After the pain there will be sunshine - In the name of Thiago - Day 32
After the pain there will be sunshine
(this intriguing beer name may or may not have been aimed at the five blokes drinking the stuff)
The day Thiago went
into cardiac arrest was horrible, the day he died was horrible and the day we
buried our little man was pretty shit too.
Yesterday was a
different sort of shit but certainly still measuring close to being off the
shitometer scale. Yesterday I was hit by the realisation of what Angelica and I
will now never have. Birthdays and Christmasses will be unbelievably desperate and
we will probably end up taking a very different approach to how we deal with these
occasions.
I’ve always enjoyed marking
an occasion, normally with an enormous bosh up, so this will be difficult for
me to process mentally. Speaking of bosh ups the five gentleman – and I hasten
to add that I use the term very loosely – in the picture below gathered
together in the Bottle Grove last night to make a toast to Thiago and
mark what would have been his first birthday.
Bottle Grove is a
splendid little craft place in my hometown of Eastbourne. On the first Tuesday
of every month they host a home brew club, of which Bulldog is a regular contributor.
Greg, who runs the place, was happy to have the other fellas along to raise a
glass for Thiago’s birthday and when they sent me some pictures last night, it
did help me raise a smile.
These guys have never
been far away from me when I’ve been really low and frankly there’s been a
truckload of those moments this last six months or so as Thiago struggled
bravely to live life to the fullest he could. And bloody hell, he did just that
the little trooper.
There’s been some
terrific media coverage over the last few days, which has definitely helped
with the fundraising, as I know that I can’t do this on my own. So thank yous
go to the Eastbourne Herald, BBC Radio Sussex (listen from 1:09 on the timeline), Signal Radio and The Sentinel
who have all written and broadcast my story and my journey with a great sense
of empathy.
I’m already a third of the way
to my £10,000 fundraising target, which even if I say so myself is a truly astonishing
achievement, as I don’t (yet) have a corporate backer or anyone other than
friends and family (with a little help from the media of course) who are getting behind me by driving this forward. So that says an awful lot of
positive things about those closest to me. Big up yourselves people.
The fundraising will
not stop. Angelica has now had a lesson in felting from her work colleague Gemma and
is cracking on with making little Thiago hearts so if you’d like one, you can
comment on the blog and/or send me a message on Facebook or Twitter. Gemma has made
70 hearts already and Angelica has made a dozen or so since yesterday, although
her fingers have taken a bit of a stabbing in the process, poor lass!
Well that’s it for
now, Southampton have just equalised at Spurs so I'd better go and lend a bit of support to the boys..
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