18/12/2025
Ten years.
Ian Pettigrew - 19.08.1959 - 19.12.2015.
Itâs hard to believe a decade has passed since I said my final goodbye to my dad. And yet, grief has a way of making time feel both impossibly long and heartbreakingly close.
Someone once asked me what it feels like to lose a parent. The closest Iâve ever come to explaining it is this: it feels like being homesick for a place you can never return to. A world that disappeared in a single breath. Because when someone who has known you all the days of your life is no longer here⌠something in you shifts forever.
In those early years, the homesickness was constant. All day, all night. Grief wasnât just sadness, it was the sudden hole at the centre of everything. Life went on, but I was not the same.
But over time, something changed. Not the grief itself, that stays, but the space between the waves. The edges softened. The ache became more familiar. And slowly, I began to understand something Benedict Cumberbatch once said: âIf we love, we grieve. Thatâs the deal.â
A decade on, my dad has become my why. My strength. The voice inside me urging me to do better, be better. I donât carry him beside me anymore, I carry him within me.
But it wasnât always like this. It took me years to feel steady again. Years before I could speak his name freely. Years before the anger eased and the tears softened.
And if you are grieving your person, whether itâs new or decades old, I want to offer you this:
You wonât always wake with grief as your first thought. You wonât always fall asleep with tears in your pillow.
One day, you will say their name with more love than pain.
The waves will become smaller. Gentler. Less sudden.
The world will feel possible again.
Until then, please be gentle with yourself. There is no schedule for grief. No finishing line.
As C.S. Lewis wrote: âThe pain I feel now is the happiness I had before. Thatâs the deal.â
And Iâve learned another truth: We donât lose someone just once, we lose them again and again, through every milestone they miss, every joy we wish they could witness, every version of ourselves theyâll never meet.
But within that truth is something quietly beautiful: To be loved so deeply that losing them reshapes you⌠that is a rare gift. One I will always be grateful for.
As we move through December, a time when grief often feels louder, I hold my dad close.
His legacy, his love, and the pieces of me that exist because of him.
Missing you always, Dad.
Amy đ¤
