TCF News, Spring 2023

Spring 2023 - TCF Newsletter | tcf.org.uk 6 Two different bereavements I am both a bereaved mother and a widow. My late husband, Mick, and I joined TCF six weeks after our adult daughter, Sarah, died in a white water rafting accident in Peru in May 2000. A colleague of mine, Ian Robertson, knew the then president of TCF, Graham Peart. Ian made me promise to phone Graham Peart. I did so in the midst of my tears. I learned that Graham’s 4 year old daughter had drowned in a swimming pool. We cried together on the phone. Graham told me about the National Gathering coming up in two weeks time. Clutching at straws, my husband and I decided to go. We were greeted warmly by our first compassionate friend, Dinah Perkins, who I will always love. TCF provided the help we so desperately needed early on. We learned that there are good people in this world, that is possible to lead a meaningful life even after the most awful loss and that the open wound will become a scar. To use cliches, we are part of a terrible club that nobody wants to be in but where one meets wonderful people; and that one “learns to live” with the death of a child. We certainly don’t want “closure”, we need to remember our children and never let talking about them become a taboo subject. For the first three or four years we took help from TCF and then started to repay our debts. We ran discussion groups, I typically became involved in “Sudden death”. I also ran, less often a group called, “Death of a child abroad”. This was more practical dealing with economic, legal and linguistic issues. Meanwhile my husband sometimes ran the discussion group “Grief without God” as we are humanists. He was best known, however, for his workshop on Creative Writing where he persuaded the participants to come up with poignant and moving poems, some of which were read out at the closing words. In addition, Mick edited this publication – TCF News - for a number of years. We have learned to live with our loss although we still remember Sarah and celebrate her birthday and the day of her death every year. The open wound has become a scar and now some 22 years on, we cry much less about Sarah and are grateful we are not in those black, black days of the first two or three years. So that is the first loss, what about Mick? In May 2021, he was diagnosed with bowel cancer that had spread to his liver. We had excellent treatment from the NHS and Marie Curie nurses. A hospital bed was provided and help came from the hospice, the early intervention team and local district nurses. However, on August 27th, he was admitted to a private nursing home arranged by Suffolk Family Carers. My surviving daughter, Anna ,drove us there and Mick admired the Suffolk countryside. He walked into the home but sadly he died 8 days later on September 4th 2022. He was 87 years old. Of course, I miss him, we have been married for over 60 years and, of course, his death is sad but it is not wrong like Sarah’s death was. No parent should outlive their children and I have told my two surviving children that their only job is to outlive me. Remembering Michael (Mick) Wilson By Barbara Wilson