On the 14th of October my wonderful Dad passed away peacefully at his home with me there holding his hand. It is not something that I can put into words, how I felt in that moment - apart from it being a strange mixture of extreme sadness mixed with relief that his suffering was over.
Things moved on pretty quickly after that. Thankfully, the District Nurse had not long been in for her evening visit so she took over organising the GP to come to confirm the death and get all the paperwork I needed to register things so I could start to organise the funeral.
I had to keep myself very focused to be able to get things done. It may sound hard and heartless but I could not allow myself to get upset or else I wouldn't have been able to get myself or my kids through the couple of weeks that followed. I had to be able to keep going to be able to pack up and empty his flat. If it hadn't been for my wonderful, supportive Hubby, I wouldn't have been able to cope at all.
Three and a half weeks later, I am still finding things difficult. But, having three kids and a job mean that I have to just carry on and get back to 'normal life', whatever that is. There are still boxes of my Dads stuff sitting in the Living Room and kitchen. Boxes of photos sitting on the stairs, Bags of bedding sitting in the bedroom. But I just don't have the mental energy to start unpacking the things that I had to pack up just a couple of weeks ago and had not long before had to pack and unpack again after his move here.
Post is still coming in for him, and bills are getting paid. He squirrelled away some money to be able to pay for his funeral and his final bills. He had made sure I knew that money was there so that he left no financial burdens for me. That I thank him for. He looked after me for all my life and he made sure he left me no extra worries as to paying for things after he died.
