The Slow Sudden Loss of my Mum

I know the title doesn’t make sense. How can you have a slow sudden loss? I don’t know but this is how it felt when mum passed from this life to be with Jesus.

She had slowly deteriorated over many years and in so many ways the strong independent women I had known growing up, who probably had more influence on me than any other person, had long faded into the shadows as she aged.

In my childhood and teenage years dad struggled with his health in so many ways. This meant mum took on more areas of life than she might have wanted because dad just couldn’t do it. But she did it with passion and without complaint. She often repeated marriage was for ‘better or for worse’ and so she just got on with it and, by golly, she was going to do it well!

One abiding memory I have is when I had to go to a psychiatrist to see if he could help with some of the ‘issues’ I was facing. We walked in and one of the first questions that was asked was “is everything alright at home Mrs Campbell?”. Well, the reality was things were very tough at home as dad had recently been hospitalised with some serious mental health complications. This was clearly affecting me, but mum would have none of it and in many ways was a very private and independent person. So, her response was “what has that got to do with you?” He probed further and so mum took me by the hand and said, “come on Steve we’re going” turned to the Dr and emphatically said “thank you for your time” and we left.

I tell this story as an example of her strength and determination in life.

She was strong so to see her so weakened and slowly walking into the valley of the shadow of death was frankly devastating. To be honest I didn’t see the half of it either because my sister sacrificially took on the care for our mum and in so many ways wonderfully nursed and cared for her.

Our life in Cambridge has never been anything less than full and on too many occasions I felt guilty for not being there when my sister and brother had to take on the responsibility to make mums life comfortable when she took another turn for the worse. Facetime is good but it’s never any substitute for a handheld and gentle kiss on the cheek to say I love you.

And then she died.

What just like that? No, it was the end of a slow process and yet if felt so sudden. She was gone.

I’m not an orphan because I’m a child of God. But in ‘natural’ terms I was as both mum and dad had now passed. I struggled with a feeling of disconnection and loss.

I also felt vulnerable because for me once mum had gone I started to consider my own mortality. ‘Time waits for no man’ as the saying goes, and time seemed to be slipping by and I had to fight a sense of fear of aging and even death itself despite my strong faith in a resurrected Saviour.

The way my mum died in the Covid season, though not from Covid, added another layer to the grief. We were not allowed into the nursing home to be with her, though my sister got permission in the final hours. I could only watch her slowly slipping away on facetime.

In hindsight I think I was quite selfish in my last conversation with her because I tried to get her to say the words I always loved to hear from her lips. I did this by repeating the phrase that I wanted to hear just one more time hoping she’d reciprocate; ‘God bless, God bless, God bless’.

I think she whispered it, but I’m not sure as she was so very weak.

Not being able to be there as she passed into eternity and then only having ten people socially distanced at the funeral, which I took despite the migraine, did not aid the grieving process – which is a term I personally dislike as in my experience there is no process to grief, it’s random and shocking and untameable and yet it is a journey.

What did I learn most through my mums passing?

Probably that I’m much weaker than I knew. Oh, and that I’m stronger than I ever thought possible.

Welcome to the world of contradictions, like my mums slow sudden death.

Steve Campbell, alongside his wife Angie, have been Senior Pastors of The C3 Church www.thec3.uk for 30 years. Steve works closely with several different streams and churches teaching and advising on his greatest passion, the local church. As a gifted communicator, he has a conviction to change the perception of church and loves to challenge mindsets of what Church should be. Steve and Angie are National Directors for the Global Leadership Network UKI.