Bowel cancer, stoma, illestomy bags, my journey with my fathers illness

ERICS_MUM

We had All Things Bright and Beautiful' for Mum, her favourite hymn she remembered singing at school in the 1930's ! Because we are a small family with only 18 at the funeral we had the choral version played instead of the instrumental. It was ideal, just a background of the choir so our feeble voices didn't sound so bad !

My brother chose a Nat King Cole song for our 'leaving' song. The vicar pulled a face but it meant something to my brother, he told us the story about Mum and the song.

The Vicar told us the first time we met him that the funeral is more for the family who should organise it around their memories, unless of course the deceased left specific instructions.

It's a horrible time between the death and the funeral, we had to wait nearly 4 weeks as the crematorium was busy. For us, the funeral was like a 'full stop'. Afterwards we started to grieve more calmly rather than fret about her illness and time in hospital. Difficult to explain but things have been better since the funeral.

All the very best for you and your family. One comforting thought is that you did your best for Dad, he was happy, you made lots of memories and had time to say everything you wanted to say.

EM xx

mum2one

Thank you both...

Savvy Sue - thats so weird as the song I choose for dad was the "I'll never find another you", mum choose the one about the carnival, (useless with titles), then hymns so far we've choosen The Old Rugged Cross, and not 100% sure on 2nd - have to decide soon.

Erics Mum, Those song choices sound lovely, and def personal to you, dad left no instructions bar cremation and that he doesn't want the vicar at the hospice.... In a way I'm glad we knew that he was on borrowed time, we spoke about a lot of stuff, and made some memories,
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Todays update....

The GP rang this morning, she was doing the death certificate - massive relief, so picked up my little bit of it, booked an appointment for 2mor to register it all.

DD - She had a GP appointment - for a quick check up - the gp said she is not to go back to school this week, not just losing dad, last week she was assaulted at school, there was an incident last ngt with a school friend.... (she sent out snapchat - she had razor cut her arms....) 11pm last ngt I'm driving round the streets looking for the house as DD only knew it by sight, (we got the right house), def shocked the parents... knocked DD for 6 to say the least...

Popped a few notes in the post to let people we met on holiday over the yrs, and Christmas card exchange, - seemed easier to do that.

Online shopping done for this week, - mini shop by comparison - need to do a bit of run down and see what we have. We've sent mini food parcels to a couple of the neighbours - dads food cravings, kippers, black pudding, soups, school type rice puds etc.

Emotions - We've done pretty well between us, it sounds odd, but for me I did most of my grieving back in Feb, as I did all the hospital appointments with him,

Collection - We came to a decision about that, we said cancer - but where do u go, hospital where he was treated, cancer research in general, specialist research for each cancer, McMillian or hospice... So we decided a 50/50 split...

Local Hospice - When he had cancer originally in 2014, the local hospice arranged for him to attend weekly, hense the time with them meant best choice

Dogs Trust - He loved dogs, and literally within 12mths of being married - he had gone horse racing, lost a wack of money - came home with their first dog.... in over 50 yrs the longest he was ever without a dog was 3 weeks, we supported our local dogs trust.

Hopefully a gd ngts sleep 2ngt (that is dependant on the dog!!) xx

mum2one

Todays update...

Little lie in, slept well, then 930am, the calls started.... (nice friends so dont mind).

Met the funeral directors, - they were so lovely, and went through everything, bless there hearts as I had got the registar booked for pm, they went ahead as thou we had all documents...

Coffin In - There never be another you (the seekers)
Hymn 1 - The Lord is my shepherd
Hymn 2 - The Old Rugged Cross
Last Song - The carnival is over

Asked for the curtains to be closed...

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Flowers - I was dreading the cost... as you see massive displays... but they had a lovely florist nxt dr, - we had got 2 lovely posy / sprays - £40 each. They look beautiful means we can take them to the hospice.

They were going to get Dad today from the hospital

Trying to get a date, they said looking at around 6th June onwards.... when they rang a miracle happened... there was one last slot for next Thursday - grabbed it..

....
Quick sandwich at home... then the registers office...

Thats where the fun begins....

Asked have I got the cert from doctor - yep safe in my purse... no wonder the registar looked at me weirdly....

The doctor had given me the receipt for the death certificate - not the actual certificate.... they took pity on me, and did all the calling / tracking it / added another hr to the wait... I was starting to panic - as the GP that signed it only works Mon to Wed... if other docs had not signed a new one could have been pm etc...

Had to nip to supermarket, so went and brought a £2 bunch of carnations to say thank you, when took them back the lady had a tear in her eye...

All sorted...

Arranged a wake for afterwards...

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Tomorrows plans...
Start the list of who needs to be told (done some by facebook / text / couple of calls - finish the rest 2mor.

Then start the calls / close down accounts etc etc/ xx

Mojisola

mum2one wrote: »

Asked have I got the cert from doctor - yep safe in my purse... no wonder the registar looked at me weirdly....

The doctor had given me the receipt for the death certificate - not the actual certificate....

Have you been to the Register Office and registered the death yet?

ERICS_MUM

I don't know if this is something you like the sound of or if you'd find it a bit creepy!

For the wake after Mum's funeral on 29/3 I made a montage of photos of Mum, going back to her first birthday in 1924 and through to a few weeks before she died. Luckily I'm the 'keeper' of old family photos so I had quite a few to choose from. I mounted them on one of those cheap stretched canvas frames from The Works (3x4 feet !) and spelt Mums name out on bunting that I draped across the top. It was a lovely tribute and everyone enjoyed looking - where possible I'd included pics of Mum with other family members, friends and pets. I took a photo of it for my album. We also raised a toast to Mum with Asti Spumante, the only wine she would drink and then only at Christmas Day lunch !

Anyway we enjoyed these small touches, they raised our spirits on an otherwise very sombre day.

EM. Xxx

mum2one

Mojisola wrote: »

Have you been to the Register Office and registered the death yet?

Managed to get that sorted yesterday, the doctor was faxing paperwork across so they let me get it sorted xx

mum2one

ERICS_MUM wrote: »

I don't know if this is something you like the sound of or if you'd find it a bit creepy!

For the wake after Mum's funeral on 29/3 I made a montage of photos of Mum, going back to her first birthday in 1924 and through to a few weeks before she died. Luckily I'm the 'keeper' of old family photos so I had quite a few to choose from. I mounted them on one of those cheap stretched canvas frames from The Works (3x4 feet !) and spelt Mums name out on bunting that I draped across the top. It was a lovely tribute and everyone enjoyed looking - where possible I'd included pics of Mum with other family members, friends and pets. I took a photo of it for my album. We also raised a toast to Mum with Asti Spumante, the only wine she would drink and then only at Christmas Day lunch !

Anyway we enjoyed these small touches, they raised our spirits on an otherwise very sombre day.

EM. Xxx

That sounds lovely, my daughter asked could we put some photos of dad around, love the sound of the canvas, ditto here we have Wack of photos, got one of him when he was a baby dressed in a dress, xx

Mojisola

mum2one wrote: »

Managed to get that sorted yesterday, the doctor was faxing paperwork across so they let me get it sorted xx

Did you use the Tell Us Once service? That saved us a lot of work, not needing to contact all the government agencies.

mum2one

Mojisola wrote: »

Did you use the Tell Us Once service? That saved us a lot of work, not needing to contact all the government agencies.

Yes, used that sounds an absolute godsend... I'd already rang the Attendance allowance and carers side, at this takes some pressure off xx

mum2one

we went to see Dad yesterday, he was at peace, he looked well, and didnt look in pain.

Organising...
Sorted out the wake.
Upset some relatives - times not suitable / dont I realise they need to get taxis to and from the wake never mind the service.... They were politely told - you dont have to come if you dont want to.....

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Slowly working throu my to do list / notifying people, main companies are done, got to do banks - take in cert next week.

...
The minister has come today and arranged the service, he is doing the speech for us, I would break down, he suggested a poem, said would suit dad to a T, can't remember for the life on me what it was...

...
One thing that we said summed up dad, he loved to travel although he got to Manchester airport many times, he never got further than the car-park....

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We're doing well xxx