Love, Loss and Learn

'I am sitting on my new pink sofa, sipping Baileys in a sitting room decked with a huge Christmas tree. As I sit there, I reflect on what I achieved in 2021, smiling. My business has grown, I am working with my ideal clients, I have found my voice, my social media strategy is on fire and I no longer hide behind being busy; I am proud, delighted and have a great work-life balance. Cue ice rattling in my glass of Bailey's feeling content, happy and a little bit smug.'

That is what Christmas 2021 looked like during my visualisation exercise with my business coach Kirsty Waite in January 2021. I wanted this; I was excited to get started and implement all of my plans for a successful, happy 2021.

But Christmas 2021 didn't look like that. Yes, I was working with new clients, my business had grown, and there is real pride in the projects I have worked on.

BUT life had other plans for me; in 2021, we had three significant family bereavements. My father-in-law died at the start of 2021. This was the first big blow for our family. Shortly after, I started to notice something was wrong with mum. Our worst fears were confirmed by June, and we received the devastating news that mum had terminal cancer.

Massive curveball, huge! And with this news, everything was about to change.

So what do you do when you run your own business, have two children and a terminally ill mother? Well, there were several emotional meltdowns, to begin with. I then tried to scale things back and get more help on completing my commitments (big thanks to Katie Labak and Polly Chester ). I worked hard to clear my desk to have more time with mum.

The whole point of me branching out on my own was controlling my diary and being there for my family. So, I made the most of this and started to spend Fridays with mum, blocking out my time on my work calendar. We got around five weeks before mum was too tired for lunch trips out and chatting for hours, despite a hopeful prognosis.

At the start of November 2021, mum was admitted to the hospital. On the 20th of November, whilst visiting mum, the next big blow arrived as I received news of my Aunt's sudden death. The whole family was distraught. It can't get worse, can it?

Yes, it can. Just seven days later, my lovely mum left us.?

Life was never the same.

Everything has changed.

2021 was not my year of visibility but a year of loss. There was no sitting smugly on a pink sofa sipping Bailey's.

It was a year of loss but also a year of love. My husband managed to get home to see his father and say his goodbyes. We spent time with my Aunt at my sister’s wedding at the beginning of November - she is right there at the front of the group wedding party photo, at the head of the family where she belonged. There were lots of hugs that day.

And we were able to be with mum. We had a family photoshoot on our favourite beach, pictures we will treasure forever (thank you, Ema Pruteanu ), and we celebrated mum's 70th birthday just as she wanted. I had lots of chats with mum and spent time brushing her hair, she loved to have her hair brushed. There was no doubt mum knew she was loved by us all.

Her whole life was for her family. Mum was always there for us, always an anchor, and always had our backs throughout our lives. Grief comes in many forms, and I remember crying as life changed due to mum’s illness. A typical act of mum popping in for a cuppa couldn’t happen anymore as her mobility was so affected. The grieving process had already begun with the confirmation of a condition that was foreboding our inevitable loss.

2021 the year of loss - with loss, there are lessons to be learned, and you learn a lot about yourself.

So far, I have learned :

Work will always be there; if you need to change your timelines, then do it. You will get where you are going. Reassess what is important to you. Remember your why – why do you want to work for yourself? What is your purpose? For me, a huge reason has always been my family. And remember, we are all human, and sometimes the best thing you can do is take a bit of time. If you are taken off your path, that's okay. Just enjoy the scenery, reset, and maybe a lesson or two can be learned along the way. Oh, and don't sweat the small stuff; it really doesn't matter in the grand scheme. Just keep doing you.

But what now? Where do you even begin when everything has changed?

For now, I do know I want to help people, to make a difference. I want to help others going through or who have gone through a similar situation as our family. There are things I wish I knew, things I wish to share and things I wish to explore about death and grief. If I can help just one person, I will be happy and feel I am honouring mum through my work. I have now started producing a podcast looking at terminal illness, palliative care and grief. To open up the dialogue offering comfort, support, conversation and information.

'Everything has Changed' – The Grief Podcast will be coming later in 2022

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