The weeks and months after the funeral were really hard, everyone thinks when you have other kids that you just dust yourself down and get on with it, and to a certain extent you have to, my youngest son was only six when his brother died and I was on my own so I had no choice I had to make myself get up in the morning,I had to make life as normal for him as I could, So to the outside world Phyllis was okay, if only they knew the truth, I didn't want to be here anymore I just wanted to die so I could be with J.P. people may think that was a terrible way to think when I had three kids still here, but in my mind if I wasn't here they would still have each other and and the rest of the family, but John Paul was on his own and I just wanted to go and be with him. Six weeks after he died I decided to go back to work as I just couldn't stand to be in the house through the day on my own, my mind was torturing me with the thoughts of how he died, I had these pictures in my head of what he must have looked like,(because of the length of time it took for the army to bring him home we were strongly advised not to see him, we did not even have identify him the only way I could be sure that it was my son in that coffin was for the undertaker to tell me where his tattoo was and to describe it to me, that may seem stupid but there were three coffins on that plane I had to know I had got the right one.)So because I did not see him I had these images in my head of his injuries, it wasn't until after the inquest on the 3rd of November I sent for a copy of the coroners report,that funnily enough helped because I then knew the facts rather than what I was imagining. I just couldn't bear the thought of his handsome face being all battered and broken "crazy isn't it" but according to the report he only had a small bruise on the left side of his face the main injuries were to his leg and the most serious was to the base of his skull. Anyway as I said earlier I went back to my work in the middle of October, I worked in a small residential home for the elderly I had worked there for 5yrs and my boss was a good friend, he allowed me to work hours to suit me, so I would drop Dean of at school in the morning in a taxi then go to work, I always took a taxi so I didn't have to meet or speak to anyone, I would work till about 1.30 then my boss used to drop me of at the cemetary and I would spend some time there then leave in time to walk round to the school in time to pick up Dean. Then Dean and I would go home and shut the rest of the world out, that was our life for a long time, people would come to visit at first but that doesn't last because they don't know what to say to you, they try so hard to avoid talking about what happened, when all I wanted was to talk about my son, not carry on as if he had never existed, and people don't know how to deal with that. It is at times like that you find out who your true friends are and surprisingly they are not always who you think they are, I had what I thought was a best friend we had known each other since we were sixteen, we had came through so much together, we had both been in violent relationships and were left to bring our kids up on our own,but we were always there for each other she even stayed with me for a while, but since J.P. died she just didn't know how to deal with me,so she gradually distanced herself, she had known J.P.since he was a baby but yet didn't want you to talk about him, well I lost a "friend" but it is almost 15yrs later and I talk about my son everyday he will always be a part of my daily life and if people who are supposed to be my friends can't understand that, then too bad, because I don't need that kind of friends.