Oh, that sounds so sensible. Having never been in the situation myself I suppose I shouldn't comment, and everyone grieves in their own way, but I always worry a bit when I hear of people, especially parents of children and young people, leaving their rooms exactly as they were, down to pyjamas on the bed, clothes in the wardrobe, posters on walls, etc. It seems a bit unhealthy to me, as though they want to try and live in the past. Your sister's approach sounds so much more positive and constructive.Katharine wrote:Thank you Nasty Mum for that, very interesting, I must look for that book. Will it help me with my 30+ sons, I wonder?
I think we are bearing up, Caroline. I let out a cheer on Thursday night after I put the phone down when I had been speaking to Mother. She had told me that I was wasting my money on phoning her so much - she was back to being Mother! No amount of explanation would get through to her that calls in the evening are free, she is still in her mind the poor vicar's wife whose children had to go to CH for a decent education as they did not have 2 pennies to rub together. I did not phone her yesterday but will tonight in case her thoughts are resting on 'this time last week'.
My sister is being amazing, she admits to very black times, but in the better times she is celebrating the funky young man that he was. It hurts her that she has been hankering for one of her sons to move out so she could have a craft room - now she has the chance. She says she will redecorate and be able to craft and remember without making a shrine.
I am glad to hear she and the rest of the family are coping. My limited experience of any sort of grief or trauma is that you have good days and bad days, until you start to realise the good are outnumbering the bad. The funeral will be a milestone but watch out for her a few weeks afterwards when the adrenalin has stopped carrying her through and things are "back to normal", and people have stopped asking how she is, except that they will never be that sort of normal again. That's when she will need most support - at least according to some of my friends who have been bereaved (not children, but widowed quite young). They say that it hits you most just when people think you should be over the worst and getting on with life. But projects such as redecorating the room and working on her crafts should help to give her a focus.
Oh dear, listen to me.... I said I shouldn't comment but there I've gone and doled out some advice after all. Probably inappropriate, but well-intentioned, and based on experience, even if not my own.
