27th November - the saddest of anniversaries

Most people live long enough to lose someone close. Many people lose the futures they had mapped out for themselves. You will probably relate to my struggles today.

The first time 27 November made itself particularly known to me was the day I gave birth to my first daughter, Aimée in 1989. A vigorous little girl inside me who may have been a lot like me but I will never know. She died as we were waiting in a lift to go up to the operating theatre for an emergency caesarian. I knew at that moment she was gone. It seemed a tenuous psychic link just faded away. No matter how frantically nursing staff hammered on the lift buttons or worked on her aggressively and almost heroically on the table, they had acted far too late. Too much complacency and incompetence at St George's Hospital was carefully hushed up.

We know the medical fraternity closes ranks in situations such as this, to support each other, but there was no support for Aimee and I was left with a lifetime of mourning which I push to the back of my mind most days but which I will never get over. The pain doesn't diminish with time when a child dies.

I so vividly remember being doped up on morphine and having my wheelchair wheeled into the chapel and then the burial site. I went back to that site today to pay respect to that litttle girl and I regret we never got to look into each other's eyes and really see each other, even for a moment.

The wind was very blustery, but as I left Memorial
Park the jam jar of lemon, scented Teasing Georgia roses nodded and stayed put til after I had gone.

Driving home in the car I reflected on a different 27th November. This time it was 2017.

That's the day I left France to return to New Zealand. My dream and seven years of effort up in smoke. It was another mourning where the pain also never diminishes. I had to come back principally because NZ won't let you have your superannuation retirement unless you destroy your new life and relationships to come back to be resident here - just so you then have the right to apply for retirement at age 65.

Having been a tax payer in NZ since the age of 15 I find that rule immoral but there is no getting around government rules, no matter how draconian. You can't stay overseas and apply for it, as you can in more enlightened countries.

Everyday I miss France, knowing I am not where I need to be but lacking the means to do anything about it. I thought I had been given a reprieve earlier this year, when I went back for three months, but it was smoke and mirrors and only deepened the distress I feel. https://francesbigadventure.blogspot.com/2019/08/when-dreams-die-twice-man-behaving-badly.html

These key events in my life are the hardest deaths to manage because they aren't really manageable and it isn't helpful when folks say "Don't look back." The 27th of November is such an important part of my story and who I am that I will not be able to amputate it from my memories. Aimée and my sojourn in France remind me of who I am.