Telling your children their father has died is as bad as you think it would be.
It might be worse.
I just know I wasn't prepared for the screaming. The sheer panic-stricken, guttural, ear-piercing screaming.
When Pete died, we had been on our way back home from Melbourne, having dropped the kids off with my parents for a beach holiday on the NSW mid-north coast.
The family holiday was trying to give us all a break and start 2019 in a positive fashion because 2018 had been pretty shit - we had started the year with me deciding to repair a hernia I had developed many years ago thanks to growing giant babies that saw me bed-bound and house-bound for 10 days instead of the anticipated three. Pete was diagnosed with an auto-immune disease that we then spent the entire year trying (unsuccessfully) to get a handle on and which saw him spend Christmas in a wheelchair with legs that weren't working correctly. And our family lost my Great Aunt, my grandfather, a cat and a dog.
So my family declared 2019 should start with a holiday to try and reset, interspersed with one solemn day spreading my grandfather's ashes.
As an added bonus, my parents - together with my brother and his wife - would take the kids on the Sunday and Pete and I would meet them up there on Thursday once I'd had a few days of child-free time and Pete had attended a work conference.
Turns out, Mum and Dad had only just walked into the accommodation unit when I called to tall them about Pete and asked them to get the kids home.
But how do I tell the kids what has just happened?
I didn't know what the 'right' thing to do was - should I tell them what had happened when they were so far away from me, or should I wait and tell them when I had them in front of me to hold?
Inconveniently, we had pretty switched on kids. They knew immediately that something was going on. And that something wasn't good.
I took advice from my Dad and brother about the kids' disposition and how they felt about being the bearers of that emotional load without me.
I took advice from the pastoral care lady at the hospital, the hospital coordinator who barely left my side for 5 hours.
We decided to wait. To tell the kids: Daddy has collapsed and is in hospital and his heart is not ok, we need to go home.
Those with the children would then fill every waking minute as best they could and they would get the kids home a fast as humanly possible.
I had spent a lot of time between when Pete died and when my parents were able to get the kids back to me about 9pm the next day thinking about what I would say and steeling myself for their reactions.
I had played out how it might go over, and over, and over in my head.
I hadn't prepared myself for the screaming.
I had decided on the no small talk option and just breaking it to them really honestly. They aren't silly, our kids. I thought it was only fair
"You know how Daddy collapsed yesterday and there was something wrong with his heart? His heart actually stopped. Daddy died."
There was a split second look they gave me I will never forget as long as I live. On reflection, I'm pretty sure its the same look I gave the Doctor when he told me.
And then screaming. All four of them in hysterical wails of disbelief and not understanding. And then racing out of the loungeroom and into our bedroom to get a shirt that smelled like their dad, and an item he had given them, and silence and hugging and tears.
Right then I discovered a downside to having four children - my arms are not long enough to wrap around them a fully hug them all at once.
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