Grandad

[Rainbowmum]

I know you have a lot on your plate right now.
But you must go see him.
Trust me , you do not want to spend the rest of your life with regrets.

Go!

[faceslikemine]

Another thing that has factored into this is price :/

I haven't got any money at the moment to contribute towards the buses to get down, and my mum can only currently afford to send one person. So of course she wants to be with her father. I don't know what to do.....

It seems that staying put for the moment and saving my next instalment towards the travel would be best. But now what everyone has said has made me think twice..

[KJ1989]

Hey man, I'll speak from my personal experience here.

2 years ago I was just after arriving up to Fort William in Scotland for 10 days of climbing. Literally there for 2 hours when I got a phone call off my dad. Grandmother wasn't doing very well at all, and I had actually gone to here her the day before I left. My dad told me to stay, but I said I'm going home, so booked a train/flight home straight away and was there at her bed the next day.

She held on for about 2 weeks, but I wouldn't have changed anything. This was really the first person close to me to die, so I don't know what it would be like to not be there, but I have to say being there just made things so much easier for me, the simple fact that I was there with her.

Things are a bitch when they come at ya at once, including the lack of funds, but I'm sure things will come together for ya. As for your sister, if she isn't answering calls all you can do is show up. Worst she can do is not talk, which is no different than how things seemingly are now. I have no idea what the situation with the husband is and this may be completely stupid, but maybe there is a way by talking to him, he could convince her to talk to you?

Best of luck with all anyway man and sorry to here about your grandad.

[Bowyn Aerrow]

Take a deep breath. Breath - Just breath.

Got a clock - I mean a ticking clock not one of these fancy digital read out ones that doesn't make a noise. If so, listen to it tick for a moment. That is time.

Time.

Consider its simplistic beauty. Time is the thing that keeps everything from happening at once.

Everything you present to us and yourself is NOT happening all at once. Sure there are seemingly too few clock tics between each thing, but these are not happening all at once.

Everything is NOT happening today. Its being parceled out one slow second at a time.

Yes it feels like its all happening at once, this is time being relative.

You may want to visit sister and reconcile and keep her from making a regret. You are a good brother, a good man for this wish for her. However we all choose our regrets. Ultimately this is her choice to either make a regret, or to not. While it may sting to let her do it, if she does do it she obviously needs it for some unfathomable reason.

Time - Every life has a beginning and a completion (not really an end - there is a difference). Grandad is reaching his completion date - Its ok, we all have one. Yes its going to hurt, and you will grieve. This too is a part of life.

I have sat by many death beds holding the hands of people who were completing their lives. Most had their regrets, their 'lost moments'. These often look like fear. It is not fear.

Few actually regretted big things, it was the little things, such as putting a comforting hand on the shoulder of someone who needed it, but they were afraid or shamed to reach out. The biggest one is failing to utter three words. "I love you." We humans tend to hold it back more than we outta.

I suspect that what grandad is really experiencing is not so much fear, but regret. He is, most likley, reviewing his own life and judging it and he sees all to painfully clear all the tiny little 'could have beens'. This is part of the completion of life process.

[gilhooly]

Your family sounds more normal than mine. I have 3 sociopathic sisters who giggle when they talk about murdering me. I assume they are being cute and funny. I will give you one of my sisters for your sister.

[James]

Say in a e-mail to her that you have to go and why, ask her to please post phone her agenda and please respect your grandfathers wishes, gods speed my friend, Jim

[faceslikemine]

Bowyn, Thanks for the reminder . That's why it's my sig...

Okay, would it make a difference if I said she has had the worst up-bringing of all of us? My mum didn't protect her properly. We all had a turbulent childhood, but she is the eldest. She remembers the most. I never understood why she would totally lose it when mum would have a glass of wine. She used to have a drinking problem. I never understood why she doesn't trust the friends my mum has. She used to have all sorts of rough riff-raff coming to the house, and smoking dope, at the very least. I don't know details of this, and I can't exactly ask her now, but these things happened either before I was born, or when I was too young to remember.

One thing that my sister doesn't remember is when he walked out on my mum for his secretary. She has not a single memory of him, aside from the occasional birthday card in the post. They have had absolutely no contact that she can remember. She looked him up a few years ago, and it seems he has started a new family. She has more half-brothers and sisters. She tried to make contact with them, and I think was initially successful, but then when he found out he forbid them from ever communicating with her again. I don't suppose anyone knows what's going on in his head?

By contrast, my memories of early childhood were ignorant bliss. My mum was stable, had a stable job, stable mortgage. I even had both parents in the same house - at least for a while (they later said that the resentment had set in soon after I was born, and only stayed together for the kids' sake). Most of my memories were sunny (literally, as it was Cornwall). My mum never mentioned the other stuff, and when my sister confronts her about the past, my mum always down-plays it, as if it weren't that bad. I am more inclined to believe sis, as I am aware of how mum's mental contortion-ism can bend around the truth.

Then, there's the stuff that happened to us that I DO remember. My mum's third husband was evil. I will not go into the details of why he did what he did, but he brainwashed my mum - always making her his special super hot curries which we now suspect were drugged, as they were only for her, not the kids. My mum asked my dad to take me when she moved. She sent my brother to live with my grandparents, and my sister stayed with mum and huband no.3. They quickly sold the house and payed off the mortgage.

Most of what my sister suffered was mental abuse. She was allowed to go to school but had to come home straight after. They lived hundreds of miles away at the opposite end of the country from my family, and were even miles away from the nearest settlement. When I was younger I didn't understand why they didn't just call the police. I think I understand a bit better now, hearing other people's stories of abuse, but I have never lived this, so I can't truly fully feel how it has affected her now. There was no one to rescue her from this except my mum, who was too goofed up on hypnotics and stockholm syndrome to ever want to leave. Regardless of the reason, my mum let her down. My sister was the first to stand up to him. As punishment she was kicked out.

She came to live with me and my dad's new family, which went well until she went and had a wild house party without his permission. Now, this is a man who is strict on his own kids, and wouldn't think twice about hitting us to keep us in line. He had a very militant attitude towards our upbringing, which makes sense considering he was in the military. But this level of disobedience from someone who isn't even his own child was not to be tolerated. I remember the night she was kicked out - the screaming and shouting from my dad and step-mother, and the sobbing and weeping from her.

At 15 years of age she ended up homeless - I am not entirely sure how this happened, as I thought she would have ended up in care. But instead, she ended up in a youth hostel. She told me that she did speed sometimes instead of buying food. All of this has a common theme. Her family couldn't keep her safe. So why now are they so concerned for her well-being, and that her husband might be to control her, when she is happily (not quite sure about that) married, with 2 children?

What I am trying to say is, she needs help too - she is possibly more of a victim of this than my mother, and I don't think mum understands that. Even if she does realise what is going on, is she seriously going to leave him, split up another family and risk her children going through what happened to her? How on earth can I get through to her and bring her back? This isn't a rhetorical question - is it even possible? Some people said I had a difficult childhood, and it's nothing compared to the hell she had.

I have cut out some details for the sake of brevity, but at the same time I see I have once again gone on far longer than I expected. Can someone say they went through something similar, so I can maybe understand how to see things in her shoes?

Perhaps this was even a bit...... But I guess the family issues kinda are all roots of the same tree.

[Gizzie]

I can relate to your feeling that you have to reach out to your sister.
For me, I know my mom had a tough childhood with alcoholic and violent parents ( my grand parents) which led to her having drinking problems too, and me growing up feeling abandoned.
As much as I feel broken, I know my mom was a victim too and felt I had to reach out to her.

For me, the best solution was to keep my distance and let each other have the space to build our own independent lives.

I know that morally speaking, you should drop everything and go, but I also no that there are no happy endings or a perfect hollywood script in life.

Even if people call me cold and distant, I know that not talking to my mom keeps me and my mom happier than us trying to "do the right thing" but end up hurting each other even more.

Your heart knows what is best for yourself

[zeon]

hello,
Maybe going and visiting him will be the best idea and stay as long as needed because when someone is slowly leaving the world for the next it can be a tough and challenging reality... I watched my great granddad and great grandmother both die... All they require is loved ones this side of the worlds because in the next there are loved ones waiting to welcome them back so he wont be alone. I am so sorry for this. Between u and me and the rest of gayspeak if u have money problems and need some contribution towards it send me a message mister and ill help ya get ya bus ticket down to plymouth because in my world... Family comes first in times like this..

Just for advice when he does pass over remember that his still with you and your family and will conbstantly be looking over you guys... Your sister mister needs to be told to get a grip get her arse to her granddads and pay her damn respects!

Big hugz and here if needed

Aunty Zeon x

[faceslikemine]

Between u and me and the rest of gayspeak if u have money problems and need some contribution towards it send me a message mister and ill help ya get ya bus ticket

I really appreciate that, but I feel extremely uncomfortable taking other people's money. The plan is that when my mum goes down she is going to help them get webcam set up so we can see each other.

Apart from this, I just want to focus on my current life. I have just applied to be a Residence assistant for the university. The deadline for the application was today, and I almost forgot about it in all this recent hassle. I have to think straight because my flatmate and I haven't been on the best of terms. She seems to be pretty down about getting kicked off her course, and now needs to find a new plan in life. I really don't want that to happen to me. We are disagreeing over bills which have so far amounting to several hundred pounds. I know I can get it sorted but I need to focus on one problem at a time. He is going to die whether I see him or not. That's so harsh. Maybe he will hold on a few weeks and I can see him then? Or maybe I should pluck up the courage and ask my dad to lend me the money so I can see him now.

Every time I post I can feel more problems re-surfacing. I want to take a deep breath, and focus on the road in front. Not the trees, not the pavement, not the dark sky. Have tunnel vision for a few weeks. Just get one more thing out of the way. I am so tempted to do this. I can focus on my studies. Even my mum has agreed this is best. I haven't played my new instrument in a while. I would like to bow and bow and then bow some more until it is right. I want to do the right thing, but no-one close to me has died before. I have never been to a funeral. I don't want to think about it happening yet..