When I reflect on the most difficult points in my adult life, times when I was hospitalised due to my mental health, times when I was penniless, when my marriage was most difficult, when my husband died, leaving me bereft and in tens of thousands of pounds of debt and even when my mum died, there was one constant person in my life who invariably helped me pick up the pieces. My dad. And I don’t say this lightly; the legend who was my dad.

It utterly breaks my heart to say ‘was’. I still can’t comprehend it. I miss him so much. In the last 39 days since he died I have organised and attended his funeral. It went off so well and was absolutely becoming of the man he was. Practical, straightforward, no nonsense sort of man. Yet utterly devoted to my mum throughout her dementia and in death. And completely invested in the well-being of my brother and I until the end of his days.

And I have endeavoured to get underway the process of administering my dad’s estate. Despite being the younger of the two siblings my dad considered me by far the most responsible and trustworthy. However he was also aware how vulnerable my mental health can be, so had advised me to go directly to a solicitor and hand everything over in the event of his death. In fact he’d planned to change his will to make a solicitor the executor, but sadly time wasn’t on his side.

Because despite the degree of kidney failure he was experiencing, in addition to a handful of other medical issues, it was a fall that caused my dad’s death. Although we are still uncertain whether he had a stroke that caused him to fall, or whether he simply lost his footing, he appeared to have fallen down the steps near his shed.

Part of me has a sense of satisfaction that the fall responsible for his fatal head injury occurred as he was going about his everyday, independent life; taking a jar of pickles to the shed to pop in the vice to loosen the lid. However seeing him crumpled at the bottom of the steps before the ambulance arrived, in a pool of blood absolutely ripped me apart. Later we discovered he’d fractured his skull and had a catastrophic brain bleed. I don’t believe he was experiencing pain proportionately to such injuries at that point. And in fact when the ambulance technician asked him if he knew why they’d been called, he just managed, “I don’t feel too good”. Those were his last coherent words.

He lived for four days after his fall. We were told that in the unlikely event that he woke up dad would be severely disabled and unable to be independent. Still my brother kept telling him he needed to wake up. I made the impossible decision, with the doctors, not to resuscitate him in the event of arrest. Despite abuse from my sibling and his determination to prove I was mentally incapable of making such a decision, I completely believe I did the right thing. And every time I was alone with my dad I reassured him it was ok to go, if he needed to, that I would take care of everything and not to worry. I didn’t want him to survive at the cost of his independence, he’d have hated that. As much as it was wholly devastating I would rather live (somehow) without him than have him here and desperately unhappy.

But I miss him like crazy.

So many tears writing this. Hoping it will be cathartic.

Since dad died the relationship between my brother and I has deteriorated further. It is in no way what I want, but I owe it to dad to ensure his last wishes were respected and executed. A man who was so fair in life and always made sure both of us were provided for, would want nothing less in the event of his death.

It’s going to be a long journey. When I consider it, it overwhelms me. Not only all the ongoing administration, but an inquest into dad’s death, because it was sudden and unexpected, and apparently investigations at both hospitals where he was a patient following his accident.

At some point I need to learn to be my own rock. Already aware since mum died I’d been thrown rather reluctantly into the role of matriarch; now people are relying on me to make the grown up decisions for others like never before. How did this happen? How do I do all this difficult stuff without my rock?

All I really know in this is how great my friends are. They’ve carried, supported and protected me in recent weeks. Widowed friends, mental health friends, family members, and of course my incredible best friend Frances. And Dave, the unexpected friend from the dubious origins of Plenty of Fish. Now affectionately known as The Old Perv. He makes my life a little brighter by being in it. I guess this is how I get through, until I develop the rock within myself that I can depend on.