Today I am packing - bedding, towels, clearing the chests of drawers, clearing cupboards. I need to get the majority of it done this weekend, ahead of my move in just over a week’s time.
I was motoring along quite well - doing it alone, of course. The house, quiet. Then I nipped up to do a clear of Tom’s cabinet in the bathroom - one I had left pretty much untouched since he died. Loads of stuff in there, most of which is good to come with me. Scored some lovely shower gel - so thought I was onto a winner there…
Then, on the top shelf, at the side, pushed/hidden behind a shampoo bottle, there it was - a small, dark glass bottle and purple syringe. I pulled it out and squinted at the label. Oral Morphine - a very strong painkiller - a prescription for Tom, dated, August 6th, 2021. I froze. He had been given this to bring home from the hospital that last time he came back - and I hadn’t known about it. He was a brave, stoic and private man - so would have taken this without sharing the depth of his pain and discomfort.
I went downstairs, to take a moment. The process of leaving this house we rented and shared has been far harder than I anticipated. But it is these little windows, like the morphine, these windows back into that terrible year, that make it so much harder.
I must dispose of the bottle, its contents and the syringe today. Another trip to the charity shop with clothes, and then, to the chemist to dispose of the drug.
What a gloomy day, too, rain, wind - the perfect setting for all this sorrow.
Hold tight, everyone xxx
