Thanks to Victoria for sharing her experience of grief, and highlighting the ongoing effect a traumatic bereavement can have. If you would like to share your story with RoadPeace, please don’t hesitate to get in touch at info@roadpeace.org

Victoria Drew-Batty’s ‘Grief Journey’: No matter how far down the road you may have travelled, it is never too late to ask for help.

I approached an organisation recently to ask if I could write an article for their website for people – like me – who are, for whatever reason, afraid to speak of their grief, or who may be feel they don’t feel they have a right to speak of their grief because their grief – quite simply – is not accompanied by physical injury. It is ‘just’ grief. Is grief following an incident where someone is killed, and others are hurt, worse for those left behind, who also sustain physical injury? Is the grief of those (just) suffering the pain of loss comparable to those who suffer loss and physical pain?

Over sixteen years have passed since the very sad death of my mother, who died within hours of being struck by a London bus – a bus that also hit two members of my family, resulting in life-changing injuries for both of them. The days, weeks and months that followed the crash were, to some extent, a cacophony of activity – my whole family coming together to sustain each other in new, bewildering, unexpected and chaotic circumstances.

We all had to adjust; my father without his wife of forty-two years, me, my two brothers and my sister without our mother, a child suddenly disabled – and wider family and friends troubled by sadness for us, but also their loss to cope with too.

However, to some extent, in a strange sort of way and I hope to goodness I do not sound heartless, looking back, in terms of my own ‘grief journey’, those early days of grieving were certainly easier than they are today. I now tread a lonelier path in my grief; my family who needed me then have found their own paths and whilst I have moved on, too, with my own family in ways I would never have expected, the sadness of the loss of my mother seems to weigh more and more heavily. Is not time meant to heal?

In those days, grief was shared, it was equal; the loss of my mother – also wife, aunt, sister, friend – was keenly felt by so many, no-one’s grief was greater or deeper than another’s; we all just looked for ways to cope and ways to help each other cope. Life was very busy too – I had a baby, but also gave up my work so I could be there for my father and one of my brothers, who needs extra support. I know if the terrible incident that took away my mother had not happened my life would have been completely different (I was working at the BBC at the time, who knows how I would have progressed …) but that said I don’t resent the choices I have made – caring for my family in the way I have has been very rewarding; and in the early years particularly the love we all felt for my mother, and the unity of sadness we were all experiencing, bonded us all.

The weeks, months – early years – of shared grief were encompassed too by many other life lessons, all thrust upon us in the ‘new world’ none of us had ever considered. Especially, during those early days, the constant whirl of personal injury law – working out compensation for my sister’s family, for my brother, my father. Endless letters, reports, appointments. My father used to regale that it is better to be miserable at least ‘with money’ than be miserable without it … so the unedifying spectacle of the ‘value’ of my mother’s life was calculated; a process that had to be allowed for those in my family, in the eyes of the law, who had suffered so much. I made appointments, attended appointments, made (and poured) the coffee, read and answered the letters … watched as the ‘system’ wrapped its arms around my family members, calculating their compensation, counselling them, and providing practical care. I watched as it worked out what they deserved, comforted them with their loss – consoling myself with what I had, rather than what I didn’t have, grateful for what they shared.

Then, quite suddenly, in August 2012, my father died. That, too, was a terrible shock. I was always very close to my father, who was extremely kind, wonderfully good-humoured, and so grateful for the care I gave him after my mother died (not a difficult task because he looked after me too.) However, he wasn’t in very good health, and was physically weakened too after my mother died, I don’t think he ever came to terms with it. He was only 72 years old and had a heart attack whilst he was asleep – or he might have been reading at the time – his book was on the floor by his bed; delightfully (if it is alright to say that) it was an Anthony Trollope book, a Barchester Towers novel … he loved reading Trollope.

My grief over losing my father was totally different to that of my mother. I miss him and still do, every day, for the joy he gave me and – yes – I do resent that my children and my husband do not know him – but his death was so peaceful; I am so comforted that when he died was not in pain. In contrast, my mother’s death (she was 65) was utterly traumatic in every conceivable way, taken from us all at a time when her grand-children were so young, when she was so needed, still, by us all.

It has taken me a long time to open up about my grief. I have for so long felt that my feelings of loss are somehow ‘self-indulgent’ because I don’t have physical scars, that I should be strong for those around me whose needs are ‘greater.’ However, recently, just very recently, I have started to address my own feelings, I am slowly realising that it is alright for me to ask for help too. I didn’t really think I would ‘qualify’ for care through a road crash organisation after such a long time, but it took just one phone call. Already I have been told I can have all the help I need and that my grief does matter, too.

Thank you.

Updated on: 27 March 2024