Handing back the drugs

Even though it’s been nearly seven months since my dad died, there are still little bits of fall-out. While clearing through a locked cupboard I found bags of drugs which had been proscribed to him in his last months. I had locked them away to stop any visiting child getting hold of them, then forgotten all about them.

So, the other day, I took the three bags of medicines to what had been his local pharmacy to dispose of them. I stood there, sorting through the boxes with the pharmacist, looking out for needles and separating out the low level meds from the seriously dangerous stuff. As we got to the last fews boxes the pharmacist found a label with my dad’s name on.

“Oh, Mr Cruttenden.” She said, with a heavy sigh (meaning dad, not me). Here was someone who had remembered the stages of the medicines, the initial ones for breathing problems, the more serious ones for the cancers and the oral morphine, for when things got bad. For whatever reason she had remembered him through these boxes but never heard of his fate. Until now.

We talked briefly and I got to thank her for the part she had played in helping dad, then it was time to go again.