When I was standing at his coffin and looking at my father, I thought: “He looks so young, and so well. But he is dead, how can that be?” He had died about 25 hours before and I realized with sadness that, even though he looked so well, he was still dead. It puzzled me.

My mother had called me at about 6p.m. to tell me that my father was dying; he had just suffered a massive heart attack. But it was not until 10 o’clock in the evening that my brother told me that our father had died. It made me feel that an invisible weight had knocked me unconscious. I had to be alone.

I felt choked by the pressure of my own family and of friends, who were with us. I was a dried-up mummy, sitting on my bed, not seeing anything at all. My daughter Caroline came up to me and put her firstborn on my lap. It was all incomprehensible.

I had wanted to be with him at his deathbed, but no planes flew to Holland at that time of the evening, and the drive took over nine hours. I knew that he understood how much I wanted to be with him.