They lied when they said that the years would mend, That time was a healer, That the months would lend, A blanket of comfort to soothe and end The pain you felt. They lied. They lied with their platitudes and their meaning-wells, With death comes to us all, With time will tell, Meaningless […]
Grief
A bittersweet time of year
‘What a terrible time for it to happen,’ we say of winter tragedies, as though those suffering would be able to bear their sorrows more easily, had they happened in March, or in July. And although tragedy pays no real heed to the calendar on the wall, it’s true that grief sits uncomfortably in December. My son died on December […]
A stranger's words
I was at the hospital the other day (for nothing of note) and was asked, as is always the way, to recount my medical history. I have it off pat now: the twin pregnancy, the dramatic labour, the weeks in neonatal care. The worry, the relief, the false hope. The illness, the grave expressions, the […]
There are no photos
Why didn’t I take more photographs? I had all the time in the world. I arrived at the hospital at eight every day: drifted between intensive care, the pumping room, and the canteen. I went home at four then came back after supper to sit in the dark between two incubators, against a backdrop of […]
Sometimes the news is too hard to bear
Sometimes the headlines are hard to read. Sometimes the news is too much to take, and I have to switch over; switch off; turn away. Sometimes it’s just too real. Right now 18 newborn babies are critically ill. One has died. All have been infected by what is believed to be a contaminated batch of feed, administered […]
There is a punch line to grief
There is a punch line to grief that no one tells you. You won’t find it in the leaflets you clutch as you leave the hospital, or in the waiting room when you go to register the death. It won’t be in the platitudes from family and friends, or in the order of service you […]