Compassion Magazine Winter 2022

Winter 2022 - Compassion | www.tcf.org.uk 7 I believe that we have learnt so much over the last three years. Although we have gone back to in person meetings we have not abandoned the benefits of on-line and we are still using them for our volunteer meetings and some specialist and guest sessions. Of course, it has helped our executive to communicate with the volunteers and each other irrespective of the geographical location of everyone involved. I am very glad that we are now able to meet in person, especially our support groups and have been doing so for some time. There is something about being in a room with each other and being next to someone who speaks the same bereavement language as you. The meetings are so important for all bereaved parents and siblings and especially those in the early years. Something happened last week at our North London meeting that left an impression on me and reminded me just how important our Charity is for bereaved parents and siblings and especially those in the early years. We had a very large number turn up, there were 19 of us. As usual, we invited everyone to introduce themselves to the group. As I always do I tell everyone that I am ‘Fabian’s Dad’, that he died almost 8 years ago when he was 19 years old. But last week I also mentioned that a few days earlier would have been Fabian’s 27th birthday and that we had got together for a Sunday brunch with a group of six of Fabian’s school friends. This has been a regular way of marking Fabian’s birthday since he died in 2015. Without thinking, I spoke from my heart and said, “it was such a lovely day for me.” A parent who had been bereaved for under two years asked me how I could say such a thing. How could I say that remembering and commemorating Fabian’s birthday was a ‘lovely’ day. How could it ever be a lovely day? I realised that when I was at that stage of grief, I might have asked the very same question. But now, some 8 years on, I was able to respond and explain why I had used the word ‘lovely’. I told the parent and the group that for me it was always lovely to see Fabian’s friends coming together to remember him. They do not come simply because I ask them, they genuinely come to be together, to talk about him, to remember him and to feel everything they do about each other because of the memory of Fabian and of his passing. Fabian is no longer with us physically but he is still loved and remembered and cherished. All of that is lovely to me and very comforting. Why did this leave such an impression on me, so much so that I wanted to share it with all of you? In short it showed me and reinforced just how important our charity is. The exchange we have as parents, both at different