The family of a man who died in the early weeks of lockdown say their grief is still as raw as ever after not being able to give him the send off he deserved. David Cooper, 78, died in April 2020 after being diagnosed with bladder cancer which spread to his other organs.
His daughter Liz Daniels said lockdown restrictions prevented the family from organising an apt funeral for the popular grandad from Heath. As a result, she said the family still gets phone calls from old friends who aren’t aware he has died.
“He had bladder cancer which was cured, but it travelled to his lungs and his brain," Liz, 52, said. "He went into Velindre and in the last week of his life we went into lockdown and were told we wouldn’t be able to come in and see him. I knew he didn’t have long left so I managed to get everything in place so he could come home. On April 5, 2020 he died peacefully at home with his family… As the time is passing Mum is getting calls from old friends who didn’t even know he had died.”
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Liz said her father worked at car dealer Fordthorne and was popular with dog walkers in Heath and Roath parks, where he walked his beloved dog Bentley. He also frequented Splott boot sale every Thursday. She said he made a lot of friends and always had a smile on his face.
“He always had a black labrador and was well known in Heath Park and Roath Park lake with the dog walkers. He was the biggest dog lover you have ever met and he wanted all his funeral donations to go to Cardiff Dogs Home. Everyone would call him a real gentleman and he always had a smile on his face.
“He loved his times in New Quay and was known as Dave Cardiff down there. He loved football and most sports and supported Man United. He had two grandsons - now aged 11 and eight - who absolutely adored him. He loved making up stories for them and told them everything was magic. He was also a great uncle and loved his nieces and nephews. He could fix anything and was me and my brother Rob’s ‘go to’ person – he always had what we needed in his shed.”
Liz said her father’s funeral was a particularly difficult day for the family because they weren’t able to invest in it as they would have liked due to lockdown restrictions. Despite his popularity, only eight people were allowed to attend. She said: “Looking back it makes me so upset that people weren’t given the opportunity to celebrate my dad’s life. We would have had a massive wake at the Three Arches pub.
“What makes me sad is that at his funeral, only eight of us could go and we couldn’t have a wake. There’s not really anything that represented his passing. At the funeral, we didn’t have funeral cars or flowers because there were so few of us there. Mum couldn’t have a single visitor to her house so had to grieve on her own. I moved in with her for a few weeks but she couldn’t get a hug from anybody. My dad was her carer so it was absolutely horrendous. We’re three years in now and we realise he was the glue that held the family together.”
Liz said the family is looking to book a trip to New Quay in the summer, where they hope to organise a ceremony with friends and scatter David’s ashes. She asked anybody who wishes to make a donation in David’s memory to send the money to Cardiff Dogs home as he wanted.
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