Dad spent two of the last days of his life alone and distressed in A&E – for no good reason. This insanity must stop

‘The doctors in A&E found lots wrong with him – none of which was news.’ Photograph: Master/Getty Images (posed by models)

There are good things and there are bad things. The trick is to enjoy the good things as much as possible and do everything you can to avoid making the bad things any worse than they need to be. Death is one such bad thing. In fact, I’m calling it: death is the baddest thing of all. So anything that can make it any less unbearable is worth some thought.

I wrote about my dad dying because, in the circumstances, I couldn’t apply myself to any other subject. I wasn’t sure this was the right thing to do. It was taking oversharing up to 11 out of 10 on the Spinal Tap amplifiers. And when I realised it had helped take some of my pain away, I felt something like guilt about being blessed to have a platform as great as this on which to share my thoughts when 99.9% of bereaved people have no such thing.