A letter to my lobster

Dear Steve,

Its been two years since I last heard your voice, since I last held your hand, since I last lay next to you. Two years it turns out is a long time to be without you.

God, there is so much that I miss, but its the everyday sharing of a relationship with you that I miss the most - the text messages, the unexpected phone calls when I'm at work, the sharing of chores (particularly the cooking!), the sound of you coming through the door after work, the sound of your laugh and the touch of your hand........Much about our daily lives has changed over the last two years, yet at the same time, we have managed to keep a lot of the same routines as we had before.

When you died, a chapter in our lives closed but (in one of the cheesiest metaphors ever) the book that is our lives has continued to remain open. I'm writing to tell you that although our grief continues (as I am sure it always will), we also laugh and smile everyday. We talk about you daily and remember us as a family of four with comfort and joy. The memories of the hardest and darkest of days following your diagnosis have started to fade and the happiest of days are remembered evermore fondly. Your brain has a funny way of retaining the good bits and not so much of the bad bits, just like when you look back on your childhood and can only remember those sunny, glorious days of summer and magical days of celebration. The many rainy, wet days spent inside during youth somehow now seem to be completely missing in memory.

We miss you, we talk to you in private and the children continue to draw pictures for you...........You are always in our thoughts and forever in our hearts. However, I want you to know that we are not living in perpetual sorrow, but that we are happy and living our lives as you wanted us to.

You would be so proud of the children. Emma is turning into a wonderful young lady, who is creative, a bit of a drama queen, but also full of love and vigour. She is a very deep and mature thinker and particularly empathetic, something I think she has developed over the last two years. She is also now only 20cms shorter than me so will soon, no doubt, be in my wardrobe!

Mason is a footballing superstar. I'm sorry, but I have not managed to convert him to the egg-shaped ball yet......That may take a bit of time and a lot of persuasion! He is also so incredibly loving. He loves nothing more than a snuggle with his mum. It turns out that he is also a little bit good at maths, something which he must have got from you since my mathematical ability (as you know) is pretty limited.........! He is so much fun to be around and never fails to make everybody he meets smile - just like you did.

I'm hoping that over the next year, we will continue to move forwards, that life will continue to be happy and that the children will continue to develop into wonderful little people. What else could I ever hope for? I hope I'm making you proud and hope that wherever you are right now, that you are at peace.

All my love,

C

xxx