I am travelling back to Ireland tomorrow , the first time since my sister passed away. I can not imagine being there and not seeing her. Living over here, it is easy to imagine that nothing has changed, that all is as it was. I was with her when she took her last breath, I do know, but I have not had to really confront her absence from my life.

This all changes tomorrow. I have such mixed feelings about returning, on the one hand I long to visit the places that she loved and to share all my memories with family. No one really knew her, where I live now, and I want to reminisce, to laugh and cry and celebrate with those who loved her as deeply as I do.

I also know it will be so emotional and real and raw, that my grief will be overwhelming once again. I attended a wedding a few weeks ago, a friend of mine got married and it was a beautiful celebration of love. The bride's younger sister, spoke at the handfasting and she talked about how her sister had impacted her life and how much love she had for her. I was in tears, hearing of this sisterly bond that so reflected my own and also how I should have been doing that speech for my sister.

She had wanted to marry her partner and had planned to do so this year, but it was not to be. In the end she was cremated in the dress she chose to wear on the day. A dress that was 10 times too big for her, because when her time came she was skin and bones. How very unfair her faith has been.

I still really struggle with the injustice of it all. My sister spend her life looking after others, putting everyone before herself. She tried so hard to mask her pain, right up until the end. Until she was unable to communicate with us any more. I remember her making a comment about me losing weight and telling me to look after myself more, while she lay bed ridden, her body now like a skeleton. That was my sister, she never complained, she just blew us all away with her strength and compassion.

Yet she really suffered, it broke my heart to witness what she had to go through, it was so fucking unfair.

So tomorrow, tomorrow I return to my family home, to the home I grew up in with my sister. I go home to face the reality of her not being there. Of not hearing her laugh, not singing with her, not dancing with her. I am so scared of what that will feel like, of that huge emptiness entering my life once again. I know I can fill it with the love I have for her, that grief in itself is another way in which we love. But that doesn't stop it from hurting so fucking much!

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