Re: life goes on
I have lost various people at different stages of my life....
When I was 8, i lost my nana (who lived with us and we grew up with), he died in hospital suddenly..he had been in and out of hospital all the time that he lived with us (so like from when I was born) but this time I just found it so hard to comprehend that he died there...for a good few years after he died, I didn't go near the hospital, didn't want to drive past and the few times I had to go (to accompany my nani for appointments and stuff) it upset me a lot.
Then at the age of 15 I lost my nani through cancer, it was a long hard slog, seeing her deterioration over 4 months...I had a close bond with her and this time, getting used to the fact that she just wasn't there took it out of me...I used to reminisce about things we'd done together, things she taught me and I used to do things like wear her clothes....her dupattas and stuff..even to this day, even my hubby says "You talk about nani so much, in everything - more that you talk about mum"..even now, I make the food she used to in the way she used to...in many ways, I haven't got over her loss even though it's now been nearly 13 years.
At the age of 22 I lost my first baby through miscarriage........
At the age of 23 I lost my second baby through miscarriage...........
The grief for both these losses has never gone away, and I am finding it harder to cope with these losses even some almost 6 years later than I did of my grandfather at the age of 8...at that time I managed to be rational and function, these losses have made me irrational...which makes it hard to comprehend because I knew my grandfather for like 8 years, nearly 9, but I knew my babies for 16 and 10 weeks...............
At the age of 24 I lost my dadi..I had never met her, as my parents divorced when I was 4......she lived in india....I had never seen her even! That hurt, because my sister, although hadn't met her, had at least seen her when she visited India...I still felt a loss when I heard of her death.....but this hasn't lingered..although I have some regret at never having seen her..but that was out of my hands..
When I was 21, my cousin who was about 18 who I had never met died in a freak accident in India while he was on a train...he died instantly. I felt grief for the way he died, and then when people spoke so fondly of him I wish we had met....
When I was 24 another cousin died in a horrible car accident in South Africa...and he was such a nice person, I met him so many times and a week before he died, he'd visited me at home in the UK....
With the deaths of my cousins their sudden deaths really shocked me, and in the case of the second cousin, because I was married and living away from mum, I was expected to call and pay respects to his parents....I couldn't do it.
I truly believe that you cope in a different way for each and every loss - because each and every loss is in it's own way unique....all we can do is pray for the deceased and make dua that Allah SWT grants them their deserved place in Jannah ameen)