Sometimes In Life We Can See The Good Through Our Tears

I am sitting next to my mum holding her hand, just as I have been doing for the last thirty days. They have just turned off the life support; I watched her dying breath as it escaped her tiny body. She had gone to hospital with lower back pain, a complaint that should never have caused the loss of life. My head is in my hands, it feels like my body is being torn apart by the hounds of hell. How in the world could this happen. On arrival she had not been seen by the consultant in charge of that particular ward, the reasoning for this? He was on holiday. On his return after some seven days she was rushed to theatre. But this would prove to be far too late. I had walked with her as far as possible, coming to an abrupt halt at the theatre doors. The last words she spoke were to tell me that she loved me, she would never speak again. She had totally and utterly forgiven me for my part in the madness that had ensued. That day part of me went with her never to be reclaimed. Some months later I would attend a formal hearing, where the duty of care was discussed. Tears are streaming down my face; I can’t focus on anything through the haze. The outcome was never really a surprise for me; once again she would touch the world with fairy dust. During her life she had given freely all that was asked of her, now even in death she had been able to reach out to others. During that meeting steps were taken to alter the macabre situation we had found ourselves in. Never again would anyone go through the torment felt because it increased a consultant’s work load. There is still an invisible thread that runs between us, one that however stretched will always hold fast even in death. They say the good die young, he or she was too good for this world .Both proverbs sit well with me. We may have no comprehension of the path that has been ours to walk. We may have no understanding of the battles we were made to face. But if we share this with others through our pain, they have a meaning a reason for being. We can then take a horrendous situation and spread a little fairy dust of our own.