BUT A SAD EVENING

. . . I can't help it. Today's the anniversary of my step-father's death. I blogged about it last year, you can read it in the archives, or find it here.

I keep hoping that with time and especially now that Alice is home that these anniversaries will get easier, so far they haven't. Despite a wonderful day today I kept having flashbacks to 2001.

When we woke up on Saturday November 3rd 2001 we didn't know what the day would hold. Nick was terminally ill with stomach cancer, we knew he was dying but we thought he had longer to live. I blogged about his final day when I remembered publicly his death last year on the anniversary (privately he's thought of every day), so this year I'll blog about his illness.

Early on in the year he began to have problems eating - they food just didn't go down easily. He went for investigations and on the Wednesday before Easter we were told that he had stomach cancer. At that time we believed that he would have an operation that would be a cure. Days later, after an MRI scan, we were told that the cancer had spread, an operation was no longer the best treatment, he had spots of cancer on his liver and so he would never be cured. They hoped that chemo would put him into remission for a year or 2, then they anticipated that it would recur, more chemo with hopefully another remission - his life expectancy was 3-5 years.

Nick had had a monk's hairline (bald on top) for as long as Mum and I had known him, ironically the aspect of his treatment that he found most difficult was loosing his hair. He never went totally bald, but was left with very fine, white hair, more sparsely spread across the sides and back of his head. The hair that remained was lovely and beautifully soft.

The chemo was brutal. His tumour was small but unfortunately it grew across the entrance to the stomach and so made it difficult for food to get passed. The combination of eating problems and the effects of the chemo were more harsh than anyone could have predicted - less than 9 months after symptoms started and less than 7 months after diagnosis, he was dead. (23 months later Mum died suddenly and unexpectedly, but that's another post.)

He was a gentle gentleman with a wicked sense of humour and a great capacity to love. This year I miss him in yet another way - he would love Alice and would have such fun with her. This year I mourn the relationship that they are both missing.