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Mixed emotions
Sep. 24th, 2003 08:57 amMixed emotions this morning.
One of my colleagues lost his mother yesterday - she died of cancer. What seems to have thrown him most isn’t that she’s dead (she was very old) but the speed of it - the cancer was only diagnosed 1 week ago. I’m not saying it to him right now, but I’m sort of glad for all of them that it was so quick - my grandfather died of cancer last summer, 3 weeks from diagnosis to death, and by the end he was begging us to kill him. And we knew 3 months before he died that my Dad was going to die of his lung cancer.
At the same time, today is my son’s 6th birthday. Looking at him this morning I was struck again by how much like my Dad he looks. No one sees it but me - my Mum doesn’t want to see it, she’s moved on and remarried (which I have no problem with), and my husband never knew my Dad (I met him the autumn after Dad died).
So these two things have brought me to thinking about my Dad, and about him dying (I was the one who was with him when he died). It’s made me remember that last afternoon, sitting alone with him, listening to him fighting for each breath. And then the silence, total silence, stretching out until you realise that there isn’t going to be another breath, that he’s gone. So quiet. I will never ever forget that.
My Dad had his faults, but I loved him, and I still miss him. Especially this morning.
One of my colleagues lost his mother yesterday - she died of cancer. What seems to have thrown him most isn’t that she’s dead (she was very old) but the speed of it - the cancer was only diagnosed 1 week ago. I’m not saying it to him right now, but I’m sort of glad for all of them that it was so quick - my grandfather died of cancer last summer, 3 weeks from diagnosis to death, and by the end he was begging us to kill him. And we knew 3 months before he died that my Dad was going to die of his lung cancer.
At the same time, today is my son’s 6th birthday. Looking at him this morning I was struck again by how much like my Dad he looks. No one sees it but me - my Mum doesn’t want to see it, she’s moved on and remarried (which I have no problem with), and my husband never knew my Dad (I met him the autumn after Dad died).
So these two things have brought me to thinking about my Dad, and about him dying (I was the one who was with him when he died). It’s made me remember that last afternoon, sitting alone with him, listening to him fighting for each breath. And then the silence, total silence, stretching out until you realise that there isn’t going to be another breath, that he’s gone. So quiet. I will never ever forget that.
My Dad had his faults, but I loved him, and I still miss him. Especially this morning.
