There's Always Light at the End of the Tunnel

Over the past couple of weeks I have been thinking a lot about my mum and specifically about her death and each and every time I think about her I begin to get tearful and find myself asking the same question over and over again, when will it get easier? When my mum died and indeed before my mum died people told me it gets easier, things will be ok and that as time goes by it gets easier to deal with her death, but does it? Does it ever get easier? I still think about my mum everyday, I remember her death so vividly, I can still feel the atmosphere from the hospice room, I can still feel my back against the wall and I can still her the nurses soft voice almost whisper "she's gone". The pain doesn't go away, the hole in my heart has never been filled and the constant reminder that I am never going to see my mum, hug my mum or even talk to my mum again never goes away. Each time I think of my mum, despite the positivists I am plagued with all the negatives, the can...

Something happened to me about a week and a half ago, something which I never expected to happen and something which was really out of the blue, about a week and a half ago a family member from my mothers side made contact with me. I know you may be thinking what is so surprising about that but you have to understand that my interaction with my mothers side of the family decreased incredibly after her death. A week and a half ago I received a friend request of Facebook from my godmother who also happens to be one of my mums cousins. Now initially I wasn't sure who the person was as a result of the change in last name but after a few moments it clicked with me who she was. Now I'm not great with building relationships and it is something which I have spent a lot of time working on both personally and professionally as a result of the nature of youth work but again it is still something which I can often struggle with. When accepting this friend request I didn't think anyt...

It’s crazy how time goes by so fast. This time last year I was on holidays in sunny Spain with my granddad and my brother Paul. Many people think a holiday in Spain would be great but not this holiday, this holiday was one that I will never be able to forget. While in Spain nearing the end of our holiday my granddad got very ill, he was taken into hospital where he passed away because of a heart attack. During the whole experience of being in a hospital where the doctors don’t speak English and that I was on my own with my brother I was terrified. I was scared that my granddad was going to die but I was also scared because my granddad was blind and half deaf so I was scared for him. I tried to stay positive during the whole thing but it was very hard and in the end the outcome was very much a negative one. While we were in Spain part of me thought because he is such a strong man he will pull through this. I mean he went into a diabetic coma once and came out of that stronge...

I blogged about my granddad before and well I wanted to blog about him again. My granddad was a wise man he was like a book of knowledge and he had a story for everything. Every day we heard a new story or the same story as before but with something that he forgot to tell us about. Right up until the day that he died he was telling us stories. Not many people really live their life but I can assure that my granddad lived his life to the full. He has done everything..... He travelled to lots of different countries, owned a shop, became a knight, set up the order of Malta in Celbridge he became an honorary Carmelite and so much more. I think that it’s safe to say that my granddad will defiantly be remembered and not just by family members but by everybody who had the pleasure of meeting my granddad. He will be missed on the annual Carmelite pilgrimages to Lourdes and by the friends that he made when he went to Cork to train with his guide dog. He will be remembered by all of the oth...

A couple of weeks ago my uncle moved to Spain because he got a new job. He moved to Marbella a place where I have gone many times before with my Granddad. I’m really close to my uncle and we have talked about me going over to visit him this summer. I really like going to Spain I have been there the last four years in a row with my granddad and so I know they area really well and I can get around no problem on my own. My uncle says I can go over anytime I want and my dad said that I can go over any time I want to the only problem is I don’t know if I’m ready to go back there just yet. Because this has been my T.Y blog up until summer I haven’t had the chance to blog about personal things so I’m going to explain why I don’t think that I am ready to go back to Spain this year. Last summer I went over to Spain with my Granddad, my dad and my brother Paul. After my mam died I got really close to my granddad and so did my two brothers. Me and Paul and Shane pretty much done all that we coul...