A devastating blow instead of hope

I brought my son to hospital on 10 June 2020 Wednesday afternoon for a hope. But I was delivered a devastating blow instead when the emergency doctor came to talk about what they would and would not do for him, and EOL care. Not only that, due to the COVID situation, after my son was immediately admitted to the emergency department, I could not be with him. We were separated in our hour of need and desperation.

Your eyelids did flutter, didn't they?

 As I watched the white coffin bearing my son in it rolled towards the closed doors, and Amazing Grace being played, the finality of it all overwhelmed me with helplessness, grief and despair.

I broke out crying. And in my heart, I cried, Stop it. How can you do this to him?

I wanted to go grab my son and take him away. But the glass and distance separated us.

The cruelty of life is that you have it and yet you do not own it.

I often feel that I have failed my son. In many ways. I have let him down. I could have done better.

He was so beautiful and handsome as he laid there. I had wanted to tell the embalmer not to put too much powder on him but to let him be natural and himself.

I didn't have the chance to do so as everything happened so quickly after he breathed his last.

I was glad when I saw him again that he wasn't caked up with powder. There was little powder on his face and none on his neck. He looked just like he was, and not like a corpse at all.

He wore the best shirt he ever had, a blue surfers paradise shirt. It brings the brightness out of him.

He was so beautiful, so natural and so pure. He had very long eye lashes, and looked like he was just sleeping.

I talked to him during the wake when I was alone with him. I had things to say to him. Three times, I thought I see a very quick flutter of his eyelid.

I thought perhaps it's the light above that blinked. But there was no faulty lights.

I swear his eyelid did flutter so very quickly....

My Son and I when he was around 1

 

My son and I when he was around 1. He was a lovely boy, but so soft and floppy few people dared to carry him. I used to carry him and sing to him every night in the kitchen to try to soothe him to sleep. Those were all very precious moments. Before his sisters came along, he was my preoccupation.

I did not believe that life was fair. And I still don't