The façade of having it under control

I have to admit that at the minute, I'm attempting to fool myself and everyone around me.

It’s the façade of having it all under control. That I’m handling it all well. That we are ok.

I mean, we are ok. We are functioning. When people see me down the street or at the supermarket – I’m dressed, I’ve make up on, I’ve been to work … totally got it all under control.

Absolutely not.

This is what the last four weeks has put on our plate...

Our first school holidays, which is where the kids went to my brothers’ so I could still work, which lead to me waking the kids early on a Sunday morning and taking them on a road trip and farewelling them saying “see you on Thursday” which is exactly the same scenario as the trip we took the day Pete died. The kids realised this. They were upset by this.

When I collected them and returned home for Easter – our first to negotiate without Pete – it also coincided with the three-month anniversary of Pete dying.

Then school went back for three out of the four children for Term 2.

Then we tackled ANZAC Day. For the last 20 years I have travelled to spend ANZAC Day with my WWII veteran Grandfather. Our children have never experienced an ANZAC Day without him. He died last year. So this year was our first without him.

The hockey season then began. Despite not knowing an awful lot about hockey, Pete was at every game he could be, beside the field yelling encouraging and inspiring words… well, he felt they were encouraging and inspiring, some may beg to differ.

That first round of hockey had some pretty big wins for our teams, and touchingly, the club’s teams wore black arm bands recognising Pete. The kids scored goals or kept goals and our youngest played her first game of hockey having sat on the sideline for five years watching her siblings. One of the children dissolved into tears at the conclusion of the game because it was different without Daddy on the sideline and they can’t ring Daddy to tell him the score. The others followed suit later in the night.

And then I took a work trip away. I had planned it well, talked to the kids about it all, thought I had full prepared for all the scenarios and any fallout emotionally.

I had eight families on the books and my brain was like an excel spreadsheet with one child at a different friend’s house for two nights and then swapping to another house to ensure they could all attend their extra-curricular activities and trainings … keeping their routine as close to normal as I could.

My poor boss when he asked the question on the first night if the kids were all good – I’d had three out of four in tears, which subsided to just the one out of four over the course of the four nights away.

When I got home and they collapsed into my arms in tears I knew that perhaps I had completely underestimated the impact on them of the trip away. I absolutely don’t regret going from a work perspective, but I just totally underestimated it from the kids’ perspective.

At the same time, I drove home from work to find the coroner’s medical report in the mail one day, and the coroner’s certificate of determination of cause of death in the mail another day.

So as not to upset the kids or take time away from them, I had spent one hour and 17 minutes on the phone to Births, Deaths and Marriages while the kids were away before Easter to locate Pete’s death certificate.

“Oh, it’s all sorted and should have been sent. Sorry, just an admin error, we’ll have that out to you in 24-48 hours.”

And so, every day for the last two weeks, I’ve driven in the driveway expecting to find it in the mail box.

This morning, I spent one hour and 47 minutes on the phone to Births Deaths and Marriages to find out it was ‘completed’ but the files hadn’t linked up automatically so it hadn’t even been sent yet.

At least I know it won’t be in the mail today or tomorrow, and probably not even Monday.

Yesterday, the two middle children competed in their school cross country and ran well, but both had tears because they couldn’t call their father and tell them how they’d done.

Grief: It really is the gift that just keeps on giving.

Which leaves us to just deal with the fact that Mother’s Day and Pete’s birthday fall within five days of one another this coming week.

And the fact Pete's employers have just set up the most extraordinary auction for us, which has just reiterated to me what an amazing person everyone thought he was. That we knew he was. And it's just reminded me - in a good way - of what we have lost and how incredible people really are.

I definitely do not have it all under control. I’m exhausted. And I'm getting a cold.

Definitely, if you see me in work clothes, with a face of make up on, smiling at the supermarket or down the street, it is definitely the façade of having it under control … and I’m probably just heading to the bottle shop.