Missed opportunities - every weekend. When a child dies.

Every weekend since Stephanie died on the 7th October has been a weekend missed.

We visited her every 2-3 weeks. 

We took her out to the local supermarket and did our weekly shop, we had lunch in the cafe.

We went to The Range, B&M and into Starbucks for a coffee.

We went for a walk around Gloucester Quays and popped in for a Caffè Nero.

We went to B&Q when Peter had a DIY project on the go.

Stephanie didn't care where she went, she didn't know who we were in terms of 'mum and dad' and why we were taking her out, but she trusted us, recognised our routines and was happy to be with us.

We planned our visits around events that were coming up, such as birthdays, Christmas, Halloween, Easter, any shopping we needed to do.

We alternated our visits to the above places depending on the weather, her mood and health. Had she slept well the night before? Was it over lunch time we were taking her out? Did she have a planned activity in the afternoon? Get her home in time for dinner?

Occasionally we took her further afield, but she wasn't a fan of longer car journeys.

We chose places where the ground was even. She treated every colour change in the supermarket tiles as a drop and would just stop walking and let us help her over the non existent obstacle, clutching our arms, leaving pinch marks in our skin.

She liked the noise and the lights of the supermarkets, she loved pushing the trolley and would often grab someone else's trolley and attempt to wander off with them if we stopped too long to look at something.

She liked to be on the go all the time, then sometimes she's just want to sit down and rest and it would be hard work getting her going again.

Once I took her for a walk near her home and she just sat in the leaves on the pavement as they were too deep for her to lift her feet through and eventually I had to pick her up and carry her out.

We needed to always have a toilet nearby and carried a large changing bag with a set of clothes, her plate, cutlery, a bib and her water bottle.

When she was younger we mostly visited family and friends, went to the park and she'd play for hours on the swings. 

She joined us for holidays, days outs, walks up the hills.But as the kids grew older, as did she, the time became just Peter and I and the supermarkets.

She didn't sit and watch the TV, there was no resting when she came home on weekends and gradually we went from every weekend, to alternative weekends, to once a month, until eventually she never came home again.

It didn't stop her being part of our lives. We saw her often, we had regular contact with her home, even when we lived abroad for 12 years. The boys now adults would come with us for visits, my mum would meet us in Gloucester for days out.

It took 2 of us to take her out due to her needs. We moved back to the UK because of her, we moved back to our former home to be near her. We planned our old age around her.

The last 10 weeks have been unbearable. 10 weeks of only being 25 miles away from where she lived for the last 16 years of her life. 

'What shall we do this weekend?' We'll pop to see Stephanie. Take her out for lunch. I would combine a trip to B&M and The Range because she took forever to get around pushing the trolley and Peter would patiently walk with her while I go the chance to shop. 

In the supermarkets, Peter would do the food shopping and Stephanie and I would wander around the parts that Peter had no time for, the clothes, toys, toiletries, homeware. 

At Gloucester Quays if the weather was nice I could shop and Peter and Stephanie would go for a walk. I'd meet them at the coffee shop. Phone in hand ready for the call to say she needed to be changed and the endless battles of finding a clean and useable disabled toilet.

Every weekend is now an opportunity to visit Stephanie. I had two dates penned in my diary to visit her. I honoured both dates on my own. The first one I visited her home and paid her final utility bills. The second one I went for a coffee in Starbucks, but I couldn't face the shopping on my own.

We didn't go to her home or into Gloucester in November. There are plenty of other places and people we can visit, plenty of things we can do to fill the time, but each time we did anything our thoughts were 'we could've been with Stephanie.'

Two weekends ago Peter and I dropped off a Christmas present for the staff. We would've been dropping her gifts off, taking her out for a coffee.

We're going away for Christmas, it was already planned and booked before she died. We would've popped in this weekend, just because. There would've been a Starbucks, another opportunity to visit her.

There are no more opportunities to visit Stephanie, but there are endless weekends where we'll be thinking 'lets go see Stephanie, it's been a while since we last went'

Our last visit.