These entries begin shortly after Anna’s funeral and cremation in July 2016. They are based on text messages, email and journal entries. Anna and Conal had been together since 1978.
July 20: Anna’s ashes are dropped back. The local Palliative Respite charity shop has come to collect Anna’s wheelchair, the forearm walker.
I feel deflated. Why? After months – if not years – on a crazy, death-defying roller coaster I am now at the end of this manic ride and am now wandering around in the bright sunshine wondering “Well, what happens now?”.
I feel washed out. Almost-empty. The inner strength I’ve needed over the last nine months in particular is no longer required.
It is bizarre. Do you say Good Morning to the ashes? I say Good Night to her photo, why not the ashes? Grief has made all of us mad.
Conal Healy, Grief Survivor
The giant balloon that has been filling and filling when I was caring for Anna didn’t burst … and is now deflating back to Normal size where I only have to care for the kids and myself. I am now back in the real world where I have to concern myself with bills, mortgages and a child studying for the High School Certificate. I wonder if my only living day-to-day existence is coming to an end?
Obviously I am starting a new part of my life, a life without Anna. It will be hard, but I knew this day was coming. I know I am letting go of Anna – my love – and moving on. I just have to get used to this huge feeling of emptiness, the space that was the domain of Anna.
I look at Anna’s ashes and wonder: How could somebody with so much personality, such a big character, with such heart and personality …be reduced to two urns of ashes?
It was hard to write about the ashes, am close to tears, but the tears shows how much grieving I still have to do.
July 26: It has been a month since Anna’s death. It’s my birthday. I am sitting here drinking beer. Feeling sorry for myself. Watching bad TV. Nobody remembers it is my birthday. There are no presents. No cake. No candles. My Son is too upset (about Anna) to talk, so we ate a specially prepared roast dinner in virtual silence. (My Son realized Anna is not coming back.) We are like bears wandering around a big cave. Probably my worst birthday, ever.
Today, I bumped into a mate who lost his wife to cancer about eight years ago … he is still mourning her.
It was a bad day for me. A really bad day. Forced myself out of bed at 7.30am this morning, to go for a cycle. A long bike ride sometimes makes me feel feel better – today it didn’t work.
Trying not to think of Anna. Otherwise, I will cry. It is surreal. I have Anna’s ashes nearby, on a table beside her day bed, there are flowers and photos beside the ashes.
It isn’t a shrine. Just where the hell do you put them? Obviously in a graveyard. But until then?
It is bizarre. Do you say Good Morning to the ashes? I say Good Night to her photo, why not the ashes? Grief has made all of us mad. We have taken gallows humour to a whole new level.
Our humour is dark. Black.
“Anna has lost weight” I told the funeral director this week when he handed me the urns containing her ashes.
Is that a bad thing to say? *Sigh.*
I didn’t even look at the funeral director’s face … to see if there was a reaction to my weight-loss joke.
July 27: I am slowly recovering my life. I’ve noticed that I am starting to speed up again.
For example, two months ago I would use the 120 seconds it took to make a bowl of porridge to get Anna’s medications ready for the day. A month ago, it was taking me 1.2 hours to get motivated to have breakfast (this was before the funeral).
Now it taking me 12 minutes to made the same bowl of porridge. It still takes 120 seconds to make in the microwave … but I have to find the milk in the fridge, measure the milk, watch the bowl rotate, be distracted, wander out to hang out the clothes and remember there was a bowl of porridge in the microwave and return to the kitchen.
A month ago I had a 10-minute attention span. I would start a job, folding the washing, but after 10 minutes I’d say “What is the point?” and wander away (leaving the pile of washing) and begin another mess elsewhere.
These days, I force myself to finish something once I’ve started. Going back to work today has forced me to plan ahead. I have to prepare meals in advance, because I know I hate cooking a meal after working an 8.5 hour shift.
We are living one-day at that time, but now have to plan a week ahead.
July 31: Take Anna’s day bed apart, put it in the garage. Washed the bed linen and put it away. Taking apart the day bed is another small step in the grieving process. I did look around the room a few times to see if there were objections. There were none, so I carried on. I re-arranged the furniture downstairs too.
(NB: When Anna was released from the Palliative Care ward at the Tweed hospital we converted the downstairs sitting room into a bedroom for her.)
August 4: Yesterday was a no-cry day. I am going for three days in a row without crying. Am reminded of the song by the Beatles, Getting Better All Time.
Getting Better All Time (Lennon/McCartney) I've got to admit it's getting better (Better) A little better all the time (It can't get no worse) I have to admit it's getting better (Better) It's getting better Getting so much better all the time!
Ashes? What next?
