Three days after publishing it, that relative died.
It has taken me some time to come to terms with her death less than three weeks after her transfer to a specialised centre with palliative care. The first thought that came to mind was, would she have lived longer if I had stayed with her? Managing the health problems, which had crossed the line into medical care, was what had prompted me to look for professionals to take over from me. Now I am not so sure it was the right decision.
Although she died surrounded by friends from her church, she was not in her own home of fifty-five years.
I am convinced that I prolonged her life by living with her for a year, but guilt still niggles at me that for a matter of three weeks, she might have had the comfort of dying in her own bed. No amount of rationalizing by family or friends will ever remove that doubt or guilt.
Her funeral, in London, UK, is planned for the 8th of April.
When so many people are cremated today, I do have a smidgen of comfort knowing that she is to be buried in the same grave as her mother, my grandmother.
She has requested in her will that the gravestone be inscribed with the words ‘The Best Is Yet To Be’; another small source of reprieve to think that she didn’t mind leaving this world.
It will, however, take some time before those memories of happier moments, which I mentioned in the previous blog, escape from beneath the shroud of guilt with which I’ve now covered them.