‘My father passed away, then my brother died six weeks later – now I’m left trying to process it all’
Author Judith Cuffewas hit with the shock and life-altering grief that accompanies two different kinds of loss when her father and brother — both named John Small — died within six weeks of each other
I believe there’s a difference between passing away and dying.
The first takes place within the natural order of life. Dying is more sudden, unexpected, and entirely out of sequence.
In six weeks, I have come to understand both. I wrote my father’s eulogy in December 2022 in the weeks before he passed away as a form of therapy to help me relive his life.
His demise was on the cards — perhaps from the moment he was diagnosed with cancer.
Three years later, on his 78th birthday, we buried him. With shaking legs at his winter funeral, I recounted a full life and how, in the weeks before he passed, Dad expressed immense gratitude for the love of a good wife, three daughters, a son and nine grandchildren.
He’d enjoyed success as a builder and carpenter, thrived in his pastimes, held lifelong friendships and announced that he had no regrets. Put that way, what more could one ask for?
I didn’t add that he loved life so much, he fought tirelessly, refusing to give in. Our sister-in-law, Ciara, a nurse, stepped up to see Dad over the line.
For seven gruelling weeks, we cared for him at home, watching our once-powerful father waste away to nothing. It was the hardest thing we’d ever witnessed.
Yet, while desperately sad, Dad gave us a gift in that time — the chance to grieve while he was still alive and leave nothing unsaid.
I was with Dad when he died. In the end, it was peaceful with little fuss, exactly how he’d wanted. As we all will someday, he took a last breath and, for the first time, I observed the thin line between life and death. In, out, gone.
Afterwards, I planned Dad’s funeral with my brother John. Not to blow our own trumpets, but we were a dream team. No fuss. No drama. Decisions were snappy.
With the help of Colliers of Bray, we executed a non-religious, intimate service — what John would later describe as the Carlsberg of funerals.
Determined to speak, I delivered what I’d tinkered with for weeks. Halfway through, overcome with emotion, I paused. When I looked up, I met my brother’s eye and heard him say aloud: “Keep going, Judy.” So, I did.
The next day, John called to my house, hugged me and stuffed some money into my hand, instructing me to treat myself.
A man of actions rather than sentiment, he said he was incredibly proud of me, that he always had been, but that I’d come into my own during Dad’s illness.
Though his words meant far more, I still managed to buy what I call my grief runners — gold and very sparkly.
I was wearing them six weeks later when John drove by me in Enniskerry Village with his bike in his truck. At 1pm, I texted him to ask him to meet me for coffee.
Forty minutes later, he phoned back, but it wasn’t John on the other end. It was his wife, Ciara, and something was very wrong. I arrived at their house moments after the ambulance to utter chaos — loud, frantic, terrifying.
Feeling unwell after returning home from a Sunday morning cycle in the hills, John got into the shower to cool down and suffered a massive cardiac arrest before his wife’s eyes.
Immediately commencing CPR, our hero Ciara kept him alive for 15 minutes before the paramedics took over. When they managed to move him, John arrested a second time in the ambulance.
At approximately 3.40pm, we were led into a room in St Vincent’s Hospital, instructed to sit and told that although John had fought hard to stay, there was nothing more they could do.
That day, I witnessed a second John Small die. This one, a brother I worshipped, who was just 48, fit and happy, with everything to live for, mostly Ciara and their two girls, aged 11 and 7.
Six weeks after the first, I returned to Colliers of Bray to plan a second funeral. It made sense that I’d help. After all, I already knew what coffin John wanted. He’d jokingly pointed to it the day we’d selected one for Dad.
His funeral was much the same as Dad’s, only bigger, sadder and even more moving. Once again, I spoke, this time of a brother, husband, son, father and friend like no other — kind, talented, very funny and far too young.
If my heart was broken before, it was now shattered. This time, when I faltered, I caught his wife’s eye, and Ciara told me to keep going. So, I did, for John, the love of our lives.
In six short weeks, we had encountered two horrific types of grief — expected and unexpected.
Like my father and brother, two John Smalls, the same but different, so is the ache that accompanies their contrasting departures. With Dad, it is emptiness, teamed with relief that his suffering has ended.
As a family, Dad’s fate had welded us even tighter, and though hurt, hope had begun to spring through the fog with various trips and plans.
We’d faced something awful, but were still here, primarily because of John and Ciara. That part gets me the most. It was them who carried us through Dad’s battle.
With John, the grief is searing agony, unimaginable shock, and trauma. He was here one minute and then gone like a story you might hear — one where you’d exclaim at the injustice, secretly thanking God that it happened to other people. Surely not us.
Each morning, the realisation that it did happen hits with force, accompanied by the deepest exhalation you could fathom, and I wonder, is this what dying feels like?
But then, somehow, my lungs expand and I get up. I do so for my family and John’s wife and daughters to help carry them this time.
Judith’s father and brother, both called John Small
The last time I was with John, the Friday before he died, I was due to go on Ireland AM to discuss my writing career. He joked he was setting record on his TV to slag me later.
I’d planned to talk about the brevity of life and seizing the moment. He told me to go for it and warned me not to cry about Dad on live TV. I never got the chance.
Most days, we revisit what happened, piecing together our part like a patchwork quilt of pain, lest we forget, as if we ever could.
We’re involuntary survivors now, forever altered by loss, etched with the knowledge that you never know what’s around the corner — and even if you did, you still can’t control it.
Though my body aches and I struggle to make sense of life, I refuse to give up on laughter and happiness, much as I’d sometimes like to. Whenever those thoughts hit or this feels too immense, I listen for my brother’s words at the start of this arduous journey: “Keep going, Judy.”
So I will, until the day my lungs fail to expand, because that’s what he’d do and what other choice is there?
The impact of grief can cause tremendous chaos in all areas of our life, and we may be surprised by our reactions.
There is no set pattern to how we will react, and no ‘norm’. Each grief experience is as unique to us as our own fingerprint.
I don’t think you can ever be prepared for death, even though it may be expected and there may be relief that the suffering has ended.
We only lose a person once, so there will always be an element of shock. Each loss is unique and brings its own unique grief experience.
We often hear about stages of grief, and it would be encouraging to think that we do go through certain stages, coming through the other side stronger and wiser.
At least that would give us some semblance of what to expect. However, grief is much more unpredictable than that and what we do share, rather than stages, are the symptoms.
The symptoms of grief are various and overwhelming and we can feel so many things all at once and in any order. Even though we may share similar emotions to others, no two people will experience the same loss in quite the same way.
As human beings, we never naturally stay in any one state, and we are constantly fluctuating. As long as you keep coming up for air, know that you will survive.
Be open to and embrace your feelings whilst you grieve and be kind with yourself — don’t expect too much. We don’t recover from loss; we learn to live with it by accepting and managing it.
Part of the healing process is to feel your feelings and process your thoughts, so you can take your learnings and begin to move forward. If you make your life about missing someone instead of accepting their death, you may make yourself resistant to healing.
We can also use our own experience to help others. Really being aware that the things we have today may not necessarily be in our lives tomorrow can also improve the relationships in our lives.
Tips for coping
• Our grief needs attention. Spend some quiet time to connect with your inner self. It can help to write your feelings down and you can get a sense of "handing over” and being heard. Putting your feelings down on paper is powerful. • Have a support network in place — designated people or someone who you can talk to about your loss and feelings confidentially. • Take extra-special care of yourself. Just as you would dress a wound, the heart needs tending too, but be wary of short-term relievers such as alcohol and junk food. • Eat well — little and often is good. It is easy to neglect our nutrition at this time, but diet is important in keeping us physically well and nourishing the brain. • Don’t isolate yourself. It’s OK to have “me time” but make sure you spend time with family and friends. • Rest and sleep when you need to. • Fresh air and exercise are like a spoonful of medicine. Even if you have to force yourself, you will always feel that little bit better afterwards. • Accept that the person who has died will always be a part of you and you will always have those moments of sadness. • Create rituals for remembering — it is important to connect and have moments when we allow ourselves to feel the sadness of loss and to focus our thoughts on the person who has died. This is how we honour their memory. • Every so often, look back and see how far you have come.
