“The whole of the first year was just a vast plain of pain and loneliness. The pain, at first, was literally physical. In time it does ease and transforms into other feelings like emptiness, guilt, tremendous sadness and disbelief. But the four worst days of the year are still Mother’s Day, her birthday, my birthday and the anniversary of her death.

“Coming up to Mother’s Day, six months after our loss, the overriding feeling was envy; envy of those who still had their mother and took them for granted like I did. The sight of shop windows offering gifts and people complaining about how it is just commercial nonsense made me want to scream.

“My siblings, father and I just missed her so much and the fact that I live in a different country meant that I had to go through it twice in that first year.

“How did I cope? I stayed in bed and cried, holding a photo of her, talking to her and playing Elvis songs. I spoke to my father and sisters, my brother dealt with the day in his own way, and we shared our pain, which did help. Nobody who hasn’t been through it can really understand how bad you can feel but you get through.

“As my mother died so suddenly and unexpectedly, it is taking us all a long time to come to terms with it. Eighteen months on, I still can’t believe she’s gone. I would like to be able to say that there were things I did on Mother’s Day that made me feel better but, personally, I cope better if I really let go and give in to pure grief when I feel really bad.

“If you hit rock bottom, really cry, scream if you need to, get annoyed with her for going without saying goodbye; then there’s only one way you can go from there and that’s up, or at least that’s how it works for me.

“In the first year, and especially on the special days, you remember your mother every day, you think of little else. There are a lot of ‘if onlys’, but in our case she had so many interests that there are lots of ways to remember her. We sometimes even laughed because it is also true that it is physically impossible to cry all the time.

“My family are very open to talking about our loss, in fact most conversations come back to stories about the past or tears about the bleak future without her. That helps a lot, but something strange has happened to our close-knit family since my mother died.

“Nobody knows what their role is anymore. She was a very strong, energetic woman and the house is so empty without her, the family is like a table that has lost a leg and is all wobbly.

“What advice would I give to someone facing their first Mother’s Day alone? Really I would say go with your feelings. I count myself lucky because I have no problem expressing my feelings so that releases a lot of pain and tension but not everyone can do that.

“Do what feels right for you. Don’t act one way or another because it’s expected or to make someone else feel better, even if that person is a member of your family.

“You need and deserve your time to grieve and Mother’s Day is a day to do that. That said, if you feel like going out for a beautiful meal and having a glass of champagne in honour of the life you shared up to then, then that is what you should do.

“Just go easy on yourself, she still loves you as much as you love her.”