.... and it was a truly beautiful experience - writing that - seems a weird way of putting it - but it was beautiful, it just felt right, well done, peaceful, joyous and sad........ and several hours on - I cannot think of it as anything other than a truly beautiful and wondrous thing - to witness - and to be a part of.
It has been getting closer for several days and the pace seemed to accelerate very rapidly near the end.... but like all these things - it seems a very long few days - it is always difficult to put time into boxes.... the days and nights seem to have stretched but also to have contracted.
My Dad did seem to have been released in someway by my Mum's visit on the Sunday - like she was giving him permission to die. He has always been there for her.... I think he has been staying alive for her for a few years now - staying in his tired and worn out body through the power of his love for her.
He also waited for his two older daughters to get home - leaving us less than 24 hours after their return. My sister Ann stayed with him last night, then I went up to the nursing home early this morning. They advised me to get my sisters there... and we got my Mum there as well.... so we were all there..... and looking back I think it was just about an hour after my Mum arrived - from her own hospital bed - that he died.
It has been getting closer for several days and the pace seemed to accelerate very rapidly near the end.... but like all these things - it seems a very long few days - it is always difficult to put time into boxes.... the days and nights seem to have stretched but also to have contracted.
My Dad did seem to have been released in someway by my Mum's visit on the Sunday - like she was giving him permission to die. He has always been there for her.... I think he has been staying alive for her for a few years now - staying in his tired and worn out body through the power of his love for her.
He also waited for his two older daughters to get home - leaving us less than 24 hours after their return. My sister Ann stayed with him last night, then I went up to the nursing home early this morning. They advised me to get my sisters there... and we got my Mum there as well.... so we were all there..... and looking back I think it was just about an hour after my Mum arrived - from her own hospital bed - that he died.
It was an amazingly beautifully sunny day and we moved between his room and this little garden - at the moment of his death - two of my sisters and I were with my Dad - and my other sister, her husband and my Jimmy were in the garden with my Mum. As we watched the signs of life fade from my Father's frail and tired body, I could hear my Mother's voice 'tinkling' in the background through the open window. The sound of his life.... my Mother's voice..... It was like a big beautiful wave of love filled the room and followed the sound out of the window....... pure peace.............
She was amazing.... accepting that it was his time to go - I am so grateful that we got them together on the Sunday - as I think she would have found it so difficult to understand had she not gone through that day.... and my wonderful son Jimmy was her companion as she sat for the last time with her lovely man of 66 years.... her youngest grandson being there for her.... she was so surrounded in love... she just kept saying - I am just so lucky..... and she was and is.....
She is not ready to go, she is full of life.... though having a broken hip and a faulty heart valve are cramping her style a bit at the moment... but her zest and enthusiasm for life are inspirational. I think she just needs to keep this momentum going over the next few days and weeks of getting her 'home' somewhere - which will probably not be her home of the last 55 years... but one step at a time, the next one is Rehab - and the funeral......
So my lovely Dad is no more in this world - it has been an extraordinary few weeks, very hard but also such a blessing - I am falling asleep as I type - so time for me to go to bed..........................
She was amazing.... accepting that it was his time to go - I am so grateful that we got them together on the Sunday - as I think she would have found it so difficult to understand had she not gone through that day.... and my wonderful son Jimmy was her companion as she sat for the last time with her lovely man of 66 years.... her youngest grandson being there for her.... she was so surrounded in love... she just kept saying - I am just so lucky..... and she was and is.....
She is not ready to go, she is full of life.... though having a broken hip and a faulty heart valve are cramping her style a bit at the moment... but her zest and enthusiasm for life are inspirational. I think she just needs to keep this momentum going over the next few days and weeks of getting her 'home' somewhere - which will probably not be her home of the last 55 years... but one step at a time, the next one is Rehab - and the funeral......
So my lovely Dad is no more in this world - it has been an extraordinary few weeks, very hard but also such a blessing - I am falling asleep as I type - so time for me to go to bed..........................
