My middle daughter died February 2004 aged 45 from BC. She was the typical city-living single female who had a busy social calendar with many friends and associates. Not only did she work in the city but she lived off fast-foods which may have brought about her illness. Weight had become a problem to her and my late wife and I made many abortive attempts at cajoling her into controlling it but she always seemed to be too busy and I guess, like many of the young, she felt immortal (big mistake).

Within a period of 7 years this was the loss of 3 close members of my family. The impact of each loss was considerable but with slight variations to each. Furthermore, having managed grief on two earlier occasions I had become aware of my capacity to manage stress but this did not lessen its impact.

Frequently, mostly in the evenings or the 'wee small hours' of the morning, but not exclusively, I would be overcome by emotion yet, unlike, at the loss of my wife, I was not swamped by grief so was able to get through my daily life. This was probably because she had lived for a number of years independently. What surprised me was that after 14 months this build up of emotion was still occurring. One night, while in my study focused on something else I again became emotional but I also became aware that the feeling seemed to be superimposed on me. One would have had to experience something similar to appreciate this effect.

It dawned on me that my daughter might be endeavouring to communicate with me so I asked her, verbally, what was wrong and immediately the answer came into my thoughts as if she had actually spoken herself and, to my surprise she was seeking my forgiveness but for what? She seemed upset at ignoring my advice about her diet and her health. It did not appear that she was apologising, she simply was seeking my forgiveness and I readily forgave her but said to her that there was nothing actually to forgive. From that moment my grief lifted and I felt a happiness and a feeling of satisfaction overcome me (which may have been hers) which remained with me for about 30 minutes then I was able to return to what I had been doing previously. I have never been overcome by grief since but continue to feel at rest in the knowledge that she will probably have moved on conscience free.

I leave the thought with you.