The title of this blog asks the question, but you will probably ask what pain am I talking about. I'm talking about the pain of loss and grief, losing someone who is close and means a great deal to you. It doesn't matter who you are, in time it is something that we all experience. Many of us have already experienced it, some of us are yet to experience it, it is not something any of us can escape.

You may ask what is the significance of this blog, why bring this up now? Well I'll tell you and to be honest it's the irony of the significance of today for me.

Four years ago today my father, passed away, he was in a coma following a stroke. My brother, sisters and I had to make the difficult decision to have his life support discontinued. He was a member of GA known as cognac69, he had only been a member for a short period of time and made some friends on GA, he believed he had longer to live and introduced me to the site. When he died it hit me hard and I didn't handle it very well, what had been minor mental health issues became magnified. It still surprises me how many people told me 'everything will be okay, you will get over it'. WTF, are some people for real, losing someone you love is not something you 'get over', you 'get over' a broken leg, you 'get over a cold'. You do not 'get over' losing parent or anyone else that you hold dear in your heart. The best that happens is that you become accustomed to the pain, you learn to deal with it without it holding you back - others may describe it differently, there is no right or wrong way to describe it - It takes time and there is no prescribed time as it is different for each of us. When I woke up this morning my heart felt heavy, no surprise considering the day, after a coffee and what little I could manage to eat I got on with the usual tasks at home tidying up. The weather has been dull and it has been raining most of the day, it has mirrored my mood. My father was cremated and his ashes were scattered on the graves of his parents and brother, so as usual on this day every year I went there to visit with them for a couple of hours, then I went to visit my mothers grave and sat there for a while. I remembered the good times and yes I did cry, I'm not ashamed to admit it. I miss both of my parents, even after they divorced they both remained in my life and they were friends. I miss my grandfather and remember him fondly with love. I can't say that I miss my grandmother, she died when I was of an age that don't remember her, but I do miss never having the opportunity to know her. I can't say that I miss my father's brother - my uncle - I never had the opportunity to know him as he died when and my father were sixteen years old. I know my father missed him, he always said that when Colin died a part of him died too. Anyway when my day at the cemetery ended I got back into my car and drove home, needless to say I was drenched from the rain and feeling somewhat morose. Arriving home I dried myself off and got into some dry warm clothes, made a coffee and decided to check GA, I'm always logged in even when I'm not actually on the site. There was a lot of notifications about stories that are in the last batch of the current anthology. Naturally I began to click on each notification, I clicked on one that was a reply to a chapter comment I'd left on one of the stories. When I read it the second sentence - "I took you on a sentimental journey, didn't I?" - struck me, at first I started to cry but then the crying turned to laughter and it felt quite cathartic. It struck me that today is the anniversary of my father passing and the anthology theme is 'Anniversary'. The stories have been a mixed bag of genres and interpretations of the theme, some have been happy anniversaries, and some not so happy, some are about the passing of loved ones. Even my own entry had been about the passing of a couple, it featured a car inspired by my fathers first car and conversations with him and some of his friends when they were alive. Maybe I'm warped in the head, I don't know, but I found the coincidences ironic and it made me laugh, I know that if my father could could have seen me laughing this afternoon, he would have laughed too at the irony of it.

That brings me back to the question in the title of this blog, does the pain ever go away? Everybody's answer may be different but I've found my answer, no it doesn't it just becomes easier to bare, todays events and the current anthology stories have taught me that.