When they are gone


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Right I'm chucking my oar in!!

When I read Chullas post,he put it just right!!

But some feel this subject sad or out of place..I see both sides.On a personal level,I won't elaborate on my losses as it's private and confrontational.. would it be' owt else with me?

In a PM chat..maybe.But I like the difference in our members views as it makes for good reading.

PS: I did read all posts with sympathy and understanding.

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I was lucky (if lucky is the right word) with the passing of both my parents. Dad made 82 before the cancer took him, at the end that 6ft 2" 16 stone ex miner was but a shadow of his former self and in great pain it was therefore a great relief when he died. Mother did a lot better she made 95 and pasted very quickly, and she always believed she would she her darling Bill again.

As the only child it fell to me to clear mums place a sad task indeed until my wife broke the silence. She found a poker I had made for mum at Ellis, picked it up at said "Remember when your mum threw this at you?" That bought a smile....... hard as nag nails my mum with a heart of gold.

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My mum died, aged 97, in 2012, thankfully with all her marbles. Dad had died 25 or so years earlier, at 82, after developing dementia, and his passing came as a relief to mum. I am sorry to say that, at the time, I wasn't deeply affected by his death, exept to regret not having taken him up on his offers to take me on the footplate to Woodford. Mum was the last surviving family member of her generation, and I have since come to appreciate that there is no longer anyone to share in my little achievements, as I now share in those of my children and grand children. What's more, there is nobody left who can confirm or deny those little events which occasionally crop up in family discourse. I know snippets of my parents' lives, but how I wish I had taken a greater interest.

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Beautifully written piece by Chulla, though my experience was different.

I can't recall if or where I reported my Mum's passing in October.

My Dad died in 1976. He was 56 and to be honest our relationship had always been difficult, but was improving as we both mellowed. He had suffered a lot in WWII, plus several mining accidents and finally lung disease, which killed him. He spent his last few years within reach of an oxygen bottle and little else. I have no pictures of him as a child, but I can imagine him from the few stories he told me of his youth in and around Bestwood Village. His death was reported to me by a phone call, as I was then living in Skelmersdale in Lancs. It was a shock, but not a surprise. I called my Mum in Nottm and said I would be down as soon as possible. She just said 'What's the point? We'll just sit looking at each other till the funeral' So I went down the night before the funeral. Having not seen my Dad for a month or so before he died, I thought it 'behoved' me to go and see his body. I won't be doing that again, for anybody.

I was taken aback by how much my Dad's death affected me. I think it was a mixture of sadness for a relationship which never properly grew, though I have a lot of evidence that he really cared. He was never good at expressing his feelings, and I think I was the same, at least with family, back then.

Next up I lost my older sister Pam 4 years ago. She too had lung disease. I saw her a few weeks before she died and I was aware that she was running out of fight, after years of battling with it. I'm as certain as I can be that she had had enough, and decided to stop fighting. Last I saw orf her she was sitting on a hospital bed. I gave her a hug and a kiss and said. I'll see you Sis.. I didn't.

Mum lived alone after Dad's death for decades. Still in the house on Bestwood Estate where we were brought up. Looking back, I'm often amazed how rich our lives were, as relatively poor council estate kids. Bestwood Est. back then was a friendly, largely crime free place, though I always looked more to the fields and open spaces directly across from the house, long before Rise Park, Top Valley etc., were built. I was away from Nottm, so the house gradually became less of the place it had been in my youth. We finally had to get Mum into care several years ago. We didn't tell her when Pam died, or when her sister Betty died. We judged, rightly or wrongly that it was pointless to put her through pain which she would forget, then have to be reminded again and experience again, Ad Infinitum.

Mum passed away in October, at almost 92. She'd already lost most of her memory when she went into care, but had remained fairly physically fit. Then we saw the inevitable decline, which accellerated in the last 12 months until she was unable to do anything for herself. Even then, she retained odd sparks of her old feisty self. When it was apparent she was dying, I was back and forth to Nottm., like a yo-yo. I said my goodbyes several times, but she finally went in the early hours, after I'd returned to Nottm. Seems to be a common experience.

By now.. there was no house. It had remained unoccupied for a while and was then sold when it was apparent Mum wouldn't be coming home. I thought I'd miss it, but the lovely views over the Leen Valley down to Bulwell, and the open fields spreading up to Bestwood lodge, have not been visible since the 1960s, so not much to miss.

When Mum passed, it was something of a relief that she was no longer suffering. It took longer for the implications to hit. Now, months later, I have occasional little twinges of regret, or sometimes just uncertainty. My generation is now next in the firing line. My Mum's late younger brother's wife, IOW my Aunt, is still alive, but I've not seen her for years. There's no reason we should meet other than the tenuous family relationship, but I think I may make the effort to see her while she's still with us.

In the last couple of weeks I got word that my Dad's last surviving sister had died, at 89. I hadn't seen her since my Dad's funeral in 1976. Her husband passed years ago. Without going into detail.. there were a few issues in the family. But I've always thought it stupid for kids to carry on their parent's feuds. Dad's sister is survived by a son and daughter. Daughter is apparently in Florida. Son.. unknown. I've put out all the feelers I can to establish contact. We played together happily as kids, but somehow now we are complete strangers.

So we, are now pretty much the next generation up for Oblivion, Heavenly Paradise, Purgatory, or whatever we believe in.

And even after all these years, and all of our accumulated experience and wisdom, we are still children, still learning and still basically helpless and clueless. Our kids come to us for advice, support and reassurance. We give them what we can and try to seem knowledgable and confident, but in the final analysis, we're all just whistling in the dark.

Col

P.S. Some music needed I think.. I'll have to look at What I'm Listening To Now..

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Thank you to those who appreciated the ambience I described in my original post. I am pleased that the catharsis has promoted similar discussions by members who have lost their parents. Both our parents died in that living-room; not in a hospital bed, a nursing home or on the street, but in surroundings familiar to them during the whole of their married life. A small mercy, perhaps, to be thankful for.

After clearing the house I stood in the living-room for the last time, now just bare walls and bare floorboards, a million miles from the sights and sounds I remember. I closed the front door, took the keys to the council office and that was it. Only memories from then on.

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Losing parents is always very sad. I am lucky because mine went as elderly people. When they die young and leave a young family it can be so much more devastating. I never looked at what material things my parents acquired in their lives. It was more to me what they stood for in other peoples lives. My mum and dad were loved by all my school friends and later in years, my children used to take their friends to see them. And moving the clock forward further, my grand-children grew to love my mum and dad very much. My eldest grand-daughter still grieves for my mum even though she died 12 years ago. Like I said in another post, I feel my parents presence everywhere I go.

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I never got on very well with my dad; we always rowed and argued. In fact we couldn't be in the same room for more than a few minutes without falling out over some stupid little thing or other. I was living abroad when he died and was unable to attend the funeral. That didn't bother me but what, for some reason, really did bother me was that he died before I went to Uni as a mature student and was thus unable to see me graduate. He always wanted me to go to university but as a kid I was too rebellious to bother. He would have been proud to have known that he reared a son with a BSc. and in a way, I let him down by leaving it too late for him to witness it.

The death of my mother meant that I became the oldest family member. Until that point my sister and I used to speak about once every couple of years or so. We always got on well but just never bothered keeping in close contact. She was my mother's main carer and suffered much for it, my mother having dementia. The main thing is that we are now in regular contact and closer than we have ever been, despite literally living at the opposite ends of the country to each other; she in south Devon and me in North Caithness.

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Funny how lads and dads often don't seem to hit it off too well. My dad missed many of my formative years because he was in the navy. End of WW2 and then back in again for the Korean war. By the time he came home I was 8 or nine years old and we seemed to have little affinity for each other. We often fought over trivialities. We seemed to get on better after I married and left home when we would often go for a drink together. When he died in 72. I had just moved to Canada and didn't even have enough money to fly back. My mom told me not to come which made me feel a bit better. Life throws us some funny curves.

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In 1969 I went to Doncaster to look for work and chase after a certain young lady. Cutting a long story short I wasn't too successful at either and was in the habit of hitching home most weekends.

Then I got a letter from Mum saying that my Grandad Jack.. the war hero, was ill. I wrote a letter back wishing him well and on the Tuesday of the following week received another letter that he was feeling better.

For some reason on the Weds I hitched home and arrived at around 12:00 noon.

My Mum's first words were. "Where's your stuff?"

"What stuff?" I replied.

" Clothes... You can't go to a funeral dressed like that!"

I was stunned. It seemed Grandad had passed away after writing back to me and Mum had sent a telegram asking me to come for the funeral.

I never received the Telegram but had turned up anyway.

I wasn't thinking too straight and there wasn't much time and because I had no smart clothes decided not to go to the funeral. I've regretted it ever since.

Very strange.

Col

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When my maternal granddad died I said I would not go to his funeral as I was working nights. I was asleep in my bed after work when mam came into my room and woke me up. "Come on, you're going to the funeral", she said. I asked why and she said because grandma had told her that there was going to be an odd number at the funeral. Apparently I would make it even.

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