Hi Karena,
It is very hard, when everyone has got someone to go home to and go out and do things with.
I feel like life for me now, is like having an out of body experience, where I am just looking in on life and what everyone is doing.
In the beginning, most people are sympathetic, then it gradually wears off, as they really don't want to know about how you are feeling. I am finding this now, more and more, friends and relatives that would phone me every week, don't bother anymore and I don't phone them now, as they are obviously don't want to be bothered.
Things just get worse I think, I don't know if I told you, but when it came to arranging Janice's funeral, I had a major fall out with my Daughter, the problem with her is, she likes to be in control, she likes being the centre of attention, so she is telling me about all the people that she wants there, well, quite a few of them, Janice had no time for whatsoever, so I ruled those out straight away, then there were family members, a couple of sister in laws, that Janice never got on with and a lot of family members , who never bother to ring or visit to see how she was when she was here, so I thought, well you didn't worry about her when she was alive, so I consider it will be an insult them being there.
Anyway, my Daughter did not like this, so I said " Ok Sharon, you have your PITY PARTY, and everyone can say poor Sharon, I said if that's the case, then, its going to be hard, but I won't go, I know, that as a Spiritualist, her spirit has left her body, so the funeral, is just her she'll, I said I will have my own private time with her. Well, believe it or not, I didn't have one sympathy card from anyone in the family, Sharon got them all and was also sent flowers and got all the visits and phone calls. Well, eventually , Sharon said, ok then, it will just be the five of us, meaning, her, her husband, our son and his partner and me, but Amy came as well, so I said ok, that's fine, so there were six of us at Janice's funeral, not one of the family have contacted me since. What hurts now is, Sharon asked me for one of Janice's poems last week, so I was curious as to why now, she said , " Oh, when we come back from our holiday, we are meeting up with all the family, down at Bracklesham and I am going to read the poem out and we are going to let balloons off for Mum," so I have become an outcast now, so as I say, it hasn't got any better for me, it just gets worse, I wish she hadn't told me .
Things between us are not the sane now, still very tense. The youngest Daughter, we have not seen, for about nine years, she never came to see Janice in hospital, or never visited us, in that time and she never came to Janice's funeral. xx