when a child dies. footsteps of a grieving family. (veritas publications, 2008)

People say that one never gets over the death of a child. I never wanted to believe this. It is possible to get over many losses, and I thought that the loss of a child was no exception. This thought, in a sense, was a burden. This burden was lifted one day when a psychotherapist friend remarked that one never really gets over the death of a child. She did not realise how her comment impacted on me. But I believed her because she is a highly skilled therapist with long experience, and it validated how I felt, so long after Cathal had died. It made me accept the reality that I had been trying to dismiss, pretending that after a number of years I could be perfectly happy, even though I knew deep down that I would never forget. Of course, there is no forgetting, and there is sometimes some element of pain, as I suspect there will be for as long as I live. There will always be a nagging feeling of loss, some unease beneath the surface. It is not always apparent, but it is never absent. There is no perfect happiness following the death of a child.