Having received no reply as of today, I called a consumer rights group in my local town of Béziers, who recommended that I wait another two weeks (as apparently replies to this type of letter from companies often take quite a while - part of their complete disregard for the customers that keep them in business) and then call them back (the consumer group) to arrange a meeting. They seem to think I have a good case and from that point on they will be my allies in order to try and secure a replacement bench.
As you can see from all this, I have come a long way from the cautious wreck who had a return panic attack to the bench delivery guy's panic attack (and subsequent bench-dropping) upon seeing my dog. This was the day feeble me who could hardly stand up left for my restorative nine days being looked after in the UK. Now I am stronger and I am on a mission to get this sorted out. I am so glad that someone is finally listening. Don't worry Girls' Night friends - William shall have his bench!
Now, you have all been following my head in its twists and turns regarding what the heck to do with my life, to move or not to move, if so, where to, etc. And we all know now that one shouldn't make big decisions in the first year of grieving. In light of this, I am doing nothing till January. If things haven't changed by then, I will re-assess the situation and see whether I have started, or it looks like I might start, generating enough money to keep this house, our family home.
The two big issues are that the house is too big for two people and the overheads are enormous, so, as I noted in a previous blog, I have decided to chop off two rooms of the house from every day use and dedicate it to earning its keep - my chambre d'hôte idea (bed and breakfast). Apparently this is very time-consuming and hard work (yikes!) so I don't know if it will work in the long run, especially once I have done my TEFL course and want to get out teaching. But one longer term option (to be decided in January), as the rooms have their own independent access, is to add a small corner kitchen and call it a gîte (holiday apartment). That way I don't need to be quite so present.
But for now, I've had to do hardly anything to get these two rooms to a point where they are rentable. Oh, apart from several days of hard painting! But I finally finished on Monday and have spent the time since doing a deep clean and putting the furniture back, as well as dressing the rooms a bit; a new kettle, crockery and tea and coffee bits.
My friend Sean arrives tomorrow and my builder friend Alex is turning up on Friday for a group demolition job on the old blue bathroom. I'm hoping Alex will have time to put up my curtain poles, ceiling rose and light, fix the new shower taps on and box in the loo pipe and then it's off we go! Photos and then up on some websites. I'm slightly nervous. I've been thinking, what if they end up in the house and see photos of William and ask about him? What do I say? Maybe just that he died in hospital and leave it at that, because let's face it, I don't know if I'd be comfortable staying in a house where a little boy had died. I know that sounds blunt, but I have learnt to be prepared for questions. You have to put yourself in other people's shoes in order to protect yourself later.
Here are some photos of my work:
And I now have almost everything for the new bathroom. I've been extremely busy both with preparing the chambre d'hôte rooms and researching and going out to buy bathroom things. My time-filling is going very well.
One interesting aside to organising the two chambre d'hôte rooms is that it has necessitated a furniture re-arrange elsewhere in the house. Moving furniture to new places is like a breath of fresh air - it's amazing how swapping one piece of furniture out can completely change a room. I have also hung some new paintings and drawings on the walls recently as well as putting more photos of William (and Izzy) around the house (we had loads of Izzy already and not very many of William - second child syndrome!). So instead of moving house, it seems that there is a natural evolution occurring right where we are which is moving us on, changing things without us having to lose our happy memories. And if I'm honest, I'm hoping these small alterations, although unnoticeable by Olivier (I do have to point them out to him when he pops in! Which he is doing quite regularly which is a good sign, I hope.), may help a tiny bit for him to consider coming back here in the future. God, I hope so.
One thing that was in fact huge for me was that yesterday morning I went and did the food shopping in my closest supermarket - I haven't been back since William died. I couldn't bear it. My trips there with William are so indelibly marked in my brain as they were so regular and all the staff knew him - we always stopped for chats and the usual 'Oh isn't he getting big now!' ,'Will he be starting nursery this September?' and so on and so forth. Fortunately no-one saw me, or at least, no-one stopped me for a chat. I have no idea if they are au courant but I would think so. It was a really hard half hour or so (empty seat in the trolley glaring at me) and just when I was heading to the till, it was made even harder because I bumped into William's friend from Fridays at the childminder, a little boy just 6 months older than William. I had to gulp back the tears then. To make matters even worse, the only open till was the one where, on our last shopping trip together, I remember so clearly William standing up in the trolley seat ad launching himself on me to give me a massive hug and everyone around me laughing with us.
Another big step forward was that last night (my 'no Izzy' night - she's with her dad on Tuesday nights) I finally accepted an invitation to eat out with our French mummy friends (originally Olivier's friends and now mine too) - the mummies of the families with whom we madly attempted to holiday with so soon after losing William. It was a super night and we talked a lot about what's been going on since we last saw each other, with some enlightening information emerging.
They are very, very good friends and fabulous girls, but I haven't been able to see them since the holiday as I've been unable to step back into my previous life where William was once so present whenever we saw them and their families, and where these families still have their two children, older girl, younger boy. It's fine, I don't feel guilty about this as I know from my research that it's quite normal to feel like this. I knew these feelings of sadness and even jealousy wouldn't last forever and they haven't, although I'm not sure I'm ready to see them with their children just yet. We've arranged to meet again next month, which is terrific.
I have come to realise that since losing William, I have actually been creating new friendships, rebuilding 'paused' friendships from where I was absent in the land of toddlerdom with a French husband, or cementing friendships from what used to be passing acquaintances. And mainly within the English community here, with mummies whose children are older. I've completely changed the dynamic of my social life. I am now proud to have these lovely ladies as friends. Due to me having both my children rather late in life, my English friends are more my age group but have older children. Olivier's friends are younger but have children of Izzy's age (and William's before). So I straddle these two worlds, and I'm comfortable with that.
The best thing in the world would be if Olivier came back strong enough for us to try and rebuild our marriage. If that happens, I would definitely like to keep this new balance of friendships across both communities working for me.
I've said it before, but I'd like to say it again, thank goodness for friendship! And thank you to all my wonderful friends, old and new, for your unwavering support, kind words and attention in the last few months. I couldn't have come this far without you.
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