Wednesday 17.04.19

8:22am John rang to let us know we got the house
8:34am I tried to ring Dad's mobile (told Ben, Dad was probably in the bath)

8:39am messaged Mum about the house
8:41am – messaged Dad
“Hey Dad, John just rang to say we got the house”

At 9:20 I had a scan, and the radiologist was amazing she told me to get the surgery and answered all my questions. I told her she was an angel.

When I walked back through our front door I told Ben I was 100% on board with the surgery and I relayed the amazing conversation and clarity I just got. The radiologist told me to ring back the hospital and say I had increased pain to bring my surgery back to the 3 month mark which at that time I thought was something Dad would tell me to do. She looked at me and said “they'll never know”.

Ben and I went out for a celebratory lunch, I thought it was weird that neither Dad nor Mum had texted back about the house.  Got a text back from Mum at 12:07.

12:50 John rang to ask about adding in a clause

12:58 tried Dad's mobile again

12:59 tried Dad's business number

12:59 tried Dad's other number

1:01pm
“Hey Dad, the seller just wants to add a clause into the contract about the tenant. John is going to write something up and email it through and has asked if you could look over it."

1:12
“Hey Andrew are you anywhere near Dad? I just can't get ahold of him. Thanks for making the drive up yesterday, so nice to see you guys!”

1:29pm I tried the home number

1:30 tried calling Mum

I went and told Ben it was weird nobody was getting back to me. I tried to think of a logical story. It involved Dad being at a settlement and forgetting his mobile at home. That Andrew and Mum weren't great with their phone.

Maybe it was my phone? But Mum had texted.

Mum rang Ben's mobile (1:54pm from Dad's home number). I was in my room and Ben was in the lounge, all I heard was Ben say that he would put me on and I instantly thought it was Dad on the other end.  I got up from the bedroom and started to walk towards Ben as Ben was walking towards me, phone in hand, we met in the hallway and it was Mum was on the speaker. She said she had some bad news and I asked if Matty was dead and she said no it was my father. I went and sat on our bed and cried.

Ben called John and arranged another lawyer to help finalise the tenant clause issue.  Ben called my work to say I couldn't come in the next day.

I rang Mum back at 2:07pm and asked if I could come down and see Dad.

Ben and I drove down. I drank so much water in the car I needed to pee when we arrived. Mum and Andrew were on the verandah. Mum hugged me and I said I needed to use the toilet, I walked into the house pass the two police officers and to the downstairs toilet.

Mum, Ben, the policers officers and I walked into Dad's bedroom. I saw him lying on the bed and I think I told him I loved him. I asked the policer officers if I could sit on the bed and I just stroked his upper arm and Mum sat beside me. Mum told me where his hand was (beside his side) and I grabbed his hand through the blanket. He was lying on his back tucked into a blanket in a picture-perfect way. His head lay on his pillow turned away to face the window. I looked over and saw some blue tinge near his nose and mouth but other than that he looked like he could just have been sleeping. The stillness meant that it was now just a body. His left arm was at a right angle resting under or over the pillow near the window.

At the end everyone left the room and it was just Dad and I. I didn't need much time, I just needed to tell him thank-you and that I love him. I felt accepted by his death and that I didn't need to be right there to talk to him, I could talk to him anywhere.

We went back to the lounge and a red bag with Dad's body was wheeled out.

The police told us to contact them if we needed anything and to access counseling.

We all went back over to Mum's house to tell J. J was just about to feed Coco and we walked in. Mum said for J to feed Coco and then we found ourselves in the lounge and Mum told J the news. I hugged J. He said it was bad and he said he already knew something was wrong because Andrew had rang Mum to come over to see Dad because he wasn't moving.

We all sat in the lounge.

Matty and Carmen came over.

They started to talk about the will and the safe and I sat in my chair with my eyes closed.

Mum suggested I should go home because it was late and I really wanted to.

We got home around 9.

That night. A bug crawled on us in our sleep. Ben heard possums in our lounge and the brand new smoke detector went off in the middle of the night. I went out a little while later to our balcony. I bought out a blanket and looked at the stars and chatted with Dad, it was all very peaceful. The mossies were biting me so I went back inside to bed.

/I'll be sharing a series of diary entries two weeks around my Dad's death