At Least A Thousand Times More

Today is the fifth of the month, and, like the fifth of all the other months that have marked the time since I last spent time with my dad on this earth, it's not an easy day for me.

Every month I wonder if there will ever come the fifth of a month on which I won't feel this way.  I don't think so, at least not for at least a thousand times more or so.

I thought I could make it through the day this time around without writing about my dad or my grief, a new kind of milestone that I feel a weird kind of obligation to reach towards, even though it seems unnatural - and, truth be told, so sad and disrespectful I can't really allow myself to think about it much.  

It's been 30 months.  My god that's hard to believe.  But not as hard as it is not to be able to talk to him except in the format of a one-sided conversation.  

Today I've been thinking about the last time I saw him before we knew he was sick, which was on an extended family vacation in upstate New York.  My husband, my daughters, and I hugged my dad and my mom goodbye as we headed off towards our respective gates at the airport at the end of the trip; I don't specifically remember hugging my dad then, but I'm sure I did.  And I'm sure I thought I would see him at least a thousand times more, with both of us happy and healthy.

I can't help myself from thinking back to things that happened when he was sick, and sometimes the memories and the visions of those things haunt me - like how I used scissors to cut the hospital bracelet from his wrist both times when he came home from the hospital - and how the way I felt when doing so was so completely different on each of those occasions.  The first time, he was still recovering from brain surgery and we were still reeling from the news of the devastating diagnosis and preparing for him to go to Duke for the treatment that we thought would save him.  The second time, we had brought him home on hospice, to save him from the spiraling misery that was going on in the hospital, with hope of a different brand.  The second time, I saved the bracelet after I'd cut it from his wrist; I put it in my purse as if that made sense or a difference in anything that was going on. 

I think back to the packed-up box of stuff from his office, the contents of which would seem meaningless, perhaps junky even, to a stranger but were of exactly the opposite to us in value. I don't know where most of that stuff is now; I guess it doesn't matter, except for when it feels like it does.

I can clearly remember the moments during which the news of the diagnosis was delivered to us, and I remember so well the feeling of hope that the statistics wouldn't, and didn't, apply to him, or to us.  It was as if that Hope was our magic carpet, our oxygen, our blood; to live, we needed to believe that he would live.  I sometimes wish that I didn't remember some of those moments or the rapid decline and the series of let-downs and failures and disappointments from the second and final time that we spent with him in the hospital; that was like being caught in a fishing net, and it forced us to reconsider what we thought about almost everything.  I try to think back to the full weight of the feelings of helplessness, of guilt, of terror, and of powerlessness that crept in during that time, before they were overtaken by resignation and different shades of the previous emotions. But I'm not sure; I think they just gradually took hold of me over the course of the last three weeks of his life, and I have to say I haven't quite shaken most of them yet.

At the end of that trip to upstate New York, my immediate family ended up being stuck at the airport in Albany because of a delayed flight due to thunderstorms across the country; my parents made it out on their flight on time.  After they's gotten home, Dad texted me to check on us and commiserated with me about the inconvenience of the lateness of our adjusted schedule.  "I hope you make it home ok," he texted when I told him that our plane had finally been cleared for take off, the second-to-last time he would text me, ever.  And only five months later, I said goodbye to my dad for the very last time, and, in the early hours of the morning later that night, I laid my head down on the pillow to try to sleep and found myself crying so hard that tears threatened to fill my ears.  I tried to stop but couldn't, and then I squeezed my eyes shut and felt that same message flash from me to my dad:  "I hope you make it home ok," I thought between sobs, and then I added,  "I miss you, I can't believe this whole thing happened, and I don't think I can make it without you" - thoughts that would run through my head at least a thousand times more between then and now.

Father's Day 2013

This one's not the first Father's Day I've spent with my dad, but it's hitting me hard anyway.  There is so much stress and turmoil going on in my life these days related to my job that I don't feel like I am in "top shape" when it comes to being prepared to cope with the grief that still so often catches me by surprise, either with its timing or its intensity or both.

I looked through some old pictures today and found so many of my dad doing things he loved to do, whether it was sitting in a lawn chair in the sun reading the paper, running, sitting on the beach, or spending time with his family.  In all of them, he looks happy and healthy and as if he is perfectly content, and for that I am so grateful, except for a song that keep playing in my head:

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THAT SONG ...

Today I found myself thinking about how on the day after my dad had died, I stood in the shower in the guest bathroom of my parents' house, crying and crying, feeling so much like my heart was breaking that I thought I needed to hold my hand over my chest to keep it together.  Never had I imagined - or even thought to imagine - that a day like that day was coming, or like the days like the ones I figured were still to come.  I had no idea how I was going to get through even that first day without my dad there physically with me, much less through the rest of my life.  I felt like I was falling down a well in slow motion, and I knew that at some point I would seriously need to reconsider my world view and, in essence, myself.

So many times, I've thought back to the last night that my dad was in the hospital and to the way that he insisted on having all the lights turned out and for Jennifer and me to be on either side of him as he tried and tried to sleep.  I remember how he reached out in the darkness to grab my hand and Jennifer's without even looking, and, recognizing the trust, the love, and the vulnerability in that move, I quietly started to cry there beside him in the dark; I was so grateful that he was so sure that we were right there with him.    

What I wouldn't give for just one more day with him.  I wouldn't even care what we did together; I just have so much to tell him and to talk to him about.  It's like I'm the one now reaching out into the dark to grab a hand to hold, and I'm so grateful that I have people who love me (and tolerate me) enough to serve that purpose, but it's still something that's so much tougher that I could have ever imagined.

Happy Father's Day to the man who was the perfect father for me.
I miss you and love you more than I can adequately express.

Knock, Knock!

On the next to the last day that my dad was on this Earth, I promised him that I would take care of my mom and my grandmother and my siblings, and I told him that we were so thankful to have had him to pull all of us together as a family.  And then, as I knew I needed to say for him, after all he had done for me all of my life, I said to him, "You can go. But you have to come back to me!" Dad, who had lain still for more than a day except for the slow rise and fall of his chest from rhythmic breathing, started stirring in the bed, moving around and kicking the covers in an agitated fashion.  Instantly I realized that he had heard me, and I was ashamed of the selfishness behind what I knew he thought I was asking him to do.  "Oh, Dad," I cried. "I know your body can't do it anymore. I know you are doing everything you can to stay here with us, but it's ok if you can't. You've finished the race: you've done everything you needed to do, and we will be ok."  He immediately settled down again, and I just sat there beside him, quietly crying, biting my lip to keep from wailing because I knew if I did that he would hear and be upset by that too.  I wanted to tell him that what I'd meant was that I hoped he could try to send me a sign, after he'd gone on ahead, and that he could come and be with me and the rest of the family later, in spirit.  I didn't tell him that, though, because I didn't want to risk causing him any more distress, and so I told myself that he would do it anyway, without having been asked, if he could find a way.

There are so many times these days that I feel him right here with me, and my sisters and my mom feel the same thing at times, too.  Sometimes I feel his spirit when I look up into the sky and see big white clouds contrasted against a blue sky - or when I see a beautiful sunset or sunrise.  Sometimes it's when I see or hear or even smell something that reminds me of him in such a strong way that it's impossible to ignore or overlook.  And sometimes the thing that makes me feel a connection with my dad is seeing a redbird, something that often happens at times when I need comfort or encouragement or when I just need something to make me smile and think more positively.  

My sister Nancy was the one who first commented that she had been noticing a redbird around her house and in other locations on a frequent basis.  After she said that, I started thinking about it and realized that I'd seen one around more often that I usually did, too. Other people in the family began to comment that they had seen redbirds in certain locations at different times, and over time it has evolved as a symbol of comfort and positivity whenever any of us sees a redbird.  

I sometimes think that Dad's spirit takes turns spending time now with each person he loved and watched over while he was here in this world.  If one or more of us are on the road, I think he's probably traveling along with us; if one of us is having a particularly difficult day, he's likely there to comfort us, often in redbird form.  

Yesterday morning, not long after I'd gotten to work, I checked my email and saw one in my Inbox from my sister Nancy's friend Suzanne, who, along with her family, has been having to make some very difficult decisions and plans as her dad enters into hospice care.  In the email, which Suzanne had sent to me and both of my sisters, she told us about something that had happened that morning as she was getting ready for the day.  Suzanne knew my dad and has heard us talk about the significance that redbirds have to us, and she has given me permission to share her words and a that photo she took:

I was getting ready in my dad's bathroom for a meeting at the hospice home. I was thinking about you girls and what you went through and how tough this all is. When I hear one knock at the window.  I think it's something to do with the storm. 

Knock again.  So I look, and this determined cardinal is there.  Going back and forth on the window.  Making sure I see him.  He only delivers one knock at a time .... but they are forceful.

Notice me!  I run to get my iPad to get the photo and capture the moment.  He knocks while I run away.  I take the photo and return to getting ready.  KNOCK.  

I turn around and say out loud, "Yes, I see you. And I know everything will be ok."

He knocks one last time and then is gone.  

And I have chills and an unbelievable sense of peace at the road we are about to travel.//

~Suzanne

Here is the photo she took - the redbird is in the bottom right corner of the window, looking in at her.

Happy National Siblings Day

Happy National Siblings Day, especially to my sisters, without whom I would not be the person I am today.  

Cheers!

I don't think there's anyone else in the world who can ever know a person like his or her siblings do; there is a shared history from events woven through the fabric of our lives, full of memories, tears, adventures, laughter, trust, support, and love, a tapestry of snapshots from the past and the present that results into a truly unique bond.

During the time that our dad was sick and since his death, I have felt like my sisters were the only ones on the planet who felt even close to the same way I do. We had different types of relationships with him and we are different people, but we love each other as fiercely as we loved him. 

We've taken turns falling apart and worrying about the others, but we have always operated as a unit.  I know that when nobody else can understand what I am feeling or why I am doing whatever it is  I am doing - crying, ranting, hurting - they will.  

I also know without a doubt that without both of them, I would not have made it through any of what happened as we have struggled to make it through the most difficult time in our lives, at least not in the same way that I did. 

They regularly support me, entertain me, give me things to look forward to, and keep me grounded, and I am thankful every single day to have them in my life.

The Tears That Followed

When I was growing up, my parents used to tell me that even if you have to have a good reason to cry, at some point you need to stop crying and move on - or you risk running out of tears.  I'm not sure if I totally believed them or not, but regardless I have never been much of a crier, until my dad got sick.  Since the time of his diagnosis and even more so since he went on ahead, I have officially become a crier.  And today, I'm here to say that evidently what my parents told me decades ago about running out of tears isn't really true - the tears do not ever dry up.  

On the night my dad went on ahead, when they took his body away, there was a sense of utter bizarreness, almost of an unearthly quality.  It felt like everything was happening in the midst of a fog.  Afterwards, somehow - probably from sheer exhaustion, both physical and emotional - my mom, my sisters, and I all slept for a few hours that night before we had to get up and start planning for the funeral.  Once we had made it through that, we knew we had to make ourselves eat, even though none of us felt like eating, and so we stopped by a pizza place on the way home from the funeral home.  "This is so surreal," I kept thinking, and it really was.  My brother arrived from out of state not long after we got back to my parents' house after lunch, and, after awhile, we resolved to do something instead of sitting around the house crying or in a daze.  

Someone suggested we go to get our nails done at the nail place near where my parents lived, the same place where my mom usually went and where we had taken my dad just after he'd gotten out of rehab, on the day before we'd left to take him to Duke.  

"Was it only six weeks ago that we were here with Dad?" I thought, with tears in my eyes, as we walked into the nail place.  When the woman who worked there and who knew my parents looked up and saw us, she asked, "Where's your dad?"  I couldn't bring myself to say the words "he died," and so I just stood there until my sister Jennifer said, "He didn't make it."  The woman and the other staff members there were very nice; I was grateful that they just expressed their condolences and then moved on to other more casual topics instead of asking for details.

I don't remember much from over the course of the next few days, just bits and pieces and feeling lots of sadness and confusion.  I was grateful that my family was there together and that many of our extended family members and friends had come to the memorial service, but the shroud of despair was so pervasive that it was impossible not to retreat into bouts of stunned silence and driving tears, both at regular intervals.  

It was really tough to leave my parents' house that Sunday; I wasn't sure how I was going to get through walking back into my house, when the last time I was there things were so very different.  I was operating on auto-pilot, I'm sure.  I remember one of my friends from work texting me that Sunday night to express her condolences and to suggest that I take some time off work; no, I told her, it's better if I keep busy.  I couldn't stand the thought of sitting in a quiet house with nothing but my thoughts and my tears.  

Looking back now, I think it's odd that I didn't think I should take any time off from work.  The ten weeks preceeding my dad's death while he was sick and certainly his death itself were the most traumatic experience of my life, and I was exhausted, hurt, and in shock.  So much so that I thought going right back to work was a rational decision.  But, as it turned out, I ended up with two extra days off, and I didn't have to spend them alone, because it snowed enough to warrant two snow days off from school that Monday and Tuesday.  I felt like Dad had sent me a gift, so that I didn't have to go back to work right away and so that I was able to grieve in the comfort of my own home with my kids there with me.  

I have this photo saved on my
computer under "Snow From Dad."

After that, though, I tried to hit the ground running.  I guess I somehow thought it would be back to business as usual, even though nothing felt "normal" at all to me.  In reality, though, I was in a daze much of the time.  The emotional pain, and the physical pain that came along with it, were almost more than I could bear.  The physical effects - the body aches, the back pain, the crazy appetite, the insomnia - were a complete shock to me; I had never heard that those things are part of the grief process, and they all compounded the difficulty of trying to cope with the sadness and the other emotions. 

A far as I can remember, I functioned well enough at work, but it was at a much slower than usual capacity.  Some days it was all I could do to get dressed and drive to work, often while crying, to fake being ok for the duration of the work day, and then to make it back home.  It was as if I was just going through the motions from the time I got out of bed in the morning until the time when I could get back in it in the evening.  At home, for the first time in my life, I let others take care of things like dinner and laundry and paying bills.  I often couldn't sleep at night; I spent a lot of time wishing with all my might that my dad would at least come back to me in a dream, and I was unbelievably tired.  Tired from not sleeping, tired from the grief, tired from crying, and tired from trying to keep it together.  It was beyond my capability to make plans or even very many decisions; I felt like I couldn't think straight or keep track of things, and in some cases I just couldn't make myself care about a lot of things that were going on around me.

If I had to choose one word to describe myself during those first weeks or maybe even months after Dad went on ahead, it would be "depleted." As I had done while my dad was sick, I read about brain cancer; sometimes it made me feel better, but mostly it just made me angry and sad and so I started to read about grief instead.  Eventually, I found my way to a grief counselor, and my sessions with her helped a little in that she told me each time I saw her that what I was feeling was "normal" and in that attending those sessions eventually led me to writing.  Sometimes I still wasn't so sure, though, that I was doing anything right or that I was going to make it through any of the pain, but I just kept plugging away, getting through the days and the nights, one at a time, because that's all I knew to do.

Dr. Albert Schweitzer said that he found there was “a fellowship of those who bear the mark of pain,” and that “sensitivity to human suffering does not stand alone and rootless.” We have all stood over different graves and have had different beliefs as to the fate of our loved ones, but our tears remain a universal constant and need no translation.

Sorrow makes us all children again – destroys all differences of intellect. The wisest know nothing.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Missing Him

A couple of weeks after my dad died, a friend of mine who had lost her mother a couple of years before that told me that the thing that left her with the most sadness since her mom's passing was thinking about the senses associated with her mom.  I didn't really understand what she meant at the time; I wasn't able to isolate what the worst or the most difficult part of all of it was because it all seemed so unbelievable and so horrible at that point.

I know now what she meant.  Thinking about my dad's hands, his legs, his wrinkles, his face, his voice, his laugh, his smile, his eyes - all of his physical presence - and how I'll never be able to be around them again makes me feel so sad, so lonely, and so very desperate.  

Sometimes I get a little glimpse of what I think for a split second is my dad, and in that moment I am like a drowning person struggling to get back to the surface of the water for air.  

About a month after my dad died, I was driving to work and saw a man that resembled him driving a car just like his.  I had to pull over to the side of the road and catch my breath.  

For months after he went on ahead, I woke up in the middle of the night and thought I'd heard him calling my name, just like he did so many nights when he was sick.  

As I sat crying on the night of the six-month anniversary of his death, I picked up my cell phone and impulsively texted "I love you" to the cell phone number by his name in my list of contacts.  A few minutes later, I got a response that read, "Who even is this?"  I felt like I'd been sucker punched.  Part of me wanted to text back, "Dad!! It's me! Are you ok?"  but I just kept sitting there crying, and after a few minutes another message flashed on the screen that said: "I think you have the wrong number."  

Several times when I've heard a group of people singing, I've thought I could pick out the sound of his voice singing above all the rest.  Each time that has happened, I let myself look into the crowd, just to make sure.

About six months ago, I posted the last part of the Behind the Scenes Story on this blog.  The song I chose to link to at the end of that entry was Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here."  My husband, who, incidentally, doesn't usually read this blog, invited me to take a spur-of-the-moment trip to Natchez, MS, with him a few days later.  While we were there, we asked around to find out where a cool bar was and ended up in a bizarre little place that was literally built into the side of the levee, a pub called Under The Hill.  

Only a few minutes after we walked in and sat down on our barstools, a guy started playing his acoustic guitar, and his first song was that exact Pink Floyd song.  Luckily, the darkness of the room hid the tears that rolled down my face as I sat there and listened in awe to the music.

This past summer, we had an accidental "iCloud" syncing of all of the Apple devices in my household, and all of our Contact Lists were blended together.  I didn't think too much about it until a few days later when my phone rang and I looked at the screen to see that it was showing up as "Dad" calling.  Evidently, my daughters had my husband's phone number listed under "Dad" in their Contact List, and so the iCloud sync had added that into my phone so that my husband's call showed up that way on my phone.  In the split second it took me to realize what had happened, part of my brain actually believed it was my dad calling me, and I felt my heart sink into my stomach when the reality of what was really happening dawned on me.

On the night before we left to take my older daughter to college for the first time, I was sitting outside on my deck and noticed that the wind was blowing through only some of the branches of one of the many trees in my backyard.  It was kind of eerie, and the words, "Hi, Dad," went through my mind.  About 15 seconds later, an owl hooted from in the woods behind my house.  I couldn't see it, but I exchanged a "Hello?" with the owl several times before the hooting and the isolated wind-blowing stopped.

A couple of weeks ago when my family was in New Orleans, I took my younger daughter and her friends to see the hotel where my parents stayed every February when they went for a business convention.  There, by the fountain in the lobby of the hotel, I thought for a split second that I saw my dad out of the corner of my eye, but, when I turned to look more closely, there was no one there.  

On the surface, it seems like getting a tiny glimpse or feeling a split-second connection to a loved one who has gone on ahead would be soothing, and maybe one day it will be for me - but now it mostly feels like salt (or something even worse) being poured in a wound. 

"Although their physical form is gone, you are not living your life without him or her. To live truly without them would be to never have known them. Instead, you continue to live with them infused in your heart, in your memories, in your spirit. You live with their love etched into your being. They will always, now and forever, be a part of you."

Not Knowing: Grandmom's Story, Part 3

Continued from Not Knowing, Grandmom's Story Part 2

In reading the book "Final Gifts: Understanding the Special Awareness, Needs, and Communications of the Dying," by Maggie Callanan and Patricia Kelly, I came across many things that spoke to me in regards to what my family and I had experienced during the end of Dad's illness.  I read the book with a goal of gaining some insight and perhaps even some perspective about my dad's death, and, in the process, I began to see that there might be another reason for the recent changes in my grandmother's emotional state besides the cognitive decline associated with her medical condition.

One section of the book is about things that may be needed in order for a person to die peacefully:

"Some people realize a need for reconciliation.  Some request the removal of a barrier standing in the way of a peaceful death. Still others need particular circumstances to die peacefully - perhaps choosing the time of their death or the people who will be there.

Realizing what they need, dying people often become concerned; some communicate a tremendous urgency.  Coherent requests usually bring action.  But requests that are vague or indirect may be missed or ignored, leading to frustration, anxiety, and sometimes agitation.  If the awareness of an important need comes late - when death seems to be imminent - the person may delay or prolong the process of dying in an attempt to settle an issue or effect a final reconciliatory meeting.

A person's anxiety, agitation, or prolonged dying can be upsetting for everyone ... Often, the response to agitation is to sedate the patient ... Sedatives may help relieve agitation, but medicines alone are not the answer."

Reading these passages caused me to see some things in a new light, not just about my dad's passing but about Grandmom in her terminal condition, including the fact that our decision not to tell her about Dad's illness or his death might not be the best choice.  According to the authors, "Sometimes a family decides to withhold info about the death of someone the dying person knows.  While this is typically done out of kindness and concern, the truth often brings peace instead of discomfort or upset to the dying person."

I shared that insight with my mom and my sisters, and we decided that Grandmom needed to be told about Dad.  None of us wanted to do it, but we believed it was in her best interest and we hoped the information would help to ease her mind.  As my sister Jennifer recounts, "We were so worried that she would get the idea that he abandoned her, that he didn't want to visit her again, or maybe even that he didn't love her anymore, and of course we wanted to do anything we could to prevent her from those thoughts, which of course were absolutely untrue."  We resolved to tell her the next time one of us could go with Mom to visit her. 

Shortly after that, on the Tuesday before Dad's burial was scheduled on Saturday, Jennifer arrived at our parents' house, and she and Mom went together to see Grandmom.  Here is Jennifer's recollection of what happened when they got to the nursing home:

We rounded the corner and saw that Grandmom was sitting up in her wheelchair, which was parked just outside her bedroom door.  We greeted her, and then I kneeled down right in front of her and held both of her fragile hands in mine.  I said something like this:

"Grandmom, I want to tell you something that might make you sad, but I feel like you need to know, and  I don't want you to worry.  Bill was sick and had cancer.  He went to the best doctors and the best hospitals, but, even as strong as he was, he was not able to fight off the cancer.  He passed away and is in heaven now with God and with Roy [our grandfather, Grandmom's late husband].  He is not in any pain.  You should not worry.  Vicki and Stephanie and Nancy and I were all with him while he was sick, and we took good care of him.  He always asked about you and tried so hard to come back to see you again, but he was too sick.  You were so important to him, and he loved you so much.  We promised him that we will take care of you no matter what. Then, when God decides it is your time, you will get to go to heaven and be with Bill and Roy again."

Somehow I did it without crying -- I just felt really focused on giving Grandmom some relief and definitely did not want to cause her any additional sadness or worry about why I was sad, and so I just talked clearly and slowly and looked right into her eyes and told her.  She wasn't really able to talk much, but she definitely seemed to be listening to me, and I truly think had a look of relief and understanding on her face after she heard the news.  She did not cry.  A little while later, when we left, I hugged her again and told her I loved her and that Dad loved her and that we did not want her to worry. 

In the days that followed and over the course of the next two months, the nurses reported that she was sleeping better and was much less anxious.  She required fewer medications and wasn't crying anymore.  We like to think it was because she understood that her son loved her until he took his last breath and that, given the information about what had happened to Dad, she was able to hold onto the belief that he had gone on ahead but was waiting for her in heaven. 

To Be Continued - Part 4 of Grandmom's Story, Coming Soon

What I Didn't See Coming

Since my dad went on ahead 18 months ago today, I have come to realize that when someone you love dies, you don’t just have to say goodbye to them at the time they pass away but also at every crossroad, every milestone, every big event.  I've discovered that there are endless firsts and countless tough moments to get through, not just obvious ones like holidays and big events, but many others that are equally if not more challenging and shocking, which in many cases makes them even more difficult to struggle through under the heavy blanket of grief.

As children, we look forward to firsts – the first day of school, the first time to ride a bike without training wheels, the first time to ride the school bus, the first time to go on a date, the first time to drive a car.  Firsts seem happy and are something we treasure.  But somewhere along the line, we suffer a loss, things change, and we have to adjust.  And then the firsts that come can bring about a sadness that is hard to shake, a feeling of extreme loneliness because you know the picture isn’t really complete and things aren’t as they should be.

And so as we traverse through the forest of firsts and other challenging moments in the midst of our shock, our sadness, and our grief, we are forced to let go, one finger at a time.  For me, the milestones have been hard, sometimes really hard, but some of the most difficult things to get past so far for me have been the ones I didn't see coming:

Topping the list are The Flashback Moments:  The first time I went to visit someone in the hospital after leaving the one with my dad and knowing he wouldn't be coming back.  In the elevator when I was visiting that day, on the way up to see my friend, I almost had a panic attack when the flashback hit me. It was a different hospital and a different reason for my being there this time, but when my mind careened back to a few months before, to the many elevator rides we took in the hospital when we were taking care of Dad, the unexpected flood of emotions that swept through me was shockingly debilitating.  

When I hear about someone giving birth to the first child in their family and especially when I hear about how excited someone is to become a grandparent for the first time, I flash back to when my first child was born.  As Dad happily took a turn rocking my daughter in the rocking chair in her room when she was just a few days old, I could hear him over the baby monitor singing to her and having a one-sided conversation with her, telling her that he was so proud of her and how he was so glad to be a grandfather at the age of 50 and that he thought it would be a good plan for him to become a great-grandfather when he turned 75.

There’ve been lots of other Flashback Moments too:  there was the first time I went to a funeral after I'd buried my own father, and there was the first time I found myself in the pick-up lane at the airport and I realized that I was in the exact place I was when I found out Dad had a mass in his head.  Every time I hear someone say “Howdy!” just the way Dad used to greet people in passing.  Just recently, on our family vacation, I was standing on the sidewalk on Hollywood Boulevard and suddenly I was hit by the awareness that the last time I was in that exact spot, less than a week before my dad’s diagnosis, my life as far as I knew was as it should be.  Hearing a song that Dad used to sing and recognizing that the only way I will ever hear his beautiful voice again is in my dreams is heartbreaking, every time it happens. The toughest of these Flashback Moments so far, though, was walking into my parents’ house the first time I’d been there after he wasn’t.  During all of these times, my mind is pulled back to another time as I remember; sometimes it is to a happy, healthy time, but more often it’s to darker days that let me know I am still heavily in the midst of grieving.  Even when the flood of memories from before his illness come to me in situations, I am almost knocked to the ground by the sadness and anger that come along for the ride too because I know in my heart that that’s how things should still be, with my family together, Dad singing and laughing, enjoying life as he always did.

And then there are The Stinging Moments, those that rub salt into my wounds, the ones that make me feel like I am walking on a very wobbly tightrope, like when I am watching TV and the story line is one in which one of the characters is dying and/or has cancer (or even brain cancer!).  Like when I close my eyes to go to sleep at night and all I can picture is the image of my dad’s frailty at the end.  Like the times when I’m searching for a contact on my phone or in my email and his name automatically pops up, such a cruel reminder of how I can't talk to him anymore.  Like just now, when I typed the number 18 in the first sentence of this post.  Like the time I checked my calendar just a couple of weeks after Dad's passing and I saw my notes about the trip to the Brain Tumor Clinic at Duke that we were supposed to be taking that week, and I was hit by another wave of realization about what had happened and what couldn’t happen.  Like the ones when I feel like I shouldn't STILL be crying so much or the ones when I lie and say I'm fine when someone asks how I am.  Those are the times that I keep forgetting to expect, the ones that leave me with a just-slapped feeling that I’m not sure will ever lessen or go away.

Probably the most frequently occurring difficult times for me since Dad went on ahead have been The Empty Chair Moments, the ones in which I am startled again and again by his absence.  I think about him many times each day, I fall asleep with tears on my pillow almost every night, and I talk to him in the car pretty often – so that part of missing him has become part of my routine these days.  But family vacations and holiday gatherings, they are so tough without him, even worse than I thought they would be.  I so often think about how he would've loved the things that we are all able to do, the ones that he isn’t still here to do ... going the beach, riding a roller coaster, drinking a beer, swimming and lying in the sun on a hot day, playing with the kids, listening to the conversations and the laughter.  All of those moments together that feel so great except for the fact that he is missing.  The ones that make me tear up and grind my teeth and CUSS because I am just so damn angry, over and over again. 

The first time I went on a run after my dad went on ahead, I got about a mile from my house and the tears started; being out there on the road by myself, away from any distractions and so aware of the empty space beside me, was tough, and I didn't see that coming.  It wasn’t that I never ran without him before; it was that this time I was running and I was so acutely aware of the fact that he couldn’t be.  And he LOVED it.  That day, I ended up cutting my run short and trying it again the next day; the second time I wore some of Dad’s running socks and things went a little better, but it still stung.

When my daughter graduated from high school a couple of months ago, I knew that getting through the ceremony without become a total emotional wreck would be tough for me for so many reasons, including the fact that her Gramps wasn’t there with us to see her and to tell her how fiercely proud of her he was.  As I watched her walk across the stage and accept her diploma, I felt the love, the excitement, the joy, and the pride more than anything else, and I got through it without a tear, but what happened after the graduation that night was even harder than I’d thought the ceremony would be: my husband had made a dinner reservation for nine people at the restaurant where we went afterwards; however, when we got there, the table was actually set for ten.  I don’t think anyone else except me noticed, but the chair that stood empty after we’d all taken our seats seemed like a blatant reminder to me, such a glaring physical sign of the very important person who wasn’t able to be there. 

The first time we gathered for a family photo with one less, and every time since, we can all feel Dad’s absence so strongly – it feels like the reverse of a Where’s Waldo photo. Each time I start to call him and realize that I can't. The first time I did something that I knew he would be proud of and I had to feel his pride in my heart because I couldn't hear it in his voice or see it in his eyes. The first time he became a person whose name was being written "in memory of" instead of him writing that to honor someone else.  The times when I need to ask him a question and he isn't here to give the answer that only he knew. Ouch.  

Another kind of moment that I didn’t see coming has been The Shadow Moments, the times I've seen someone doing something in everyday life that he would (should) be doing now ... scenes that, if I squint my eyes and get the angle of the view just right, give me a second to glimpse what I can pretend is actually my dad, in the moment, here as he was meant to be: a man about his age running or biking, someone swimming in the ocean, a person sitting in the sun reading the paper and drinking a Diet Coke in a Sonic cup.  All of it, underscoring the unfairness, again.

Also making the list are the surreal Not-Supposed-To Times, the times when I have to do something that I shouldn’t have to be doing – like when I visit his grave, like when we had to clean out his car to sell it, and every time I hear my voice telling someone who doesn’t know our story that my father passed away.  Or the first time I had to mark the box next to Family History of Cancer and then write brain in the box beside Type/Other.  Closely related are The Stand-in Moments when I am having to do things my dad should've been here to do - to worry about my mom, to tell his grandchildren that he is so proud of the good grades they are making, to give my mom and my sisters the advice that I think he would be giving were he still here. 

And finally, there are The Obscure Moments, those unique to him and probably unappreciated by or perhaps even imperceptible in the awareness of other people who didn't know him in the exact way I did: the first summer Olympics, the really hot runs of the summer (“Anybody can run in good weather,” he said at the start of every summer, “but it takes a real runner to brave very hot conditions.”), going to the movies and ordering popcorn and then saying "No way, but thanks anyway!" (as Dad always did) when the worker asks do I want butter on the popcorn, the times when I think of something that I know he would think is funny or interesting and I realize that I can’t share it with him. These things leave me with an aching in my heart because he enjoyed them so thoroughly and now he can't.

The first Mother’s Day after he died was one of the worst days I’ve had in regards to handling the grief.  I expected that first Father’s Day to be hard, but when I woke up on Mother’s Day that year, all I could think about was how my dad wasn’t there to honor my mom (or his own mom, who’d passed away just a few weeks before that first Mother’s Day), and my heart was unexpectedly full of sadness even more than usual that day.  When we took my daughter to visit the college she will attend this fall: Dad was so good at meeting people and making everyone feel comfortable, and I kept thinking that he would have loved to be there with us to help her meet people and acclimate to the new surroundings and he would have been so proud of her and so impressed with her college choice.  On the night of my daughter's prom, just a few months after my dad died, the kids and their parents all gathered at a park before the big event for a photo shoot, and grief descended upon me like dew falling at night; it was the first big event involving my kids that we had to get through without him being around to know about it, to see the pictures, to hear about how much fun she had.  And even the minor, the everyday times, that come in intermittent blasts, like when I see an Advil tablet dropped on the floor like he used to do or when I eat an apple and catch myself thinking I should just go ahead and eat the core too ("It saves time!" he reasoned whenever someone asked him about why he did it.) just like he always did.  Those are the ones that pop into my head and shoot me with a spear of grief and all the emotions that come with it, but at the same time somehow those memories sometimes bring a smile to my face as I remember how unique of a person my dad was and how his viewpoint, his perspective, and his “don’t sweat the small stuff” attitude are something I will carry with me forever.

And with all of these unexpected moments, I am left to wonder:  Does it get easier when these firsts happen again as seconds, and then thirds, and then so on? Do the shock and the pain lessen as the time when he was here gets further and further out, like a balloon floating in the sky? 

Time – Part 4

Continued from Time - Part 3

Last year on Father’s Day, I was resolute in my determination not to fall apart despite the fact that it was my first without my dad.  I wanted to honor my husband, who is a spectacular father, and I wanted to be able to hold it together so that those around me would think I was improving in my ability to cope with my grief.  

With the help of my teenaged daughters, the first part was easy, and it helped me to stay busy so that I could address the second part.  In the middle of that afternoon, we decided to go over to my in-laws’ house to give my father-in-law (my husband’s stepfather) a Father’s Day card.  We already had a gift for him but still needed a card to go with it, and so I asked my husband to stop at Walgreen’s and let me run in to get a card on the way to their house.  

I entered the store through the sliding glass doors and went straight to the greeting card aisle.  And that’s where I lost it.  As I stood there unabashedly crying in front of the special section of Father’s Day cards, I could hear the sound of a ticking clock, even more loudly than I had been hearing it since my dad’s diagnosis, filling my head.  My husband, realizing I had been in the store too long, came in and found me, pieced me together the best he could, and walked me back to the car.  As we had done since my dad went on ahead five months earlier, we muddled through somehow, sad but putting one foot in front of the other because that’s what has to be done.

In the last year, I honestly don’t think my grief has gotten any better (no stupid NEW NORMAL for me!), but I do think it has changed.  But one thing that hasn’t changed is the sound of that damn ticking clock.  Or maybe it’s a timer on a bomb.  Or one of those metronome things that used to drive me half-insane during the piano lessons I took as a child.  Whatever it is, I hate it.  I hate that I have that sound in my head; I hate that I have the knowledge that things won’t always be even as “ok” as they are right now.  I hate that I often don’t feel safe, because in a single minute two Octobers ago, life as I knew it dropped off the edge of a cliff, and everything I believed in was called into question.  When things became unbalanced, when I lost control – wait, correction, when I learned that there really is no control to be had over anything in life except maybe our perspective.  

And sometimes even controlling that is not entirely possible to do, especially for me now with that noise in my head and the knowledge that I needed more time with my dad!  Time while he was healthy, time to take care of him while he was sick.  Time to figure out ways to ensure that each new day would be one that he would look forward to because of the joy it could bring, rather than one to dread or to fear or even just to tolerate.  I wanted him to be able to close his eyes and smile peacefully, but he didn’t close his eyes very often and when he did, he wore more of a grimace or at least a look of worry.  As much as fucking cancer stole my dad, it also stole my chance to have enough time to make his last bit of time not just bearable but joyful for him – he didn’t get the cherry on top and for that I will always be resentful and remorseful.

And that’s the tough thing about grief: in the process, we are forced to learn to live without givens, in the midst of chaos and with the sadness and the anger mixed in.  We have to learn to focus on the good while at the same time knowing that doing so won’t make up for what happened or quiet the ticking noise or bring meaning to our loss.  As we flail and struggle and fight over what happened and about what needs to be done in light of it going forward, may we not forget the sustaining beauty that exists in every moment we are privileged to live on this earth.  Even the dark ones.

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. I want to put a ding in the universe." ~Steve Jobs