My father died today .... Well 18 years ago today

Ok yeah so people who know me know that’s its no big secret that my father died when I was 14. And those really close to me know that I still wrestle with the whole missing him and grieving for him stuff. But that’s not what this post is gonna be about today. Well not entirely at least. It’s a weird thing to lose a parent when you’re a kid. Ok in my case I was a teenager (barely) I had just turned 14 two months before. I had no clue how this one moment would impact my life forever forward.  I mean you know that you’re  going to miss him  and that he won’t be around for all the big stuff, but you can’t anticipate what will happen when you grow up have this crazy 6^th sense about things because it’s something so inertly him. For me it’s the ocean. I have this crazy draw to the ocean and  I know that somehow he gave that to me.  If he were still alive I know that it would be our thing.  I miss him more because we never had the chance to experience that passion together.  It’s been 18 years to the day since he died and I still think about him almost every day. 

I always had kinda a weird relationship with my dad. I don’t remember ever being a daddy’s girl as a child. I always kind of thought he didn’t really like me all that much growing up.  I we had a great family and did alot of awesome stuff together but I just always knew that  I wasn’t the favorite child and that compared to my brother I would always come in second. at some point I figured out that I could  to do what most girls do eventually and get attention from their dads in  a more negative way.   I  had tried to be the soccer star and impress him like my brother. But after having that fail I thought maybe it would impress him by being the aggressive fearless player who got carded more then I should have at that young of an age.   The same thing goes for grades. I really did start out trying to work hard at my homework and doing reports but at some point I  failed a class and subsequently just stopped trying at that as well. eventually I  just stopped seeking the approval from my dad. I mean what was the point anyways?

 One time I clearly remember him coming into my room at night after I half assed some report on something in like 5-6th grade. He said  that he was disappointed in me and that I could do better than this bad report hurried together at the last minute, and he expected me too. It was a weirdly defining moment, which has forever stuck with me to this day. Because the honest truth is that from that day forth I think I kind of figured it out. This private lecture was part of what I was always seeking from him, this effort  by him, even if  it was negative.  I strived  on it on and ran with it. So the problem is that from that day forward I never put a full 100 percent towards anything again... not really ever before he died.  I don’t think that I ever gave him that chance to not be disappointed in me. So how can I think now that he was ever proud of me?

See that’s the question I always come back to. Would me father be proud of who I am?  It’s a hard thing to wrestle with was you go through your teenage and young adult years. The truth of the matter is that I will never have an answer to that. Because I will never be able to ask him … he died. What I know is I am proud of whom I have become and so I have to be able to make that enough. But it will always feel like something is missing for my life to be whole, that small piece of comfort that can’t ever be given to me.

I wish more than anything that he could see me for who I have become as an adult. I think that as much as I wasn’t a daddy’s girl as a child, I am definitely my father’s daughter as an adult. I have so many similar qualities as he did: my laid back easy going attitude, this love of the ocean and anything in it, being able to sit for hours and watch a documentary, always having a book in your hand, a love for the quite relationships you get to have with people, my sarcastic/teaseable side, the way I can deliver any story and make it awesome, my huge gigantically giving heart but along with it is a very stubborn streak, wanting to make the holidays special even if just with a simple card written from the heart, the natural way I am drawn towards science and knowledge, My love of the outdoors, and the all creative and artistic parts of me.  

These are all things that I know mirror the person who helped raise me for the first 14 years of my life.  If I could do anything over again, I would have stayed there with my family the day that he had died.  I don’t know if  my not leaving would have made any sort of impact, but it’s always made me feel regret. It’s the only thing in my life I truly regret. I regret not being strong enough to see him sick and dying, I regret being a scared child instead of a brave adult like my brother was, I regret not knowing that this one moment would forever change my life. I could have said my good bye, I could have said that I loved him; I could have said that I’d miss him.  Because I do… I miss him all the time. .. Even 18 years later. So this is for you dad. For making me the person I am today. I think that you would be really really proud of me.