Day 5

Drank a Sleepy Tea. It worked well until 4.50 am, when I woke up with a start, then started composing a letter to Louise's husband in my head. In it, I thanked him for the happy 13 years he gave Louise and told him how brave he had been, and what a tremendous thing he had done in donating her organs. I know I find him an unsettling, irritating and slightly scary man, who can be pompous and overbearing, and whose passions, when drunk, run out of control, but at heart he is sensitive and creative and, like many artists, somewhat larger than life. Now I must write the letter and get it to him.

I have been asked to write a song for Louise's funeral. A line keeps playing in my head: 'She was the bright moon's daughter.' Perhaps that should be 'she is'. My friend Jacula sent me a link to the Mundania Press website where there is a wonderful tribute to Louise. It's on http://mundaniapress.blogspot.com/2009/10/louise-cooper-1952-2009.html where I found this photo of her just as I remember her best, out in the wind and sun, by the sea.

The pain remains, and I think how alike crying and vomiting are, both uncontrollable, surging up and spilling out. I suppose that really, crying is vomiting up your feelings and spitting them out. I spoke to my friend Penny yesterday and asked her how long it was before she'd stopped crying every day for her best friend Cheryl, who died at the start of the year. "I haven't stopped," she said. "I still cry every day." The beat goes on, the grief goes on, we must go on like the walking wounded that we are.

When we are young, nobody tells us what life is really like. It is set out as a mixture of work and fun. Bereavement doesn't come into the mix. If we were told what we were likely to experience when somebody close dies, it would be too much for our childish minds to comprehend. A child wants pleasure. The ultimate pain is a visit to the dentist. My counsellor thinks lessons in what to expect when somebody close dies should be part of every child's education. Some kids are forced to find out the hard way when they lose a parent or sibling far too early. I was very lucky in not having to experience bereavement until my dad died. I was 47, but still found myself ill-equipped to deal with the emotional pain.

After my mother died when I was 50, which was a worse bereavement as, though I loved my dad, I was closer to my mum, Mum's doctor said, "Don't be surprised if you get all kinds of funny health problems over the next year or so. The physical body grieves as well as the mind." I have never forgotten his wise words. They were so true. Mind affects body. Mind over matter. Sometimes, though, I feel as if my body is controlling my mind. Which comes first, the tears or the thought?