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My baby brother was buried today

40 replies

WishIWasSomewhereElse · 22/07/2020 20:16

I posted before about his passing. His funeral was today. It wasn't conventional. My dad wanted to conduct his own graveside service, but was too distressed to do so, so my mum stepped up with a beautiful eulogy.

I will post the poem I read called Jamie if you don't mind.

What use is the sun in a world without you?
Mocking me with it's cheerful glow
What use is the moon if it doesn't shine on your face
Muse to thousands of songs, but to me just a rock in lonely space

Tell the birds to be quiet as they fly on the wing
Tell the church bells to stifle their pealing ring
Dawn chorus has been cancelled, birds can no longer sing
The once found joy, they can no longer bring

If I could have saved you, I surely would
I'd break down invisible barriers to bring you back
I'd carry on where even defeated armies stood
Roar with a fury, so fearsome even time stood still in it's track

But I'm just a broken into pieces thing
Nothing left inside me wants to sing
Memories, tossed, tattered and torn
Like the pages of an old book, dog-eared and worn

I'm just an empty shell of who I used to be
Having to live in a world without you in, you see
You'll never know how much you meant to me
And how much I will miss you for eternity

OP posts:
cafenoirbiscuit · 22/07/2020 22:33

Precious lovely Jamie 💔😘😢

Pinkglower · 22/07/2020 22:47

ThanksThanksThanks

Comefromaway · 22/07/2020 22:51

The poem is beautiful. What a wonderful tribute. Wishing you and your family the strength to get through this time.

WishIWasSomewhereElse · 23/07/2020 11:10

@Bairnsmum05 I'm sorry for the loss of your dad x

@Lifeispassingby @LittleRen sorry for the losses of your brothers. My DH lost his brother, so he understands how I feel. He went spiralling into depression after his brother died. My brother and I were also very close. Our whole family our close, we live in each others pockets. We never really grew up and moved away, like 'normal' families, our children just became new additions.

I feel incredibly guilty today. We went to my baby daughter's grave yesterday, before the funeral, and I showed her a photo of her uncle, and told her he'd be there with her now, but I feel like I've betrayed her. I feel so damned devastated by the loss of my brother that I feel guilty that I'm not crying over her. I feel like a crap mother. I didn't realise after the all-consuming, suffocating pain of her death, that I could ever experience that pain again, yet here I am. And I am utterly bewildered by it.

I read that losing a sibling is like losing your past, present and future and that is damned right.

My DD has drawn pictures of her sister and uncle together, she got it before I did.

@StopGo I was perhaps harsh on my sister. She and I differ widely on how we handle grief. We visited him the day before the funeral. I'd arranged to go in with my (adult) son. She insisted I go in with her (although I'd promised my son beforehand, I'm not assertive). He came out howling...I've never seen him like that. He was like a tiny boy and my maternal instinct kicked in and I felt anger. Anger at myself for not standing up for him and to her, and going in with like planned. So when she said we'd go in together, I refused.... I guess she thought it would be nice, two sisters together, but I wanted to be there for my child. She went with her son the next morning - she went in with him....

My dad is so devastated. He has terminal cancer. My brother would take me to the hospital to see him after his operation.

The care home treated my brother appallingly during lockdown (we never visited him there, we never, ever saw it, he was moved there and all rehab stopped due to CV-19).

He looked like a hobo - his beard was down to his chest, he'd lost half his body weight....

It wasn't his cerebellum dysfunction (we don't know what), that killed him, we were told with rehab he would regain some semblance of a normal life...it was aspiration pneumonia, he caught in hospital, when he was taken in with a UTI.

I saw him on the Sunday, and his blood results had improved, by Monday night they'd stopped all antibiotics and removed his NG tube.. and he died on the Tuesday...

OP posts:
Pavlova31 · 23/07/2020 16:12

Flowers Sending love to you and your family Flowers

Katinski · 23/07/2020 17:05

FlowersFlowersFlowers tho 3 bunches of flowers just isn't enough. I'm so very sorry for your loss.

WishIWasSomewhereElse · 23/07/2020 17:34

Here are the other two poems from his funeral. I would love to post a photo of his grave, which has a montage of photos of his beautiful face, but don't know if it's appropriate. I was wrong about trying to compare grief earlier I had PTSD after my DD died. I posted on here about her all the time. I had hoped never to feel pain like it again.

What happens when the tears stop to fall
When the taste of salt water no longer lingers on my lips
When the wailing sound begins to stall
The wrenching pain, starts to slip

What happens when the world begins to have colour
When a colourful bow lights up the sky after rain
Why can't everything always stay duller
Why does time always ease pain

How can I be sure that I won't forget
That you won't slip into the crevices of time
All our shared memories won't be under threat
To lose even one precious moment, would be a wretched crime

What happens when the tears stop to fall
And we forge a life without you
Through the wind will we still hear you call
And feel your tears on the morning dew

Let Hades Wait

Fly high, in the celestial sky
Be in every shooting star
Let the moon be your avatar
Let Hades wait, bye and bye

Send a sign from up there
Be as bright as a solar flare
let Hades wait in his lair
He will still get his share
You still have those living who care

Be the wind howling as thunder
Or gentle through leaves, like a whispering wonder
Let Hades wait, in his world down under
He can wait, just a little longer

Be in our dreams, we want to see your face
Hear your voice, even...embrace
Let Hades wait, he will have you for eternity
We just want you...let Hades wait!

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Alonelonelyloner · 23/07/2020 18:55

Oh @WishIWasSomewhereElse it is many years since I lost my little brother but it is one of the few things that will reduce me to a sobbing mess within seconds.

I lost my soul mate a couple of years ago and it was just a repeat of the terrible loss.

Now I am so afraid of loss. Of the pain of it. It's a physical thud in the chest and an emptiness that echoes.

I am so so sorry. I feel heartbroken for you knowing right now as I write, you are suffering. I'm so sorry.

WishIWasSomewhereElse · 23/07/2020 19:30

@Alonelonelyloner That's exactly it, that describes the feeling perfectly. I am so sorry for your losses x

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DisgraceToTheYChromosome · 23/07/2020 19:33
Flowers
WishIWasSomewhereElse · 24/07/2020 01:23

It still doesn't feel real. He looked so peaceful and well in his coffin, compared to in the hospital.

I still cannot understand how he was getting better one day, then they removed treatment the next.

OP posts:
FredAstaireAteMyHamSandwich · 24/07/2020 02:41

I’m so sorry for your loss xx

Georgieporgie29 · 24/07/2020 09:06

Flowers I am so sorry for your losses xx

fitzbilly · 24/07/2020 09:09

I'm so sorry. My heart goes out to you.

I lost my brother in april and due to lockdown couldn't even attend the funeral as it was in another country and we couldn't get to it. The pain is very raw.

Big hugs.

WishIWasSomewhereElse · 24/07/2020 12:57

@fitzbilly How awful that you couldn't attend your beloved brother's funeral. I am so sorry Flowers. Covid-19 and lockdown has really, really been shit!

I'm feeling incredibly wobbly again, as Facebook memories showed me a poem of mine that my brother loved and shared, on this day, four years ago. I am so very sad that he never heard the ones I actually wrote for him x

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