Scattered thoughts

Today I have anger. I am pissed and I would very much like to yell at someone and can't.

I've been suspecting for a little while that some of our post has been going astray. I've been trying to organise a headstone for mum's grave and twice now the paperwork has gone missing in the post (incidentally the woman at the Masons sounded rather incredulous that this had happened which is one of the reasons I'm so wound up. As if I'd make it up and ask her to send out the same stuff three times. This time I've asked her to send it recorded delivery and add the charge to the amount for the headstone).

Now some of the paperwork we need to buy the house has gone missing in the post meaning that the whole process of that has been delayed and I am really fucking angry.

So I called up Royal Mail because I want to talk to someone, an actual person about this problem and my concerns about the lost post and I get a bloody phone tree that doesn't put me through to a person but to a recording that redirects me to their website and tells me to fill in a form. I'll fill it in, but I have the feeling that it will eventually come back with "not our problem".

In the meantime it's entirely possible that our post will go missing again. And who knows what already has?

This entry was originally posted at http://lizziec.dreamwidth.org/425586.html. There are currently comments on the original entry.

Today I have anger. I am pissed and I would very much like to yell at someone and can't.

I've been suspecting for a little while that some of our post has been going astray. I've been trying to organise a headstone for mum's grave and twice now the paperwork has gone missing in the post (incidentally the woman at the Masons sounded rather incredulous that this had happened which is one of the reasons I'm so wound up. As if I'd make it up and ask her to send out the same stuff three times. This time I've asked her to send it recorded delivery and add the charge to the amount for the headstone).

Now some of the paperwork we need to buy the house has gone missing in the post meaning that the whole process of that has been delayed and I am really fucking angry.

So I called up Royal Mail because I want to talk to someone, an actual person about this problem and my concerns about the lost post and I get a bloody phone tree that doesn't put me through to a person but to a recording that redirects me to their website and tells me to fill in a form. I'll fill it in, but I have the feeling that it will eventually come back with "not our problem".

In the meantime it's entirely possible that our post will go missing again. And who knows what already has?

This is my big sister. Catherine Patricia Frances Overal.

( Cut because the picture is of an extremely sick preemie on life support )

She was born at 25 weeks gestation - 15 weeks (nearly four months) premature in February 1982. She weighed 1lb 9.5oz and lived for less than a day, so I never knew her. Even today babies born that early have huge challenges and many still die. In 1982, despite all the care the hospital could give her, the chances were worse and she sadly died.

Because my parents weren't very well off they could never afford to get a grave marker for my big sister, and so for 29 years now it's remained unmarked. There's no visible sign that she even existed to most of the world.

Tomorrow me and my auntie are going to order the amendments to my dad's headstone to have my mum's details added and we've managed to get together the money to have my sister's grave finally marked. I called the cemetery today to double check which plot Catherine was buried in so I could give the details to the monumental mason (which btw, is an awesome job title).

It's just as well I did, because it turns out that my mum and dad (both deceased) hold the rights to my sister's grave, so we wouldn't have been able to arrange a headstone because we (surviving family) have no rights over it. It's quite frustrating.

Luckily, as Phil and I have long since sorted out probate over mum's estate transferring it should be fairly straight forward, but it's one more thing I have to do tomorrow when I'm visiting Sutton (60+ miles away). I really could have done without it.

Luckily, by the end of tomorrow a headstone for Catherine should be on order, as should the alterations to daddy's headstone.

The inscription we're going with on Catherine's will be something like
Catherine Patricia Frances Overal
03.02.1982-04.02.1982

On mum's it'll be:
Christine Anne Overal
Born: 02.04.1951
Died: 11.05.2010
Well loved

Pics when it's done, which will be apparently four or five months from ordering.

This entry was originally posted at http://lizziec.dreamwidth.org/420309.html. There are currently comments on the original entry.

It's one year today since no1typo died. Ben and I are spending the day out so don't worry too much about me, I won't be moping too much. The tribute that Phil and I wrote for mum's funeral says really all I want to today about her, so I've posted it again below.

--

( Tribute to mum )

This entry was originally posted at http://lizziec.dreamwidth.org/418232.html. There are currently comments on the original entry.

It's one year today since no1typo died. Ben and I are spending the day out so don't worry too much about me, I won't be moping too much. The tribute that Phil and I wrote for mum's funeral says really all I want to today about her, so I've posted it again below.

--

( Tribute to mum )

What follows is something of a random whinge, so please just treat it as that and nothing more. Hey look, I post for the first time in months and then do two posts in an evening. Fluke? Too much stuff in my head? I dunno really. We'll see what this develops in to.

It's been just over a year since no1typo got ill, and very nearly a year since she died and I still feel like I'm picking up the pieces of my life. There are times when I almost feel caught up, like I'm back in the groove again, but they're pretty rare. Most of the time I still feel like I'm playing some sort of catch up game.

I understood this 10ish months ago. I'd taken two or three months out of my life before she died to help look after her and be with her as she got worse. After that there was all the busy-ness random admin and worrying that came with her being dead. But it's nearly been a year. I don't get why it is I still feel like this. Surely I should have picked up all the threads of my life by now? I keep wondering if it can possibly be normal. Well, for values of normal anyway.

Gaaaaah.

This entry was originally posted at http://lizziec.dreamwidth.org/416333.html. There are currently comments on the original entry.

Warning, this could be triggering to some, so I'm going to put it under a cut. It's basically a discription of what happens, or what you have to do in terms of organisation and administration when someone close to you dies. This is based on what happened when no1typo died, so YMMV.

( This is what happened the day mum died )

This entry was originally posted at http://lizziec.dreamwidth.org/415484.html. There are currently comments on the original entry.

...and the mole just whacked us rather than vice versa :/

( In which I bitch and moan about the amount of paperwork to be found with regards to mum's estate and Anwell Vetinary Centre in Coulsdon )

...and the mole just whacked us rather than vice versa :/

( In which I bitch and moan about the amount of paperwork to be found with regards to mum's estate and Anwell Vetinary Centre in Coulsdon )

Just to let you all know, that the funeral directors sent Phil a total of how much money was donated in mum's name to Macmillan nurses. The final total was £385. There was also £70 given to Phil and I in cash that we will be forwarding to Macmillan in mum's name shortly. That means that £455 of good for Macmillan Nurses, and the people who use them, has come from this, and that is something that offers some comfort for me. Thank you to everyone who donated.

ION I saw Toy Story 3 over the weekend and it was awesome and lovely and beautiful and I would see it again even if I did spend a good deal of time in tears. Go see it!

In trying to wind up mum's estate we have been stymied at many turns by a complete lack of paperwork. Apparently mum didn't like to keep paperwork of any type. I won't go in to too much detail here, because it makes me grumpy and you don't need to know about it.

For one of the things I need to prove I am mum's daughter, which apparently involves sending in my birth certificate, and this is where a huge problem I've been meaning to correct for a while comes in. At some point in my growing up my long form birth certificate vanished. No idea where it went. I don't remember ever having it. When I applied for student finance in 2002 I had to physically take my short form certificate in to the council so they could photocopy it.

The reason I had to take my short form birth certificate in person? Ah yes, that would be because my parents in their infinite wisdom, stuck my short form certificate in to my baby book. With glue.

Generally I've managed to avoid it being a problem for some years. I have other forms of ID. However, this set of paperwork that needs it has forced me to order one on a rush from the General Register Office, who I have to say are fantastic. I paid a premium for a next day service and they delivered. You can order certificates online, and if you can wait 16 days the price is a fairly reasonable £9.25 (to put in context, to get a death certificate copy from the registry office after registration is completed is £7 - if you get copies at the time of registration it's quite a lot less).

The GRO helpfully search one year either side of the year you name, just in case you're wrong about the exact year - which is what they had to do when I asked for a copy of daddy's death certificate (mum didn't keep that) because I had no idea when the death was actually registered (he died on Christmas day, so the registry office wouldn't have been open much between christmas day 1991 and january 1992).

I paid more than the £9.25 for my birth certificate because I needed it as a rush job, and they've delivered. Really the price serves me right for not just ordering one when I've thought about it countless other times over the years. But it's now here and I can finish that lot of paperwork and yay! And hopefully I'll never have to go through the embarrassment of sending my baby book anywhere to prove who I am in the future.

In trying to wind up mum's estate we have been stymied at many turns by a complete lack of paperwork. Apparently mum didn't like to keep paperwork of any type. I won't go in to too much detail here, because it makes me grumpy and you don't need to know about it.

For one of the things I need to prove I am mum's daughter, which apparently involves sending in my birth certificate, and this is where a huge problem I've been meaning to correct for a while comes in. At some point in my growing up my long form birth certificate vanished. No idea where it went. I don't remember ever having it. When I applied for student finance in 2002 I had to physically take my short form certificate in to the council so they could photocopy it.

The reason I had to take my short form birth certificate in person? Ah yes, that would be because my parents in their infinite wisdom, stuck my short form certificate in to my baby book. With glue.

Generally I've managed to avoid it being a problem for some years. I have other forms of ID. However, this set of paperwork that needs it has forced me to order one on a rush from the General Register Office, who I have to say are fantastic. I paid a premium for a next day service and they delivered. You can order certificates online, and if you can wait 16 days the price is a fairly reasonable £9.25 (to put in context, to get a death certificate copy from the registry office after registration is completed is £7 - if you get copies at the time of registration it's quite a lot less).

The GRO helpfully search one year either side of the year you name, just in case you're wrong about the exact year - which is what they had to do when I asked for a copy of daddy's death certificate (mum didn't keep that) because I had no idea when the death was actually registered (he died on Christmas day, so the registry office wouldn't have been open much between christmas day 1991 and january 1992).

I paid more than the £9.25 for my birth certificate because I needed it as a rush job, and they've delivered. Really the price serves me right for not just ordering one when I've thought about it countless other times over the years. But it's now here and I can finish that lot of paperwork and yay! And hopefully I'll never have to go through the embarrassment of sending my baby book anywhere to prove who I am in the future.

Grief is a funny thing. I thought I knew what it had to offer, having been through it once when my dad died, but either I have forgotten or I experienced it in a different way, being, as I was, a child. I think it's probably a combination of the two. It's 19 years this Christmas since daddy died, so it's been a long time, and I'm (obviously) older now, though apparently not so old that being completely parentless doesn't feel extremely premature. I feel much too young for all this.

A lot of the time I feel like I'm doing ok. I'm even managing to enjoy stuff, and I'm not in a depressed puddle on the floor, a situation which I hope continues because it's only this year I've really felt on top of my depression and I don't need to go back to the beginning. Or even to the middle.

Then something will slap me around the face and I will cry and howl like my heart is breaking. It's not triggered by those still several times a day "oh I'll just call mum and say..." thoughts, which always complete before I remember that I can't and won't ever again. They're becoming like a routine part of my day, but still give me a little jolt everytime.

It isn't even triggered by sorting out her affairs (by the way, the Letters of Administration arrived yesterday, so I'm starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel on that one). It's usually triggered by something that completely blindsides me, like her teapot, or a song that makes me think of her.

It's annoying because I'll be bobbing along ok and then whatever that trigger happens to be will hit me and I'll be a wreck for the rest of the day.

On a not entirely unrelated note, I went to see my GP this week to get some more pills, and finished the appointment wondering if I was really doing as well as I thought I was. She said I looked weary and asked what had been happening since I last saw her in the middle of March. So I told her. Really, everything has happened since then - mum's diagnosis, her illness, her death, her funeral, her house sorting. I told her what had happened. Then she asked for more details so I told her. Then she asked about the end and I recounted the last week and then the last 24 hours of mum's life, and I cried. I was booked in for a 10 minute appointment, and she was running half an hour late when she got to me, but she still spent 20 mins with me, and then booked me in for a one off appointment with my old psychiatric nurse, Nikki.

I saw her at 3:30 on Thursday and was good for absolutely nothing the rest of the day. She spent an hour with me, during which I cried pretty much constantly. I had Edexcel work to do that evening and ended up abandoning it. I was as low as I've been in a while, which I think is just related to the hour I'd spent crying. She arranged to see me again in a couple of weeks to make sure I'm still "ok".

Honestly, until I saw my GP and psychiatric nurse, I didn't realise I still had so many emotions left to with this, or so many tears to cry, and I'm not sure where it all came from. I don't think they're all back in the bottle though. And I'm wondering if I'm really doing ok, or whether I'm just glossing over it all, which then leads to me crying for an hour at someone.

Stupid grief and its non-standard, non-linear path.

I put mum's facebook account into memorial mode a few weeks ago and then tried to ignore the problem of mum's online presence, but it's something that I've been thinking about increasingly over the last couple of days.

One of mum's friends thinks we should delete anything we can't lock down (ala her facebook account), but I'm not sure I can bring myself to do that. It feels a little bit like erasing her life. Which sounds ridiculous. But there's where my head and my heart been going on this question.

Any thoughts from you, my lovely friendslist? I'm not sure I can be objective on this.

I put mum's facebook account into memorial mode a few weeks ago and then tried to ignore the problem of mum's online presence, but it's something that I've been thinking about increasingly over the last couple of days.

One of mum's friends thinks we should delete anything we can't lock down (ala her facebook account), but I'm not sure I can bring myself to do that. It feels a little bit like erasing her life. Which sounds ridiculous. But there's where my head and my heart been going on this question.

Any thoughts from you, my lovely friendslist? I'm not sure I can be objective on this.

Horrible awful dream in which ben died in a fire after running in to a building to rescue children. Woke up full of adrenaline, shaking and breathing very fast. It was horrible - really, really horrible.

Continued from here.

( *Minor rant about mormons and visions of my father )

Continued from here.

( *Minor rant about mormons and visions of my father )

We had mum's funeral today, and we couldn't have had a nicer day for it, weather wise. It was the kind of day mum would have loved, and she would have been extremely gratified and touched that so many people came to show their love and care for her by coming to say goodbye to her.

The funeral directors, a local firm called W A Truelove and Son were amazing, and made the day go very smoothly. We arrived everywhere exactly on time, never too early or too late. Mum was carried into church by a mixture of family and friends (Ben, foo, my uncle Allan, Duncan [mum's partner], Mark F and Giles), which was lovely. I held it together more or less until we got into the church and found just how many people there were (the church really was packed with mum's friends from all sorts of places, even my Auntie Joan, who we've not spoken to for years, and my cousin Mandy [ditto] came) and ended up crying through most all of the introduction and the first hymn.

Service sheet is here by the way.

After the hymn, I read the tribute which Phil and I had written together, and managed to keep it together enough to read it, though my voice kept breaking whenever I looked up and saw how many people were there for mum, so I tried to keep my eyes on the paper.

( The tribute )

My uncle David (mum's brother) read the bible reading, and then Ben read the poem, which is Long Distance II by Tony Harrison, which I have posted here before, but I'll post it again for completeness.

( Long Distance II by Tony Harrison )

The vicar (a lovely man, Mick Hough, who was miles better than the vicar we had at the same church for our wedding [his sermon involved homosexuals and protestants in ancient corinth]), used the poem as a way to launch into his address, which was beautiful, and talked about the finality of death for those left behind, but the hope for the next life and resurrection.

The service at the cemetery was very short and nice (and very well attended again), but seeing mum lowered into the ground was very hard, and so was putting a handful of earth in actually. After that we mingled for a bit (during which the mormon in attendance asked if we minded if he consecrated the grave "for your dad's sake" - we said he could, because honestly it doesn't matter to me either way, but I'm kind of pissed he invoked daddy*) before making our way back to the house to collect the car so we could meet everyone else at the pub near the church, where everyone mingled some more and talked about mum, which was nice in a different kind of way to the rest of the day. Once again, everyone was utterly amazing.

The pictures of the flowers are here (sorry, most of them are sideways as I uploaded them before I realised, then ran out of energy to fix them. Maybe I'll get around to it at a later date). There aren't many because we requested family flowers only, with donations to go to the Macmillan Nurses through the Undertaker who will collate them. The flowers we did get were stunningly beautiful though, and very mum I thought. The flowers from Phil and Ben and I are in the middle of this photo:



The ones to the left are from the Overal side of the family (dad's family), the ones to the right are from the Walker side (mum's side).

That's it, I think. Or at least it is for now. I'm pretty tired, but suffering from lack of arsedness to actually go to bed...

As I posted earlier, mum died this morning at just gone 10am. It wasn't a huge shock. I mentioned in previous entries that she had got dramatically worse over the weekend, and yesterday afternoon during visiting hours Phil and I tracked down Fiona, the Macmillan nurse to see what was actually going on, as we hadn't seen an actual doctor who would tell us anything since the beginning of the previous week.

Fiona said she was shocked at how much worse mum was yesterday than she had been on Friday, and confirmed what I already felt - that we were looking at an extremely short period of time, probably just a few days. Fiona felt that mum would probably gradually slow down her breathing and fall into a coma and gradually stop breathing. She said we could stay at the hospital if we wanted, but that she felt we needed proper rest and that it would happen regardless of where we were - even if we just went to get a cup of tea, and so Phil and I decided that we would go home at the end of visiting hours. If were looking at a situation that could go on for days then we wanted to be fresh enough to deal with it. And in the condition that mum was in on Monday evening when we left, we knew it would be a strain. Her breathing was more laboured again than it was on Sunday, and her tongue had stopped working. She tried to say lots of things to me and Phil when we arrived, the only period she was really awake for, but unfortunately we couldn't understand any of it apart from our names. And that it was lovely when we wiped a cold flannel across her very hot face.

Fiona felt that the deterioration in mum's condition was caused by the fact that the tumour had grown so large that it was 1) causing swelling in her throat, making breathing difficult, and 2) pressing on the nerves and muscles that controlled mum's tongue, which is why it was we were struggling to understand anything she said.

As I said, when we left on Monday night it was clear we were looking at days at the most. I was worried we were looking at hours, but deciding there was nothing more we could do at the hospital, we came home.

We'd not been home long when the nurse looking after mum last night (Tidings) called and said that in the short time we'd been gone, mum was worse and that we should thing about coming in. We had dinner, and headed in, supported by my auntie Pat and uncle Allan. She was worse, and when we got there, Tidings told us that though mum was calmer, she had spent a good deal of time calling my name. We all sat around her bed and talked to her, and around her, and recalled memories of our childhood and the lovely times that we had had. All the while her breathing got worse and worse. She was also in a good deal of pain, the first time she's really been in pain since she was admitted to hospital on 29th April. They gave her a top up booster of morphine, besides what was in her syringe driver, but it didn't really seem to help much with her pain. Meanwhile she was sweating profusely, and we tried to keep her cool with wet flannels. After a while she rested more, Pat and Allan went home, Phil first dozed on the floor (to the horror of a nursing assistant), and then in the day room, where said horrified nursing assistant insisted that he move to, and I dozed fitfully in the chair next to her bed, waking every 20 mins or so to reassure her that she was ok, we were ok and that it was ok for her to let go if she wanted to, because we would be looked after. I tried to keep touching her arm and hand, though she kept withdrawing them to posture against her chest, which I think was a pain response.

We left her at about 7am. She seemed quieter, and though her breathing was a little worse (it had got steadily worse through the night), she was cooler and seemed to be in much less pain. We decided to go home and get some sleep, and come back at around 1pm.

So we left her, after telling her we loved her and we'd be back later. Came home, ate a little and fell into bed. Was woken at about 10:10 by a call from Fiona telling us that mum had died just a short time before. They had washed her and put her in a comfortable position and she had looked much easier. Even her breathing was a little better. A nurse was still with her, and Fiona had just gone away for a little while, and in that five minutes she'd simply stopped breathing. Fiona said that it was a very peaceful end.

She asked if we wanted to see her, and said we could hold her hand if we wanted to. We wandered down to the end of the ward, and she opened the door. And there mum was. And it was awful. I've never had such spontaneous tears as I had then. Immediately the door opened and I saw mum they started. She looked peaceful, yes, but she didn't look like my mummy. And seeing a body without seeing breathing is strange and odd and not nice. I couldn't touch her. I don't think I can bring myself to see her again after the funeral home lay her out. I'm almost regretting seeing her like that because I can't get the picture out of my head. But at the same time, if I hadn't seen her, the last image would have been of her in dreadful pain and discomfort. That image is still with me, in fact. I'm crying as I write this. I don't know which I would rather have. But I have them both, and I really hope that soon I can stop fixating on those awful thoughts of her and see her as she was most of the time. Fuck Cancer. It wasn't supposed to be like this. She was retiring in a year and going to have a huge party. And now she never will. I checked my irc logs. You know, it was less than four months, barely over three, from start to finish? First symptoms of tingling in February. It's barely May now and she's dead. Fuck cancer. Fuck it right in the ear.

Most of the rest of todoay has been a bit of a blur. Everyone's being awesome. So awesome that I don't know how I'll thank them, ever. We've called people, organised various things, and know which funeral home we'll be going with. I've picked an outfit for her. We've even sorted through a few of her physical posessions (though only her shoes, and toiletries). Tomorrow we're going to sort out the paperwork at the hospital, and then go and register the death with Wandsworth registry office, which is the district that St Georges falls in. After that we're heading to the Funeral Home, a local company called WA Truelove and Son, to start sorting out the funeral.

Bleh. Today was exhausting and hard in its own way. But I think last night, when she was in pain and crying and struggling for every breath that was hardest and worst. Possibly the hardest and worst night of my entire adult life.

Finally, ben signed mum off IRC tonight. It makes sense but feels awful.

20:47:49 -!- typo [typo@dm-11449.pok.me.uk] has quit [Exit: fuck cancer]

Sorry for the brain dump. Needed to get it out before I could sleep, and before I forgot it all.

ETA: 12/07/11 No longer filtered

As I posted earlier, mum died this morning at just gone 10am. It wasn't a huge shock. I mentioned in previous entries that she had got dramatically worse over the weekend, and yesterday afternoon during visiting hours Phil and I tracked down Fiona, the Macmillan nurse to see what was actually going on, as we hadn't seen an actual doctor who would tell us anything since the beginning of the previous week.

Fiona said she was shocked at how much worse mum was yesterday than she had been on Friday, and confirmed what I already felt - that we were looking at an extremely short period of time, probably just a few days. Fiona felt that mum would probably gradually slow down her breathing and fall into a coma and gradually stop breathing. She said we could stay at the hospital if we wanted, but that she felt we needed proper rest and that it would happen regardless of where we were - even if we just went to get a cup of tea, and so Phil and I decided that we would go home at the end of visiting hours. If were looking at a situation that could go on for days then we wanted to be fresh enough to deal with it. And in the condition that mum was in on Monday evening when we left, we knew it would be a strain. Her breathing was more laboured again than it was on Sunday, and her tongue had stopped working. She tried to say lots of things to me and Phil when we arrived, the only period she was really awake for, but unfortunately we couldn't understand any of it apart from our names. And that it was lovely when we wiped a cold flannel across her very hot face.

Fiona felt that the deterioration in mum's condition was caused by the fact that the tumour had grown so large that it was 1) causing swelling in her throat, making breathing difficult, and 2) pressing on the nerves and muscles that controlled mum's tongue, which is why it was we were struggling to understand anything she said.

As I said, when we left on Monday night it was clear we were looking at days at the most. I was worried we were looking at hours, but deciding there was nothing more we could do at the hospital, we came home.

We'd not been home long when the nurse looking after mum last night (Tidings) called and said that in the short time we'd been gone, mum was worse and that we should thing about coming in. We had dinner, and headed in, supported by my auntie Pat and uncle Allan. She was worse, and when we got there, Tidings told us that though mum was calmer, she had spent a good deal of time calling my name. We all sat around her bed and talked to her, and around her, and recalled memories of our childhood and the lovely times that we had had. All the while her breathing got worse and worse. She was also in a good deal of pain, the first time she's really been in pain since she was admitted to hospital on 29th April. They gave her a top up booster of morphine, besides what was in her syringe driver, but it didn't really seem to help much with her pain. Meanwhile she was sweating profusely, and we tried to keep her cool with wet flannels. After a while she rested more, Pat and Allan went home, Phil first dozed on the floor (to the horror of a nursing assistant), and then in the day room, where said horrified nursing assistant insisted that he move to, and I dozed fitfully in the chair next to her bed, waking every 20 mins or so to reassure her that she was ok, we were ok and that it was ok for her to let go if she wanted to, because we would be looked after. I tried to keep touching her arm and hand, though she kept withdrawing them to posture against her chest, which I think was a pain response.

We left her at about 7am. She seemed quieter, and though her breathing was a little worse (it had got steadily worse through the night), she was cooler and seemed to be in much less pain. We decided to go home and get some sleep, and come back at around 1pm.

So we left her, after telling her we loved her and we'd be back later. Came home, ate a little and fell into bed. Was woken at about 10:10 by a call from Fiona telling us that mum had died just a short time before. They had washed her and put her in a comfortable position and she had looked much easier. Even her breathing was a little better. A nurse was still with her, and Fiona had just gone away for a little while, and in that five minutes she'd simply stopped breathing. Fiona said that it was a very peaceful end.

She asked if we wanted to see her, and said we could hold her hand if we wanted to. We wandered down to the end of the ward, and she opened the door. And there mum was. And it was awful. I've never had such spontaneous tears as I had then. Immediately the door opened and I saw mum they started. She looked peaceful, yes, but she didn't look like my mummy. And seeing a body without seeing breathing is strange and odd and not nice. I couldn't touch her. I don't think I can bring myself to see her again after the funeral home lay her out. I'm almost regretting seeing her like that because I can't get the picture out of my head. But at the same time, if I hadn't seen her, the last image would have been of her in dreadful pain and discomfort. That image is still with me, in fact. I'm crying as I write this. I don't know which I would rather have. But I have them both, and I really hope that soon I can stop fixating on those awful thoughts of her and see her as she was most of the time. Fuck Cancer. It wasn't supposed to be like this. She was retiring in a year and going to have a huge party. And now she never will. I checked my irc logs. You know, it was less than four months, barely over three, from start to finish? First symptoms of tingling in February. It's barely May now and she's dead. Fuck cancer. Fuck it right in the ear.

Most of the rest of todoay has been a bit of a blur. Everyone's being awesome. So awesome that I don't know how I'll thank them, ever. We've called people, organised various things, and know which funeral home we'll be going with. I've picked an outfit for her. We've even sorted through a few of her physical posessions (though only her shoes, and toiletries). Tomorrow we're going to sort out the paperwork at the hospital, and then go and register the death with Wandsworth registry office, which is the district that St Georges falls in. After that we're heading to the Funeral Home, a local company called WA Truelove and Son, to start sorting out the funeral.

Bleh. Today was exhausting and hard in its own way. But I think last night, when she was in pain and crying and struggling for every breath that was hardest and worst. Possibly the hardest and worst night of my entire adult life.

Finally, ben signed mum off IRC tonight. It makes sense but feels awful.

20:47:49 -!- typo [typo@dm-11449.pok.me.uk] has quit [Exit: fuck cancer]

Sorry for the brain dump. Needed to get it out before I could sleep, and before I forgot it all.

ETA: 12/07/11 No longer locked

Mum died in hospital today, at just gone 10am. The hospital kept her as comfortable and free from pain as they could, and the staff were fantastic. In the end, she just stopped breathing. We saw her after and she looked very peaceful. Details of the funeral to follow at a later date for those who are interested.

Mum definitely worse today. She's stopped eating and drinking, though they're nourishing and hydrating her through the NG tube. She was confused, and had spent part of the morning shouting at the nurses and trying to get out of bed - by the time visiting hours started they had someone sitting in the doorway making sure she didn't get out of bed. When she wasn't trying to get out of bed, or thinking she needed to go to the toilet when she didn't she was asleep and barely responsive when she was (where before when she was asleep she would respond). The one time she was got out of bed, she kept her eyes shut the entire time. Her breathing is noisy and towards the end of visiting hours she would stop for a few seconds at a time, though it improved a little towards the end of the evening. When we left, the ward had sorted out a person whose sole job for the night was to sit with mum, though I don't know whether it was because they were concerned about her breathing, or her attempts to get out of bed, or both.

After today my gut feeling is the same, if not more reinforced. We're not looking at very long at all I think. A couple of weeks at most. Though, she wasn't expected to make it past last weekend, so I may be proven wrong. Time will tell I think.

ETA: 12/07/11 No longer filtered