When you are faced with a loved one dying, and for the first time the responsibility to deal with the situation falls entirely on your shoulders, there is little doubt about it, you won’t be prepared – even if you know in your heart that death is imminent.

This happened in January 2021 when my mother, who was in a care home and aged 94, went downhill rapidly and died within a few days of a major change in her energy levels.

I was with her when she died as the lockdown rules at that time permitted visitors at the end of life. This was tragically ironic, yet I was grateful to be able to hold her hand whilst wearing PPE. Mum did not have Covid. She died of Parkinson’s and dementia.

After her death emotions varied from distress, guilt, bewilderment and loss, to relief that she was no longer apart from me because of the strict Covid rules in place at the time, but appeared to have made her own decision to leave this world and find peace.

One minute I felt strong and able to cope, the next I was almost frightened – scared to be facing the world without Mum even though I have my own adult family. Tears arrived unexpectedly, especially when something reminded me of her, be it a meal, piece of music, television programme or an unexpected find from my childhood that she had kept.

Collecting her belongings from the care home was emotional and I knew I wouldn’t have been able to empty her room. I was grateful that the care staff at Brook View did this for me. Even so, being handed her personal effects was a sharp stab of reality and reinforced her passing.

You would think after a death that you should be given time to work out what has happened and reflect on it, but this is not the case. Immediately after a death you have to be prepared to deal with the following:

Cause of death

A doctor must record the cause of death and this should be done as quickly as possible. I was grateful that the care home dealt with this.

Funeral director

The next job is to choose a funeral director who can take your loved one to a funeral parlour. Try to have one in mind because this was the first question I was asked immediately after Mum died.

Cremation or burial

You will also be asked if the deceased is to be cremated or buried, so it is wise to be prepared for this question too and, if there is a will, check the details so you know what the deceased’s last wishes are.

Green form

The funeral directors won’t be able to do anything with the deceased until the cause of death has been established, and they receive a ‘green form’, so you can see the importance of getting the doctor involved. If a doctor cannot determine the cause of death, you won’t be able to proceed with the funeral arrangements until after a post mortem.

Covid simplified the system

Pre-Covid you would have been required to collect the cause of death notification, signed by the doctor, from the doctor’s surgery and take it to the registrar, but things had changed when my mother passed away. The doctor’s surgery emailed this notification direct to the registrar. This enabled a death certificate to be provided following a telephone interview with me as the next of kin.

Death Certificate

If you are the next of kin make sure you know the full name of the person who died, their date of birth, their address and, if you have it, their National Insurance number. Don’t get any information wrong because I was told the charge for an alteration was £90. You will also be asked how many death certificates you require. I asked for more than I needed. However, when you are grieving it is hard to make rational decisions. Four or five would have been a better number for me.

Purchase the death certificates

The registrar will send the number of death certificates you have asked for by post. (They cost £11 each in January 2021).

Tell Us Once

When Mum died, a letter from the registrar (and an email as well) included a code for the Tell Us Once service that enabled me to fill out a form online which took care of cancelling items like the deceased’s passport, driving licence, car tax, blue badge, council tax, benefits and state pension avoiding the necessity of having to send out death certificates. I had over 80 days to utilise the code, but the advice was to use it as soon as possible. Despite notifying everyone, Mum’s state pension was paid to her after she died and her estate had to refund nearly £300 many months later.

Funeral arrangements

The funeral director will get in touch and run through what funeral arrangements you want. You need to be prepared to choose a coffin – with Covid I didn’t want to go to the office, so took the advice over the phone from Adrian at A E Jolliffe in Ferndown. You will be asked about the gown you want your loved one to wear. I chose pink for Mum because she looked so lovely in pink, again this was done over the telephone. Pre-Covid you would have taken clothes to the funeral director, but this was not encouraged when Mum passed away and I knew she wouldn’t have minded. I did give the funeral director Mum’s favourite beads to hold in her hand.

You also have to decide who is going to preside over the service. If you have no one in mind, the funeral directors will help. Covid rules kicked in. My brother and I had a Zoom meeting with celebrant Ellie Lomas to discuss the service. In advance of this I emailed details of Mum’s life to Ellie. It was cathartic to go through my mother’s life and remember her for the lovely and unassuming person she was.

If you are facing the possibility of losing a loved one, don’t expect to stay strong,  Grief lurks. It’s fine to cry and equally fine if you don’t. If you have already lost a close relative, losing another one can affect you in an entirely different way. It can also compound the previous death, or deaths. It’s hard to come to terms with a diminishing family.

I was extremely thankful that my mother had given me the power of attorney for her financial affairs and I knew where all her paperwork was. This helped significantly when dealing with probate.

I miss Mum every day and it wasn’t until her ashes were laid to rest with Dad, whose ashes she had kept in her lounge for fourteen years, that I finally felt the grief ease.