The next person who tells me we all need to move on...

[Youknowaboutthepaint]

Is likely to get both barrels.

So many people still seem convinced that "the other lot" would be even worse, even though they can't begin to tell me why.

That Christmas, while our esteemed leaders were partying was DH's last. He spent it at home, in pain, without access to the medical care he needed and without seeing anyone except those he lived with.

A few days later he went into to hospital where he stayed for 3 months, without a single visitor. During that time he was told, alone, by telephone because his consultant was shielding, that his cancer was terminal, stil he wasn't allowed any visitors. He never met his oncologist and I had to fight every day to find anyone who would talk to me about his prognosis/ treatment/pain control/return home.

He came home eventually once they'd managed to get his pain under some sort of control, to die, a shadow of the man his DC had last seen, still officially not allowed any visitors. (Although by that point anyone who wanted to visited, I classified as a carer).

Then we had to restrict numbers at his funeral.

All the while those making the decisions that had affected us so badly were having the time of their life. Most are still in power/working in governement, making the laws that affect us all, dishing out or receiving honours, spending our money. And they've lied about it continuously since.

I'm still trying to support severely traumatised children whose lives were badly affected by lockdowns, even if they hadn't had to deal with all the stuff with their dad.

I'm generally a fairly easy going, resilient sort, but I dare anyone to tell me it's time we got over it.

I felt like crying reading your post, I 100 percent agree with you. It makes me so so angry to think of what are so called leaders were up to, absolutely disgraceful, and I am so sorry for what you have been through.

My heart breaks for everyone who has suffered in such horrific ways. The trauma must be almost insurmountable.

The ongoing in-fighting and defending of the indefensible and arrogance and shamelessness. And reward and honours. That must be intolerable to watch every single day.

I hear you and I am so sorry, for you and all of the others on this thread who have shared their stories.

I lost precious time with my Mum. She lived a long way from me so I'd respected the rules and not visited. By the time lockdown lifted her dementia was so advanced she no longer recognised me.

I can't describe how it feels to find out that when I was miles away, worrying about her but not breaking rules, Downing St were living it up with parties. The guilt for not saying fuck it and going to see her anyway, eats away at me daily.

I am sorry for your loss. I am currently caring for a loved one with terminal cancer and I cannot imagine doing it under lockdowns. You have every right to be furious.

And there is an old feminist saying:

'We take things personally...because that is the right and only way to take them.'

I totally hear you OP. It's so so unfair. I'm sorry for what you have been through and hope you can find a way to heal in time x

I interpret move on as forget about this 'lapse' of Tory judgement and give them another chance. Well I wont be.

we Can’t and shouldn’t move on until there is public acknowledgment of the grief & distress suffered by law abiding people who resisted the temptation to batter hospital doors down to hold their loved ones in their last moments. That never leaves people, but an acknowledgment of the selfish party lawmaking goers to those who listened, will be something. There will be anarchy if there is another pandemic as people will not listen to nor follow regulations, with some justification. Boris’ troop showed it’s every man for himself, despite what they said publicly.

OP I'm so sorry for your dreadful loss and the damage it has caused your family. I will never, never forgive that bunch of corrupt self serving bastards for what they have done to you and thousands of others in similar situations. I hope there is a special place in hell reserved for them for their actions.
My very best wishes to you and your family in trying to come to terms with your searing grief and traumatic experiences.

Whilst I generally agree with a lot of your comment, I think it's worth noting that on a population level, what they did probably didn't affect anyone negatively and personally.

I disagree with this. Decision-making about lockdowns, closures, hospital visitors etc needed to balance the benefits of restrictions (preventing the spread of covid) against the harms (stories like this one of OP's poor husband and the many others who suffered in the same way, the harm to people's mental health, businesses collapsing, difficulty of accessing healthcare, children missing school etc, elderly people isolate in care homes- the list is endless). The people making the decisions should have been doing so with a proper sense of this balance and the seriousness of what they were doing. If they were simply ignoring the rules themselves, how can they have been thinking seriously about them? There's an overwhelming sense that decision making was more like "No hospital visitors? Shut care homes? Sure, why not- now, where's the party?"

I also think all of this will mean that people won't comply next time round.

Everyone who insisted we needed to lock down was at fault here ... probably most of the people complaining on this thread. Lockdown saved no one, it merely spread the pain out whilst helping to caise massive inflation through printing money.
We should have had no lockdown and let individuals choose their approach themselves, lock yourself down if you wish but those that wanted visitors in hospital etc should have been able to take their own chances.

They had all the available data and knew covid did not pose a high risk to the vast majority of people. That's why they partied - they were not scared of taking it home to their families.
The question shouldn't be 'why did they not follow the rules?' But instead 'did we need the rules at all?'.
Watching their behaviours during lockdown tells us all we need to know. People were terrified by the government's daily dose of fear, whipped up into a frenzy by the very government that knew covid had a very very high survival rate and that people should make their own choices.
Informed consent went out of the window - they deliberately installed a team of psychologists to increase everyone's level of threat and fear.

No government should ever lock a population of people into their homes.

I just want to suggest having some therapy. NHS waiting lists are terrible and private therapy is very expensive. But depending on where you are there may be some help available from a local charity. I had two bereavements within a few weeks of each other and was really struggling and had some through the local hospice charity. They were really helpful and I went along for a few months. I did make a decent donation when my sessions ended.

I am very sorry for your families painful loss.

Yes, there's a significant amount of guilt around wondering whether I should/could have fought a little bit harder to be able to see him. I think the reality I'd have been arrested/ they'd have refused to take my calls at all but as apparently we were all a bit stupid for following the rules anyway, surely I should have been able to find a way round them....

Whilst I generally agree with a lot of your comment, I think it's worth noting that on a population level, what they did probably didn't affect anyone negatively and personally.

I'm not going to say my initial response to that, but yes it bloody did. If they knew it didn't matter why did they inflict that on the rest of us? Why couldn't DC see their friends or their grandparents and get some support that way?

They've sucked you in, exactly the way they wanted to.

I completely agree OP. We should not move on. We should remember the pain and the unfairness of it all. I am so sorry for your loss

I am so sorry.

Aww you know in 2 years, that's never occurred to me 😆

I agree with you OP and I’m so sorry for your family. Of course you can’t just move on.

My family also went through cancer during the pandemic though we were more fortunate in the outcome. However we weren’t subject to those rules that you were as our hospital seem to have judged things very differently and we were given more support than what you describe. I can’t forgive any Tory party member for what they’ve done but they were all a bit of a moral write off to me anyway so in a way that doesn’t upset me as much as it could because I don’t find it shocking, it’s what I expect from them. However I absolutely can understand anyone feeling utterly shocked, angry and betrayed and you have every right to. What I personally found more disturbing and traumatising was “good” people making completely inhumane and irrational decisions under the circumstances of the pandemic such as not allowing sick people to see families. I am having a hard time moving on from that as these were people I did think I could trust, but actually I couldn’t. Either way, yes, you cannot just snap fingers and move on nor should you.

Sorry for your loss OP.
We had to abandon an amazing matriarch of our family, late 90’s, in her residential home. Allowed to look through the window, not allowed to open the windows so all we could do was wave…can’t imagine now why we complied with it. So inhumane. She used to say “what have I got to lose?” She was prepared to take the risk, as i”d imagine were the rest of the residents!

Westminster is rotten to the core. “Anyone that wants to be a politician, shouldn’t be allowed” (not sure where I read that, but think of it often!)

I’m very sorry, I can’t even begin to imagine the pain of your loss.

You have every right to be furious at the behaviour of the government. They have shown nothing but utter contempt for rules, for the people they are meant to be serving and are blatantly pursuing their own agendas and don’t even care that we all know it. All sense of decency seems to be breaking down. Bojo has done so much damage. But we have to hope there are better times ahead….

I hope you are getting all the support that you need for yourself and for your DCs.

I am so sorry for your loss OP and you have every right to be furious, anyone telling you to move on can fuck right off. My DH lost his Mum to Cancer over lockdown, he's 40 and still quite traumatised so I can't imagine what you and your children are going through. Xx

Fuck the government and its not the partying that even has me the most angry (even though it is so incredibly contemptuous to the British public) it's the blatant corruption, £21billion of government corruption including giving their mates PPE contracts for made up companies etc that is not being investigated!? They are a bunch of disgusting theives the lot of them and should be in bloody prison! I'm near ready to get the pitchforks out myself OP. Xx

@Youknowaboutthepaint so sorry to hear about your DH. That is absolutely heartbreaking for him, for you and your kids. That is a very hard thing for you to get over and make peace with. I don't think I could.

My dad died in 2020. We were allowed to see him thank god. My heart breaks for the queues of desperate relatives outside the hospital who could not get in or whose time was severely limited with their loved one.

100%. There's no helping some people who STILL think locking down was the right thing to do

I agree actually, the really upsetting thing isn't the way they behaved, sadly we've come to expect that. It's the way so much of the public seem to accept that it's perfectly fine and we need to forget all about it rather than hold them to account.