Send me a postcard - In the name of Thiago - Day 109
I had a lovely chat with Gayle from the charity ‘A Child of Mine’ today. Gayle has provided support to me as I’ve been grieving for the loss of my little man. Her support means a lot to me as she’s been through exactly the same process herself.
I vowed today to join
one of her bereaved parent groups that come up to the north part of
Staffordshire and Angelica is quite keen to come along as well, so that’s a big
thing for me. I’ve said it before on here but the way that Angelica and I
grieve for Thiago is very different and I must be honest here and say that it
has come close, from my end at least, to causing a certain level of disharmony
in our relationship, which is what neither of us need at all at the moment.
The other reason I
mention this is that Gayle has also been sending me these little postcards from
time to time, which I find very comforting. This one was also the source of
much amusement when I was on loudspeaker, talking to my brother Judd the other
night. Elisa read the postcard in the dining room, walked through to the
kitchen and quoted it verbatim when my brother starting talking about how he
was determined to adopt a positive mindset. I laughed solidly for the next five
minutes at her comic timing.
Angelica has been off
work today so we were back to the dynamic of having the three of us clambering
over each other. I do feel for those families much larger than mine – which is
a bloody weird thing to write when your son has not long died – where it
becomes very difficult to work.
There’s a lady I work
with who faces that dilemma. This is when others need to remember that this is not
the usual working from home scenario. So if you don’t get much done on a
particular day because little Johnny has decided to shit everywhere and Sarah
is having a complete meltdown, then employers need to give you breathing space.
Because these are not normal times frankly.
With Elisa it’s almost
the opposite situation. The less time I am around her, sometimes I think the
better it is. Well for her at least. My biggest problem being a parent is to
want too much for her. She’s a very smart lass but she’s lazy, like I was. I guess
I just don’t want her to be nearly 44 and having regrets about what might have
been.
Griz has been chilling
today. After a hard day painting the fence panels yesterday, Elisa decided that
he should be able to relax and so here he is in full glory on the driveway. You’ll
note his titfer has been replaced with a headband in a nod to the increasingly warm
weather we’re experiencing, which looks like it will drop off in time for the
weekend. Typical.
On seeing the plastic
cup to his right, one lady stopped to ask me what we were collecting for. She
seemed slightly surprised when we said that there was no ulterior motive other
than to entertain passers-by as they well, passed by.
We had a little family
barbecue this evening, which went a bit awry. I tried a little too hard to get
Elisa to do her cello practice before we had something to eat and now she’s got
the hump with me. It has meant that we are all going our separate ways this
evening. Sometimes you just need space.
Take care everyone and
try to be kind to each other. If you fancy being kind to me – I’m pleased with
that one, though it is becoming devilishly tricky to keeping finding new ways
to segue into the request for support line – then the easiest way to do that is
to donate to my fundraising cause as I remember my little man. Night all.
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