Some Thoughts On Life Before

“Sliding Doors” is that film where she makes a decision on a certain day and ends up living a parallel life to the one she was supposed to.

July 8^th 2009 was that day for us – we sat in with that doctor and he said those 3 words “Motor Neurone Disease” – and everything stopped. It was as if the air got sucked out of the room and you could hear the blood pumping in your ears – and we looked at each other and realised that the life we’d planned wasn’t going to happen the way we’d planned it.

That’s the great thing about plans – they’re always in the future and you spend your life putting things in place to achieve them – and then today throws you a curve ball and all that hard work and those plans don’t mean jack.

How silly the rows and fallings out over the years now seem. We all just exist day to day without really thinking about anything other than “what’s for tea?” or “should I buy that?” or “I’m fed up with my job” or other wonderfully important stuff – football, Ex-Factor, Eastenders – what the hell’s it all really about!!

I think a lot about the silly little married couples arguments we had – sulking for days about stupid crap – and I wish I could take every one of those days back and do something more bloody useful with them. Because when a doctor tells you that you’re on the clock wasted time is one item on the long list of regrets that suddenly pop into your head.

Carol and me were supposed to grow old together doing the things we’d set in place with the early decisions we made in our life together. Our children arrived when we were in our early 20’s so that we’d still be young enough to go off and see the world with the money and health to do it! We used to joke about it and I’d always wind Carol up about the kids being gone at 18 so we’d be free! Others we knew were doing all the exotic holidays with the nice cars while we tightened our belts and lived in our council house keeping our debts low and living pretty well within our means. Plans you see, that’s what we’d made way back then, plans for the future.

We both wanted children and I suppose didn’t even contemplate waiting until we were in our 30’s or more, why would you want to do that? I wonder a lot these days what sort of dad I've been – Carol is an absolutely brilliant mum even though she was always a real stress head! I just got on with working, the standard male career path, while Carol did all the real work and raised our children to be the wonderful adults they are today. Carol put all of her hopes and dreams on hold to raise our family – and I let her do it – of course it’s easy now to look back like that. As an older and wiser man I see lots of things that just happened and Carol went along with all of them. Carol did the part-time cleaning and shop jobs, around the children while I supposedly earned the money to pay for the car, the house when we bought it, and holidays and all that. Without Carol none of it would have happened – and I’d have been a completely different person – one who wouldn’t be nearly as lucky as I have been to have spent 25 years with such an amazing lady.

Cornwall was a family decision – but I pushed for it and Carol went along – I don’t have any regrets about moving here and I don’t think Carol does either (apart from how often Annie would visit). The children have benefited from being here – of that I am sure – and that was really what drove the move. Being away from the family is hard but you have to stand on your own two feet and we’re all better people for that.

Even down here Carol covered the children – I got the managers jobs and earned the money while Carol tried to find the job she could really enjoy. If only we hadn’t worried so much about money then maybe Carol could have started nursing earlier – if only – there’s another phrase that’s been repeated again and again over the last few years.

We finally made that decision in 2006 and Carol at last got the chance to do what she’d been itching to do all those years. I’ve never seen Carol as happy in a job as she was during that 3 year period. Whether it was on placement, at Duchy or Newquay she was really doing the job she was always meant to do. The studying was hard but she never swayed and passed everything as she went through. We started making more of those plans – where shall we move to when you’ve qualified? Australia? USA?