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Disappearence
Sky's Tom Parmenter has been finding out what it's like for those left behind when someone simply vanishes.
He spoke to Chris Cook whose brother Steven, of Sandbach, Cheshire disappeared in Crete 15 months ago.
This is what Chris had to say:
"I wish I'd said goodbye, gave him a big hug and told him how much I loved him and how I always had done. How I always will.
Fifteen months have passed since the day he went missing and there has been not a second in each minute that we all don't miss him.
Dealing with the physical space is probably the easiest aspect of it all as the family are closer than ever, even though we always were extremely close.
Being together, supporting each other through this, has stopped us all from taking any time with each other for granted.
One other aspect has been to become sensitised to others in similar situations.
Whenever any of us see a news headline of a missing person we know all too familiarly the emotional churn that they are going through.
We also know the loneliness.
Nobody officially comes forward to help you through the situation. To counsel you through it all.
Thankfully, the open arms of the community and often those of strangers keep you going as much as anything.
Through such support we can, and have slowly rebuilt. Well, I say rebuild, it's more of a reconstruction, like building a house ripped down by a tornado with the remnant materials that are left.
Lives cobbled together, lives which go on although the nightmares remain and are always evident.
I can't remember the last night I slept without struggle or the last night I slept well and wanted to face life outside with anything remotely like enthusiasm. I often get to sleep at the same time mum and dad are waking up.
That sums up the state of 'in between nowhere' we find ourselves in.
During the first days and months there was a massive internet awareness campaign and as a result we received, first hand, lots of valuable information.
Now, with the crumbtrail disappearing the clues are no more than a natural fuel for nightmares: Tourists dumping their friends in industrial-sized bins as a joke; Albanian and gypsy gangs who specialise in mugging tourists; tourists going for a swim while drunk.
There are so many truths, half-truths, rumours, and contradictions that you have nothing.
So, 15 months have passed and even my best friends struggle to ask the question what I think has happened.
The simple answer is that I don't know. There's a feeling in my heart that Steve is alive.
So many people have given instances where people have disappeared without a trace only to have turned up again.
The odds are that without contact for such a long time my brother is no longer with us, but odds are for those that want to gain from a situation. I just want mine and my families' lives back.
As Steve said one night in May 2005 at half time: Believe! believe! believe!
I honestly feel he said it for a reason, and I will drag myself up to support the family, to find Steve, for every day that I have left."
He spoke to Chris Cook whose brother Steven, of Sandbach, Cheshire disappeared in Crete 15 months ago.
This is what Chris had to say:
"I wish I'd said goodbye, gave him a big hug and told him how much I loved him and how I always had done. How I always will.
Fifteen months have passed since the day he went missing and there has been not a second in each minute that we all don't miss him.
Dealing with the physical space is probably the easiest aspect of it all as the family are closer than ever, even though we always were extremely close.
Being together, supporting each other through this, has stopped us all from taking any time with each other for granted.
One other aspect has been to become sensitised to others in similar situations.
Whenever any of us see a news headline of a missing person we know all too familiarly the emotional churn that they are going through.
We also know the loneliness.
Nobody officially comes forward to help you through the situation. To counsel you through it all.
Thankfully, the open arms of the community and often those of strangers keep you going as much as anything.
Through such support we can, and have slowly rebuilt. Well, I say rebuild, it's more of a reconstruction, like building a house ripped down by a tornado with the remnant materials that are left.
Lives cobbled together, lives which go on although the nightmares remain and are always evident.
I can't remember the last night I slept without struggle or the last night I slept well and wanted to face life outside with anything remotely like enthusiasm. I often get to sleep at the same time mum and dad are waking up.
That sums up the state of 'in between nowhere' we find ourselves in.
During the first days and months there was a massive internet awareness campaign and as a result we received, first hand, lots of valuable information.
Now, with the crumbtrail disappearing the clues are no more than a natural fuel for nightmares: Tourists dumping their friends in industrial-sized bins as a joke; Albanian and gypsy gangs who specialise in mugging tourists; tourists going for a swim while drunk.
There are so many truths, half-truths, rumours, and contradictions that you have nothing.
So, 15 months have passed and even my best friends struggle to ask the question what I think has happened.
The simple answer is that I don't know. There's a feeling in my heart that Steve is alive.
So many people have given instances where people have disappeared without a trace only to have turned up again.
The odds are that without contact for such a long time my brother is no longer with us, but odds are for those that want to gain from a situation. I just want mine and my families' lives back.
As Steve said one night in May 2005 at half time: Believe! believe! believe!
I honestly feel he said it for a reason, and I will drag myself up to support the family, to find Steve, for every day that I have left."
