Grief , it creeps in when unexpected, in the most unusual ways, one minute you could be fine going about your everyday tasks, and then the next you could be in an internal battle of desperately trying to hold it all together. Sometimes the very thought of the loss of a loved one could bring you to tears or at other times it could bring about a numbness you just can't explain.
Introduction
It is with great sadness that I lost of my grandad two weeks ago on Tuesday 15th January 2019 and in the early hours of the morning, after a long battle with Dementia. He was 77 years old when he passed away, to me he had so much life left in him, being towards of his 70's was still young. For before his illness he was always a bubbly character who managed to make everyone laugh around him. He was always very active, out and about when he was able. He was also a curious soul, one that asked questions about everything and anything. He wanted to explore, to go on adventures, to experience the old and the new, to spend time with loved ones, even those far away from him.
My grandad really was a warm hearted person, and loosing him to such a horrible disease has been a very painful experience. For I never imagined the day I would sit here and no longer have my grandad around. It never crossed my mind that it would happened so 'quickly'....but what felt like quickly really was quite slow and over a period of 10 years - first starting with Dementia then later Alzheimer's, in which my grandad deteriorated and our time together became no time together.
I always thought I would see him again before he passed away, that I would get another chance to feel the warmth of his hands and hear the sound of his voice. BUT sadly that was not possible, I saw him last around 5 years ago face to face when he visited my house, and since that last day, a lot had happened in both our lives that made it so we never got the chance to see each other again in the way we once did. He used to always love to come to visit me here in London, he loved it here, for it was once his home for many years, and he had built memories here as well as his hometown in Carlisle. I never put much thought into why he always chose London to see us, I just was happy he had remembered me and my family and that he wanted to spend some time.
Thinking about loosing my grandad, I never realised the extent of the grief I was going to feel until it crept up on me two weeks when he was very ill in hospital, in what was the final stage of his Alzheimer's . When I heard the news he was in hospital, my mother and brother went straight up to Carlisle to be by his bedside with my aunts, my grandad's wife and my family in Carlisle. BUT I knew that I wasn't able to go up there and my heart broke.
I remember the day they went, all I could feel was a deep sadness. For days I cried and kept my phone on me, worried that I would missed my mums phone call on an update. it honestly was one of the hardest times I have ever experienced as an adult. Mainly because I had a child to take care and I was rushing around with the school runs etc putting on a brave face. Inside I felt extremely powerless, all I wanted to do is jump on a train to be with him...and how I longed to see him again.
Every day I thought - "I love you grandad" while tears flowed down my face and as I went about my daily tasks, trying to picture him how I remembered him last. Everyday I found it incredibly difficult. BUT little did I know that the next couple of weeks would be even harder...for me and for my family.
One evening, a couple of days before he died, I received a text from my mum saying that my aunt was by my grandad's side and that if I rung her then I would be able to speak to my grandad on the phone. This was by far the most hardest thing I had ever had to do. To say goodbye to my grandad, who once used to have many phone calls with me on the phone when I was growing up, and those phone calls meant the world to me. But sadly this phone call I was about to have was not going to be like those in the past, for I knew he wouldn't be able to reply to me. In this moment, I panicked at what to say to him, in such a short space of time I had to prepare what I really wanted to tell him. At the time my mum texted me I was about to make my dinner, and was wiping down the tops in the kitchen. I had to quickly drop everything and run as fast as I could up my stairs to make the most important call I've ever had to make.
I sat on my bed, and held my phone in my hands - I took a deep breath, for it was now or never. I was so nervous, because I hadn't spoke to my grandad since he could speak. As the dementia got worse he had lost his ability to, but week after week before things got worse, my mum did receive phone calls from his wife and she would put my grandad on the phone but sadly at the later stages of his illness he couldn't say more than a word or a noise at times. So I never got to have a conversation with him as the calls had to be quick...it always broke my heart. The most I said was hello over the phone.
Yet here I was in the present day about to make the final call to my grandad, on my own, and in my house, and I knew I had to brave. So I called my aunt, and she placed the phone to his ear, I could hear him breathing. and I said "Hello grandad, it's Jessica here, I love you soo much..." and then SUDDENLY without warning he stopped breathing for that second I said I loved him so much. My reaction to this was that I froze - for it was almost as though he had heard me saying these words to him. It made me so overwhelmed with emotion, and my voice began to shake as he continued to breath and as I continued to speak to him. I began to cry after a few minutes of saying my last words to him. And then it was time to end the call and say goodbye.
And It was so so hard, I sat on my bed and called my mum, and that was when the tears came flooding in as it dawned on me that I had just said my last real goodbye to my dear grandad. But in my heart as I sat there, I started to feel this relief, that although it was so heartbreaking, at least I had got to speak to him one last time while he was still with us.
Making the journey to Carlisle: My First Visit Ever
It was 5:20 am when I got the dreaded call, I was woken up by the sound of my phone ringing loudly on my desk. I jumped up half asleep and grabbed my phone. I saw "MUM" on the screen. And I just knew. I answered the call and my mum was sobbing away and the words came "Grandad is dead" - I was in so much shock that I just couldn't cry. All I did was lay there in my bed, hearing my mum sobbing away. I even accidentally cut the call when I tried to get up from my pillow being so early in the morning and half asleep. After I rung my mum back. I walked downstairs and stood in the doorway of my living room and looked at my sofa where my grandad once sat, that tears began to feel my eyes. Placing my head on the door frame in the dark room with light from the hallway slightly shinning in and I cried.
I spent the next few days worrying whether I would be able to go up to Carlisle to attend my grandad's funeral as money was not all that great and I had to make arrangements for my cat Sam to be looked after. Luckily I saved enough to get me a hotel with my mum, brother, sister, aunt and cousin. I also contacted my neighbour who was kind enough to look after Sam while I was gone. Even my daughter's school was very sympathetic to me and allowed my daughter a whole week off of authorised absence.
Preparing for the FINAL goodbye...
Nothing could have prepared me for this final journey of my goodbye to my grandad. On the way up to Carlisle I was surprisingly calm, I didn't put much thought into what was going to happen next. I was just relieved I was making my way up there with not much notice and with no problems sorting my stuff out here in London. The car journey was a 10 hour journey with some hiccups along the way with getting lost not long into our journey on the motorway. It was quite a funny experience despite the nature of this trip, we actually ended up accidentally making our way back to London as my brother took the wrong turn!
But we finally made it up to Carlisle at 7 pm and checked into our very cheap hotel on the hilltop above the city. The hotel itself was like stepping back in time to the 1940's and was quite strange with the hallways looking very much like bingo centres. But for the cheap cost one couldn't complain. Although the showers were luke warm and the bath looked like something out of Ramsay's nightmare hotel but luckily my mother's room was in good condition so I often found myself using their shower.
When I emptied out my suitcase after we had briefly settled in, I had this overwhelming feeling because I had finally made it to Carlisle but that my grandad wasn't alive to see it...he wasn't here to welcome me to his home town. And I felt my heart sink.
My mum rung the funeral home and arranged to see my grandad at 8 pm which didn't give us much time to prepare...in fact the whole 2 weeks that had past left very little time...but I guess in these circumstances...you can never really be prepared. For it isn't everyday you loose someone close to you.
I remember that night, rushing out of the hotel with my mum, brother and daughter to our car make our way to the funeral home, I didn't know how to feel, what to think, I just knew we had to get there and I wanted to see grandad. BUT sadly it was never going to be the same as those years before as I was about to find out...
We stepped into the waiting room with leather sofas and stairs going up to a corridor, then a man suddenly walked down the steps and greeted us. I suddenly felt so nervous, my heart was pounding. Then we all went towards the room where my grandad was.... and there in front of us, with the door open was my grandad. I really cannot describe the heartbreak I felt, the loss, the sheer utter shock to finally see him in person after soo very long. I stood there and I just cried. We all cried, it was a shared loss and that is what helped us all through this difficult time.
When we got back to the hotel, I couldn't sleep properly - my grandad wasn't the first family member I have lost but it didn't make it any easier to process. Most of the night I sat in the hotel bed and listened to videos on Youtube.
The morning after we arrived, my mum, brother, and daughter all went into town to see all the sites and to visit the shops while we wait for my sister to arrive in the afternoon. It felt so surreal to walk around the town and to not have my grandad by my side, telling me all about his town he grew up in and all the shops he liked to go in. That was always one thing my grandad loved to do, he just loved showing people all the things he loved. I know this as he had always done this in London in the areas he used to go and the places he spent the most time in. Shops were a huge part of our time together especially cafe's where we would have a meal together.
BUT here I was, in Carlisle and it was so heartbreaking that he wasn't there with us, I was there finally, but instead I walked in the town with my mum, brother and daughter trying to picture my grandad in the town. I kept asking my mum and brother where my grandad like to go with them and about what bus he liked to take. We went a few shops he once went and all the time I felt like crying as it was very emotional for me. And I guess that's what grief is...it is like the quote says at the top of this blog, that it is love that has no place to go, all the love that you cannot give... and so no matter how much my mum told me, or how many places we visited that he did, it didn't take away the pain that he was not there and that all I wanted to ask him, remained unanswered. For I couldn't go back in time and change what was, and I struggled with knowing I didn't have as much time with grandad as I would have liked to in my adult life.
When we collected my sister from the station I felt so happy to see her there, with us all, she was only able to come for one night but it made this whole experience a lot easier to deal with knowing we were all in Carlisle together. On our way back through the town, we all shared memories of grandad which helped with the loss, I guess memories are the things that comfort us, that make us feel warm inside, and that is what we did. We remembered our grandad, and it was nice
We also found some comfort visiting Carlisle cathedral and in lighting a candle and leaving a prayer in a box ready for the day after which was the big day: the Funeral.
The Funeral
I woke up at around 6 am in the morning, and a great sadness hung over us all, I sat on the chair facing the mirror, listening to the track by The Fray called "Be Still" - and I cried, today was the day we would all as a family say our FINAL goodbye to my grandad who meant so much to all of us.
The weather was foggy and icy outside, all the grass was frosted and you could hardly see in the distance. It was like something out of a movie. It made the loss more painful, for the weather was no comfort, it was freezing cold and quiet out. When we arrived at my grandad's wife's home where he once lived, we met family we hadn't seen in years, some who we had never met but spoken to online. It was amazing to know that grandad was loved by soo many, and how much he had touched everyone's heart while he was alive.
I remember hearing, "The cars are here now" and then suddenly my heart dropped again, I looked out the front door and my grandad was there, he was finally home and was there, waiting for us all, and the very thought was so so sad, he was there and I was too but not the way I wanted it to be. We all stood outside the house and stared at the hearse in disbelief as we all tried not to cry.
Everyone got in their cars and drove to the cemetery to say our final goodbye's and it was such a heartbreaking experience...and one I will never forget. But what matters is that I was there and that my family were all there - to send grandad off with so much love and warmth, and even in my family's sadness we celebrated his life through laughter and tears.
And I guess that is what helps with grief - To remember the life of the person you love and then lost, it is to share stories about the time you spent with them, to remember how they once made you feel, and to be thankful you had special moments with them how ever big or small, they still left a lovely warm presence of themselves in your heart and mind.
Love you grandad, always, and forever, may you rest in peace always xx