WORDS Rebecca Jane Hill
One inevitable thing about ageing is that one day, the process will end. That might sound blunt, but it’s a fact that so many of us are conditioned to ignore. In western culture, especially as women, we aren’t taught to celebrate getting older. It’s something to fear, to avoid displaying signs of at all costs, and even be embarrassed by. I remember crying while being surrounded by a group of friends on my 18th birthday – I felt like I had reached my peak, and that surely it would only be downhill from here. After all, what fun is going to a nightclub if it’s actually legal? However, my perspective shifted dramatically when my dad died overnight from an undetected heart condition in 2018. I was 26 years old, he was 57. Living to see another birthday now felt like something to truly appreciate instead of superficially dread. As humans, it’s rare that we understand the value of life until we’ve witnessed it being cruelly ripped away from us. Below are stories from several people who unfortunately also understand this value, through similarly unimaginable experiences. Losing someone you love is probably one of the hardest lessons that life will ever teach you – I hasten to add it’s not a lesson anybody wants to be taught, either. Whilst these stories may be difficult to read, I hope they can help anyone who is struggling with grief feel less alone. You will come out the other side – it’s just that life will look and feel a lot different to how it did before.
Hannah: “In 2022 I experienced a missed miscarriage. This is a term used for when a baby has passed away in the womb, but the mother hasn’t had any symptoms, such as pain or bleeding. In my case, they had passed away sometime between the 6 and 12 week scans. At the 12 week scan appointment, as soon as it began, the midwife told me and my husband she couldn’t see anything that resembled a 12 week old foetus. We were totally blindsided. I didn’t even know this kind of miscarriage existed. In the immediate aftermath, we took lots of very long walks, talking through the pain of our snatched-away dream. At the start, I felt angry – why us? But soon the realisation became – why not us? After all, 1 in 8 pregnancies end in miscarriage according to the NHS. I was fortunate, in a sad sort of way, to find that I did have a couple of friends who had experienced miscarriage too. They were an incredibly important source of support to me. My feelings of intense grief subsided after a few days, and I was left with anger, flatness and a bleeding so heavy I was confined to our home for several weeks. This ultimately led to me having surgery to remove the baby. This all happened around the time Roe vs Wade was overturned in the US, and my anger intensified at the thought of women in certain states enduring my exact circumstances, who would now be denied access to the same healthcare I was receiving. Miscarriage must be spoken about more. I think the reason it isn’t is because it happens to women, and we as a society can’t or won’t make much space for women’s pain. Who does the ‘Don’t tell anyone until you’re 12 weeks pregnant’ rule benefit, really? But the reality is, miscarriage hurts and affects everyone. I’m now seven months pregnant. I’m so excited to become a mum, but it has been hard for us to relax in this pregnancy. Looking back over the past year, we’ve done a lot of growing and slowing down, which I think will make us much better parents for this baby than we might have been last year. I’m not someone who believes everything happens for a reason, but we have certainly put this time to good use, in honour of our babe who wasn’t to be, and the one who (fingers crossed) will.”
Emi: “My older brother died in 2020 during the pandemic. Jack was diagnosed with a rare cancer, Angiosarcoma, in his liver in December 2019 – a few weeks after his 31st birthday. He passed away four months later. He was in home hospice care after getting an air ambulance out of New York (where he lived) back to the UK due to the lockdowns. Over that week he deteriorated. I checked his feet every night as I had read that before someone dies their feet go cold. That night his feet were warm. Jack was in my childhood bedroom in our parents house when the alarm went off. I knew this was the moment he was dying. His breathing was sporadic. My mum was screaming, my dad was saying “It’s OK son, I love you” and the nurses awkwardly stood at the foot of the bed as they watched our family’s world crumble before them. My grief is continually changing. The first year was a blur, I was simply surviving in a continuous state of shock. 6 months to a year afterwards is when the shock fades, the check ins from friends slow down and the expectation to be ‘better’ starts. I would say this was peak grief. When they first die, you still feel connected to them, as life around you is largely the same. However, as time moves on and things progress and develop, with anniversaries and celebrations, there’s a huge feeling of loss. You’re growing up and living your life, whereas they are stuck in time. It’s now coming up to four years since Jack’s passing, and photos of him are starting to look dated. I’m turning the age he would have been when he died. I will no longer be the younger sister, and I am certainly starting to look older than my older brother. The grief may not be as raw or all consuming, but there is a lingering numbness that you just cannot shake. I always talk to him in my head. Mainly, I just wish I could say how sorry I am for what he had to go through. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. I just want to share another conversation, simple chit chat, or to play a game with him. It is so hard to put a positive spin on loss. The only light I can shed is that it makes you love so much more deeply, and appreciate every single moment. Life is really a gift – enjoy the life you are living for the loved one that has passed. Live life like they can see the world through your eyes.”
Kenny: “My mum died in 2015. She was more of a best friend than a mum. We used to drive my older sister crazy, laughing and drinking on the sofa together, whilst she would shout and try to discipline us as if she was the parent! Still, my mum was my biggest support system, especially during my transition. Being a straight white parent and trying to take care of a queer black son was a lot for her. She went on plenty of learning journeys to try to understand me more. She had been exposed to queer people, but never to trans people, and so she had a lot of learning to do. I was away when she got sick. I came back home and I remember looking in the toilet – I just assumed that she had mopped the floor, tipped the dirty water in, and not flushed it away afterwards. But no, it was her kidneys shutting down, her urine was completely discoloured. When we got her death certificate it stated something resembling cancer and alcoholism. This didn’t surprise me because she had a bad relationship with alcohol her entire adult life. It’s not something we ever really spoke about. My mum’s alcoholism put a real strain on her relationship with my older sister. She saw the ‘bad’ side of my mum much more than I ever did. Because of our age gap we were in two very different places – I was young, partying and liked drinking, whereas she was having a baby and settling down. She didn’t want our mum being drunk around her daughter, which was fair enough. But for me, it got difficult because I started having to look after mum. I made sure that she ate and I cleaned the house, as she became very messy from being constantly hungover. Even with all of that, she was never a bad parent. I always felt loved. I knew she drank because she had been through a lot. She was originally from Liverpool and she moved to London because both of her kids are mixed race, and racism was rife in Liverpool. She moved to give us a better life, but she lost connection with her family, and so that was the sacrifice she made. As I get older, I can imagine how hard that would have been for her, to be away from her twin brother and her siblings. When somebody drinks and they become a different person, like being aggressive or dangerous, my mum was never like that. I didn’t feel like there were two versions of her, she was always the same person. Sometimes there are moments where you feel overwhelmed by grief and the memories are just too much. Especially if you’re blocking things out because it’s hard to process them all the time – you are going to have a moment where it all comes to the surface. When that happens, I try to think: how can I use this in a healthy way? How can I celebrate her life?”
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