My dad's death was traumatic for me, and I know it was for my family too. When I was little, I had a very intense fear of dying. I remember it would haunt me at times as I tried to sleep. I began to think of everything that could hurt me. It was around the time I learned what AIDS was when I was around 9 or 10. I would worry about contracting some scary incurable disease.
My dad was older than most other dads. He was often mistaken for my grandpa and it would annoy me when people would call him that. I would proudly and sometimes yell, "No! He's my dad!" It was never weird to me that my dad was older and my mom much younger, like Gloria and Jay on Modern Family (we love that show partially for that reason). But I was very aware that my dad was older, and therefore more susceptible to getting sick, having health problems, and even dying. This was always in the back of my mind from a very young age, What if Dad dies?
It would terrify me to think about. There were times when my dad would get really really sick and at times, over exaggerate. He would bring me into his room and make sure I knew how much he loved me if anything happened. This wasn't constant, but just in case, he would make sure I knew in case he did die.
When I was in middle/high school I acquired an intense fear of cancer, somewhat influenced by reading My Sister's Keeper. That book wrecked me. It's an amazing novel, but it gave me a deeper fear of cancer and put me in a funk for a long time. So when my dad passed away from cancer, that combined my 2 deepest and biggest fears. And not just fears that I had recently developed upon discovering my dad was sick, but fears that were instilled in my mind for most of my life.
A couple weeks after, I began to write about how I felt... It's slightly repetitive if you've already read "The Worst Day Ever" post.
"Today after church, mom told us she had a surprise for us. We drove past Coeur d’Alene all the way to Nick Matheson’s gas station on the Indian Reservation. As we pulled up, mom slowed down on the shoulder and looked at the billboard and told us to just watch it. It switched advertisements about every 10 seconds. Then our dad’s picture blew up on the screen saying “William Howard Parker January 5, 1944 - September 16, 2016 Rest in Peace”. I still struggle every day with him being gone. I find myself getting incredibly mad for no reason or for small things. I blow up at Johnny. I start sobbing at things that remind me of him. Or I tear up when someone reaches out and sends me a message of sympathy. I absolutely hate the question, “How are you?” If someone loses their dad, don’t ever ask them that. Of course they’re not ok. I’m not ok. I’m just going to ask people to please stop asking me that. It just makes me cry and the answer is clear.
When I was younger and to this day, my biggest fear was cancer and something happening to my dad. I knew from a young age that my dad wasn’t like the rest. He was much older, though he acted younger than everyone else’s dads. All the teachers at school thought he was my grandpa. Last Thursday, Johnny and I were coming home from Target when we went to look for a birthday present for Joni Borg to cheer me up. I was already really sad about my dad. We had gone in to talk with him and he looked so sad and so miserable. I miss when I used to come into his room and he was sitting in his chair looking like he wasn’t there to stay, like he had something else to do next. The last few months, he was glued to it. He sat there, tinier and lighter than me. His skin was sunken in and his eyes were closed wincing. We asked him if he needed anything and he wanted water and asked us to get Johnny’s mom some water too. Johnny’s mom hasn’t been here for a month. He was acting disoriented. He told Johnny he had been out that day looking at t-shirts he could buy to start a business with him. I later asked my mom, they hadn’t run any errands that day. 'Johnny, I just wanna succeed in life.' 'Bill, you already have.'
That was the last time I got to sit and talk to my dad in his chair. Just 2 days before we were laughing and talking about Death Valley with Sister Teiman. I can’t believe he just left. My mom took him to the E.R. because he was struggling to breathe and had been miserable for several nights. He was nauseous and had hardly eaten in days. Johnny and I followed them to the hospital and found tons of people in there laying no the floor, puking in bags, and laying on beds in the hallways. It was worse than the movies. They couldn’t get his temperature because he was so cold. They took him right away and put him in a bed to warm him up, and never did catch his temperature. They did a chest x-ray to find more tumors than my mom ever knew about. When the doctor came in to tell my mom they were going to figure out what else was wrong, she told Johnny and I to go home and that they would see us in the morning.
I told my dad I loved him and he mumbled it back at me. Johnny told him goodnight and that we were going home. And then we left. I felt sad and sick hoping that he would be alright. We went home and went to bed. I got a call from my mom at 4:30 and she was sobbing and I knew that was it. “Dad had a heart attack, he didn’t make it.” Johnny and I got there as soon as we could to find my mom all by herself sitting next to dad. He looked so small and so tired. His poor heart just couldn’t handle it anymore. My mom said they fought for him, about 20 nurses were inside using shock and CPR. They asked my mom what to do as soon as he froze from the heart attack and she said, “We have little kids.” So they persisted for 30 minutes until they told my mom they had to stop. He had already gone.
My mom said it was taken out of our hands. If it was up to dad and up to us, he would still be here. He’d still be suffering because he wanted to be here with us and he wanted to keep dreaming. Heavenly Father had to take him probably because it was killing him to see him like that. My dad had some much more work to do up in heaven. Everyday my dad’s cell phone calls and for a second I forget that it’s Little Bill. Tonight I saw feet sticking off of dad’s chair and my heart jumped for a second, but I realized it was just Ricky reading a book. The hardest thing I have ever witnessed was my poor mother telling her kids that their dad was not coming home. I’ve never felt more helpless and never felt such an aura of vulnerability so strong. I’ve never seen my mom’s eyes so swollen from crying. Never seen my siblings look so tired. We all said goodbye to our dad’s body. But I just wanted to say goodbye to his spirit and know that he heard me. We sang him silent night as we sat around him and held his hand."
Even though it was hard for me to write, I'm glad I made myself do it. My grandma would always encourage me to write whenever I felt sad and alone when I was younger, and I truly believe it helps. Even if the words you write seem silly.
On October 1st, I wrote:
"3 weeks ago, a monster sat on my lap and now he follows me and won't go away. He calls me names. He says that I'm mean and that I shouldn't get up and try. He makes me grumpy, rude, and mad. I just want him to go away. I wish I could drive to Portland and leave him in the woods by himself. I could drive away knowing that he won't bother me anymore.
I think this monster follows people when they're sad. I'm sad. It has become my emotion of choice. It makes me feel cold unless I'm next to a heater. But I don't have to be sad, it doesn't heed to be something I AM or will become, it's just a feeling.
Today I sent my dad a balloon. I wrote my dad a letter. I told him I missed him and how sad it is. I tied it and let go, watching it float away. The sky was so blue and the sun so bright that I couldn't find my balloon. My dad is in heaven now. It's hard for me to talk about. My brain doesn't believe it still. I drive by McDonald's and think I should pick up a Diet Coke for him and I remember he's not in his room anymore. He's in a box in the living room. Just his ashes. I still have the last $6 he gave me to pick up a coke for him every time I went to town. It's sitting in my drawer.
I'm sad my dad had cancer in the first place, we would never be in this situation. I'm sad I didn't get to say goodbye. I'm sad my mom had to tell her kids their dad died. I'm sad he didn't get to be there more for Johnny and teach him everything he knew. He was so excited to hang out with Johnny all the time. I'm sad he won't call me almost everyday to tell me he loves me. He was the only person who ever cared to do that. I'm sad he was so miserable. I'm sad he was in so much pain. I'm sad my mom was alone and watched him die all by herself. I'm sad that I'm still sad. I'm sad I was always away at college. I'm sad I didn't get to have him longer. I'm sad he would get disappointed in who he had become."
At first, I had tons of happy dreams. There were multiple dreams in which I was able to say goodbye to my dad, which in reality, I wasn't able to do. One night, I dreamt my family was aware of his last day to live. We woke up early in the morning and drove together to a record store, where we stayed the entire day. We had the whole store to ourselves as we listened to oldies (my dad's favorite) like Elvis, the Beach Boys, Rod Stewart, and anything my dad's heart desired. We all danced, talked, and just hung out in that record store. It was beautiful in there. Wall-to-wall shelves and drawers full of any vinyl album you could ask for. Then the sun started to go down and my dad looked at us all, saying it was time for him to go. We all stood by him and had our chance to say goodbye and he told us individually that he loved us "more than life itself" (something he would always tell us). We all got to give him a hug and a kiss and then he was gone. There was no watching him die, no seeing his body with no life, he just disappeared. And then I woke up.
I had tons of dreams similar to this, one of them where he rode off into the sunset on a Harley, which I'm sure would have been his ideal send off to heaven. But then, several months later, those happy dreams began to get darker. I would wake up crying or even struggling to breathe and Johnny would have to calm me down and help me get back to sleep. Some dreams would involve my dad coming back to life and I couldn't believe it. It felt so real. Then I would wake up and reality set in that I wouldn't be seeing him when I walked into his room at home. Then they turned to nightmares and I would repeatedly see my dad die again, every night when I went to bed. I hated sleeping for a while, when I had loved it before. Sometimes he would die in brutal ways and I would have to watch. A couple weeks ago, I had a dream my dad passed away, but took my sister and little brother with him. In that moment as I was sleeping, I caught a glimpse of what it must be like for people who lose their entire family to a disaster, war, or accident. It was awful, and I can't say those nightmares have stopped. I still have them to this day. I've actually recently started to meet with a psychologist every week. He's a very good listener and enjoys talking about dreams and what they could mean. We're still working through my nightmares, but I find that it helps to talk through them.
The loss of my dad has not only affected me emotionally, but physically as well. I think it hit me on the extreme side, but only few days after he was gone, my who stomach broke out in hives. It spread to parts of my legs, arms, and neck and I itched all over. I ended up seeing a dermatologist and they were unable to diagnose it, but figured it was most likely from extreme stress. The itch is still there if I ever forget to take allergy medicine. And it's been almost 9 months. I began to have intense stomach pains as well. My body is prone to this when I am anxious, scared, or stressed. For a few months straight, my stomach would hurt constantly no matter the efforts I tried to fix it. For the first week, I felt too sad to eat much.
Initially, I know I went into complete shock. I remember my body literally felt numb. Or like a large piece of me had been ripped off of me. It sounds a little over-the-top, but it really is how I felt. It was an out-of-body experience, I felt like I was floating above the situation, like I must be looking at someone else's family because this couldn't possibly be happening to mine. I didn't feel like talking. I didn't feel obligated to speak to people, and I'm usually pretty social. I started to feel awkward and disconnected to almost everyone. It was difficult for me to even think about laughing. At anything. Laughing felt wrong. The day my dad died, my mom's brother arrived at our house after driving for 9 hours to get to us. He loves joking around, so he taught my little brother a few new jokes. They are now much funnier to me, but I remember feeling weird about laughing, it felt forced
I started to get angry a lot. Even now when I hear kids my age say, "Hey Dad," "My dad's calling." "My dad told me..." Anything like that, my hurt lurches. I mean, I'm happy for them, they still have their dad. But how come they have their dad and mine was taken away? Sometimes I feel angry at them, especially when their dad is older too. Why is their dad still alive? And mine is not? It sounds even worse as I write it, but I believe it's important for me to be real.
I find myself getting angry often, just in general. I'll get so pissed because everything seems to be working out for other families, other couples, and other people. It feels like my life is awry all the time. Johnny and I am surrounded by newlywed couples in our apartment building and some make their life look so amazing and glorious, which it is. But behind closed doors, I'm still in pain. I think about my dad on hikes, I think about him when I'm trying to sleep, I think about him as I work on homework, I think about him in class, I think about him when I'm with my friends.
I met with a counselor just a couple months after, right when Johnny and I returned to school. The counselor listened to my story and then left the room, bringing back a pamphlet entitled: "Grief and Loss". He explained that what I felt was "normal" and told me the stages of grief. I was immediately put off. I went home and cried to Johnny that a counselor couldn't even make me feel better. I made my appointment for the following week, but I purposely stood him up. I never went back for about 6 months because of my anger. I didn't need to be told I was grieving, obviously I know. I guess you say it's normal, but it made me annoyed. A few weeks ago, I returned to that same counselor and told him that I was mad at him. We talked about it and now we established what bothers me and we don't talk about it. I feel like a burden when I talk to people about it, so at least I can talk to a counselor who literally gets paid to listen to sad people.
I was supposed to be working the day my dad died, but word spread, and they knew not to expect me. I never needed to call and tell them when I felt ready to come. They informed Johnny that we could take our time. Johnny returned back to work right away, because he grieves differently than me and he is used to difficult life circumstances and working through them. It was about a week and a half before I could bring myself to face the public. As soon as I got to work as a receptionist at the pest control office I worked at, I regretted it. Everyone looked at me like I was going to blow at any second. And they were right, I felt like a time bomb. Any small thing could set me off. Luckily I was able to file papers alone to avoid speaking to anyone. A few people came to check on me but I would say I was fine so they would leave me alone. I had just barely started working there anyway, so I didn't really know any of them. They meant well, but I had no desire to talk to them about how I felt.
One morning I had found one of my parent's favorite old CDs, I decided to listen to it in the car on my way to work. The song "Through the Years" by Kenny Rogers came on. I imagined my mom and dad dancing around the living room with me when I was little. My dad used to turn that song on and find my mom to dance with her, then he would dance with me, which I loved. Then the happy memory stopped and I began to sob. My dad couldn't dance with me or mom anymore. I wouldn't walk upstairs in the morning to see him saying his prayers by the fireplace. I wouldn't get to see him dance around the house when he was happy. I wouldn't walk out to the shop to see him fiddling around with the boat. He was not here anymore and he would never come back. The tears were so strong that I couldn't see where I was driving and had to pull over. I took a few deep breaths and drove to work. I tried to wipe away the evidence of my crying, but I was too far gone. I had to go to work, so I walked in and my supervisor took one look at me and told me to go home.
I try to remember my dad and communicate with him, even though it may sound a little weird. It really helps me. At his funeral, we send off hundreds of white balloons with notes. We even sent him his favorite drink, Diet Coke from McDonalds, via balloon. I kept a steady tradition every Friday to send him a note tied to a green balloon, since he loved green. One time as I sent my balloon into the sky, it got caught on a telephone line and I began to cry. Another time, I was chased down by a small toddler who wanted to steal the balloon from me. But I showed her it was fun to watch it float away. I've gotten out of practice in my little tradition, but I try to do it whenever I can. It always helps me feel a little better, and it's my way of still getting to speak to him.
Sometimes I catch myself talking to him, and then I catch myself. I've started to allow myself to speak to him as if he was standing right next to me. "Dad, did you see that?" or "Hey Dad, watch this!" When I jump into the ocean, see a cool car, or find something he might be proud of.
There are times when I find myself talking about how my dad died like I'm talking about what I'm eating for dinner. It comes so easily and matter-of-factly. Then other times, it hits me like a boulder off of a cliff. I appreciate when people sincerely ask me what happened. I wish so badly that more people would just ask me about my dad. What was he like? Tell me your favorite story? What do you miss about him today? No one does, because they're scared of what I might say. Don't be afraid of me anymore. I will always want to talk about him because for a moment, it feels like he's back here with us, coming to life in the story. I still long for people to ask me that.
In the book I've been reading, Option B, the author talks about a close friend who who works as a high school teacher in Florida. This teacher decided to create a program bringing Holocaust survivors and high school students together...here's an excerpt from the book:
"Even people who have endured the worst suffering often want to talk about it. Merle Saferstein is one of my mom's closest fiends and the former education director at the Holocaust Documentation and Education Center in South Florida. She has worked with more than five hundred survivors and remembers only one who declined to open up. "In my experience, survivors want the opportunity to teach and not be shunned because they went through something unknowable," Merle said. Still, people hesitate to ask questions out of concern that probing will dredge up trauma. To encourage discussion, Merle ran programs that brought survivors together with high school and college students. She notes that when students are offered the chance, questions tumble out. "I've heard them inquire, 'What did you eat in the concentration camp? Did you still believe in God?' Young girls will often ask, 'Did you get your period? What did you do when you did?' These aren't personal questions. They are human questions."
I love that. I hope others can realize that it's ok to ask human questions. It's part of our story. Don't be afraid of the elephant in the room, he's right in front of you, don't make him invisible.
I still find myself denying it. I can look at his pictures and not feel sad because he's just in the other room. But he isn't. His picture is still on my 'Favorites' list on my speed dial. Some days when I see it, I wonder why I haven't talked to him in so long. Sometimes my brain blocks out that he ever left.
There are days where I will start sobbing without knowing why. The tears can become uncontrollable. I used to try to suppress the tears, but now I allow them to flow. I'm definitely a cryer. That's how my body works, so I let it do its job. After I started reading Option B, I began to notice when I was feeling sad, and I let myself leave class, take a minute away from work, go to the bathroom, and allow myself to cry when I need to. If I feel tears, I let them come and I quickly find a place I can be alone. Or I call my mom and have her tell me about what's going on at home with the kids and that is usually able to cheer me up.
