Closing Pandora's Box

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
When death comes and takes all the bright coins to buy me,
and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes like measle-pox;
when death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,
I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?
And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,
and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,
and each name a comfortable music in the mouth
tending as all music does, toward silence,
and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.
When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.
When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.

“When Death Comes” – Mary Oliver

*****

Then…

There were times when I screamed out to God. It’s ironic isn’t it? When we are happy and have no need whatsoever of calling Him, some of us are inclined to think of His presence as an intrusion. Go to Him then and He would take you in with open arms and make you feel welcome. But going to Him when all help was lost and you’d be faced with a closed door and silence. Such loud and echoing silence, that could drive you mad. All you would hear was your own voice, full of desperation and need being thrown back to you. Was He ever there?

Then something happens, or I hear something, or see a picture, or visit a place and memories flood back like a gushing river. Every single particle of ‘rationality’, ‘logic’ and ‘common sense’ is swept away by tears of grief. Clean and honest tears. Bathing myself in self pity is something I find so disgusting. It makes me cringe to think to think the bubbly Charley I remember, whose happiness was contagious and who was always overflowing with life has now become someone who brings nothing but sorrow. If she were to see me now, what would she think? And that brings me onto my next point.

Promises made with the dead while they held our hand, walked beside us and shared the same air to breathe as us are all well and good. There are many promises I will never forget, promises that I will keep with me forever and  will try my best to fulfil. But there are times when this so called ‘respect for the feelings of the dead’ brings me doubt. Sometimes when people say “is that what Charley would have wanted?” or “Charley wouldn’t have liked you doing such and such,” I wonder whether it is really just them using her name to say a piece of their mind, to vent their frustration at my never-ending sadness, or to have their way. I know it’s wrong of me. Their intentions are pure, they don’t mean it that way. But that momentary flash of desperation, of exhaustion and annoyance in their eyes makes me wonder. I hope I never am guilty of saying it that way to anyone.

At the beginning I used to be so afraid of going all those places Charley and I used to go, the walk through the parks or taking in the view of London from the top of Shirley Hills. But over the last year, I’ve visited the park many times in the depths of the night, and despite a few early incidents it wasn’t as bad as I had expected. Her absence wasn’t any more intense there as it was in other places; it’s not confined to a particular place. Her absence is like the distribution of air, it’s spread everywhere. It’s like that, I feel it while I’m sitting alone on the bus or I feel it when I’m feeling sad and in need of someone to talk to for example. But even that isn’t entirely true. There is one place where I feel it the most. Me. I miss her hugs.

*****

Now…

Tomorrow will be exactly one year since she passed away. ******* Cancer. I was speaking to a friend recently and they said to me, ‘How do you think Charley would feel knowing she was the reason behind your grief? Do you think she would want you to suffer endlessly because of her death?’

That made me think. Yes, I still do miss her, yes I still feel the emptiness from time to time, but it’s time I let it go. It’s time I came out of the shell I have been hiding in, wallowing in my sorrow, and felt the warmth of the sun on my skin, felt the refreshing rain and tried to truly enjoy happiness and all the other wonders of this life. On new year’s I was recovering from a very long day, getting rid of all that exhaustion that I completely forgot about Charley. When I finally realised, finally remembered, it was much more than a fading memory. It would not be right for me to call it a meeting (that’d get me locked up), but it was as if the armour of sorrow which had confined me for so long was removed. So much easier to breathe, so much easier to move. There were no tears, and that I think that is why I could see properly. My eyes still need time to adjust but it’s a beginning.

Have you ever said, ‘tonight I must get a good sleep because I have a long day tomorrow,’ and found you sleep very little? Have you ever said ‘let’s talk. Now’s the time’ and noted how silence ensues? Maybe if you desire something too desperately, you may not be able to get the best of it. Is that the same with the death of a loved one? Wanting so much to keep their memory alive, to remember each and every detail you find yourself looking into a dark and dingy hole which drags you in. A bit like a black hole. In the same way, I’m led to believe God was there all along. It was my own frantic screaming which stopped me from hearing that voice of help I had relied my last hope on. God gives to only those who have the ability and the willingness to accept. I was not ready to accept, I was not ready to listen and it was my mistake.

A few days before she passed away, Charley asked me find and print out the poem shown above. Another patient who was reaching the end of his life had told her about it and said they’d discuss it together when she had read it. They never got the chance, he passed away that night. When Charley finished reading the poem, with tears rolling down her beautiful face she said, ‘It doesn’t sound so bad having read that. Are you afraid? I wont leave till you say goodbye’. But I never got a chance to say goodbye. I was reminded of the poem while at the weekly hospice training, and it brought back sore memories. Am I ready to say goodbye yet? I don’t know. =/.

Reach – S Club 7.

We used to sing this song at school back in year 6. It was our song. It is now the first song on my playlist and I thought I’d share it with you.

I read this quote a few days ago, and it really hit home and really made me think:

If you focus to much on those you have lost, you’ll end up pushing away those that are left. – Unknown²

_________________________________

Title: Iridescent – Linkin Park.
Picture 1: I have had this picture on my computer for a very long time, and so no longer have the link to it.
Picture 2: Same with this picture.
²Quote from http://www.boardofwisdom.com/

“You matter because you are you & you matter to the last moment of your life.” – Dame Cicely Saunders.

When the NHS was founded on July 5^th 1948, it was a big step into the unknown. The government wanted to provide healthcare to each and every individual and would be responsible for funding. Not everyone was optimistic. The Editor of the British Medical Journal at the time agreed with the logic of spreading the cost of the treatment of illness over the whole community but feared many dangers in a state run medical service; dogma, timidity, lack of incentive, administrative hypertrophy, stereotyped procedure and lack of intellectual freedom. At that time, Aneurin Bevin, a key figure in the formation of the NHS, wrote to all the medical professionals and consoled them saying any problems would be dealt with. You can read his message here.

Death is something which the NHS wasn’t ready to deal with in it’s infancy. It’s main aim was to cure and or manage illness. It was at that time that Dame Cicely Saunders founded St Christopher’s Hospice in 1967 aiming to promote and provide skilled and compassionate palliative care of the highest quality. Every Thursday evening, I go to St Christopher’s, training to be a volunteer. It’s been 3 weeks now and already I have learnt a lot. I thought I’d share some of those things with you.

*****

Hope and it’s relationship with honesty.

Hope is one of the few things in life that can keep us living when there is nothing else left. It is the light that is nearly always on even when every other light may have turned off. Hope can make the dead walk, it can transform the weak into warriors and can give a broken man a reason to believe in tomorrow. However hope given falsely can cause irreversible damage. “People shouldn’t give false hope when there’s none around,” said one of the other volunteers. Hope is extremely potent, a small amount, the size of a grain of sand can shine up a person’s life. But it is highly important that when we share hope with someone bereft of it, we do so honestly. There’s no point telling a person who has just lost their legs in an accident to keep the hope of walking again. Such hope, based on falsehood and nothing, is more likely to have extremely detrimental effects than do anyone any good.

Pull yourself together, and just get over it…

When passing through an illness or the grieving period after the death of a loved one, there are some people who due to a lack of experience and understanding may tell you to pull yourself together, to strengthen up and to get over it. Truth of the matter is, every day you spend bedbound or every night you spend crying the tears of sorrow, you’re telling yourself exactly that. You don’t need others doing the same. After all, sorrow and a person’s way of dealing with it is personal, as is the time it takes for them to come to terms with their loss. The journey of acceptance after a traumatic event is like a daunting climb up a mountain; full of hardships and extremely tiring. If any one needs to make that journey of acceptance quickly, it is those people who tell you to hurry up. They need to accept the fact that you need your time and them constantly pushing, directly or indirectly, will probably make it a lot harder for you.

You talk, I’ll listen.

I’ve always been a strong believer in the power of talking about one problems and having someone who will listen. In one of the training sessions, our supervisor told us to find a partner and tell them something we had really wanted to do or achieve but were unable to do so because of whatever problem. It was the listener’s job to speak as little as they could but give their full attention to the speaker. Each person got approximately five minutes to talk. In a room surrounded by people, the majority of whom, like me, had lost a loved one made me feel comfortable. Most of us had felt the pain that follows after the death of someone dear and could see it in each other’s eyes. When I began talking to a complete stranger, the words flowed by their own accord. Normally for those of you who know me personally will know that I rarely talk about such things. But at that moment in time, the feeling of unity shared as a result of loss, helped me formulate words and sentences I had never spoken before. The other person, just nodded in understanding and that was enough. The calmness and the relief it brings is something which further strengthened my belief in talking and listening. Sometimes we don’t need happy pills or pills that will stop us from dying, but instead having someone who will listen properly and at least try to understand is one of the greatest things we can ever wish for.

I like writing. It's my pressure valve which I can use to relieve the excessive build-up of emotions and feelings that sometimes threaten to blow me up. It's a way I can put down onto paper things that are eating me up on the inside so that I can face them and deal with them.
There is one such piece of writing, which when I showed to a few friends of mine they suggested I should share it with others for reasons you'll find out when you read it for yourself. I started writing this back in February, a few days after my birthday and it's only just recently that I have completed it. Many of you have been waiting to read this 'story' for a long time and at first I had decided to put it into one pdf file which could be easily downloaded. But seeing as how time consuming that is, I shall now upload each part as I finish typing it. This is where it begins...