about that time, I can still feel myself getting emotional right now, four years later. Not in the same raw way that it did in the months after he died when I couldn’t even mention his name, but in that way we get for those we have loved and who have been an important part of our lives yet are no longer with us. Sure, it has elements of sadness and loss within that emotion, but is also has joy and love and hope because I always aim to continue to be the best son I can be to my Dad through how I support and nurture my children.
Of course I can’t change the past, I can’t turn back the clock and see him again and in many ways we all have to learn to accept that, when we lose a loved one, no amount of tears or sadness or longing can change the facts.
However, one thing I did in those long hospital days (my Dad had a strong heart and defied the opinion of the doctors by holding out for another week…we like to think because he wanted to hear the fireworks one last time!): I made the decision to deliberately recall many, many of the happy times that we experienced together. And there were many. We had long, funny conversations, we went for walks along the cliffs on holidays, we watched Wales play rugby in Cardiff and much more.
