by Band Back Together | Oct 12, 2010 | Divorce, Domestic Abuse, Estrangement, Grief, Loss, Loved One in Prison, Parent Loss |
I found out yesterday that my biological father, Michael, passed away. I still don’t know how to process the news. I have been estranged from him for most of my life but he was always a constant figure on the back of my mind. My mom divorced him when I was a baby and married my step-father when I was three. My step-father is my father, he raised me, he walked me down the aisle and he has always been there for me.
When I was little, I would spend a little time with Michael and I have good memories of those times. As a kid you’re oblivious to the bad stuff. As I got older, I found out about all the bad things and I saw him less and less. He wasn’t a good man to my mom and my brother. He was abusive and mean to them. I struggled with that for awhile because I never saw that side of him. He was careful to only show me his good side.
When I was twelve, he went to jail.
That was the last of I saw of him. It was then that my parents realized he would never change so they stopped letting me see him. I went about my life. I’d occasionally get updates through the grapevine and I was fine with that. I would imagine sometimes that one day he’d be different and we’d be able to have a relationship.
When I turned 18, I tracked him down and gave him a call. I drove to see him by myself and spent the afternoon with him. It seemed like old times but was very awkward at the same time. We didn’t know each other any more, but we tried. We began speaking on the phone fairly often and were trying to get to know each other again.
It was nice, and I thought that maybe he really was a different person from the one my mom and brother knew. Then one day, I saw that side of him for the first time and it scared me. I never spoke to him again.
About a month ago, I received a phone call. He was in the hospital about to pass away.
I was devastated but I don’t know why. He was never there for me. He wasn’t my ‘dad,’ but I was still so upset. My husband convinced me to go to the hospital and make my peace. He came with me. I’m so glad I went, even though it was incredibly awkward. He was skinny and frail. He wasn’t the strong handsome man I remembered from my childhood. I stood and we spoke as if we were acquaintances, we didn’t speak of the past at all. We made light conversation for about an hour and then I left.
That was the last time I ever saw him.
My aunt called yesterday to inform me that he passed away. Apparently, he tried to smoke a cigarette while hooked up to oxygen and it didn’t end well. I feel awful that he went that way. I wish it could have been a peaceful death for him.
Since that phone call, my emotions have been all over the place; anger to sadness and everything in between. I still have the man I consider my father and Grace’s grandfather, but I still feel such a sense of loss. Mostly a loss of the future relationship I still thought I would one day have. I’m angry I didn’t have a ‘normal’ childhood with a regular family and a dad that wasn’t crazy. I have a lot of what if’s and they’re driving me crazy.
There is nothing I can change now. Everything is final. Our relationship will never change. He passed away alone, without me in his life and I feel like it was my fault. Like I withheld my relationship from him to punish him and he didn’t deserve it. The rational part of myself knows this isn’t true. He hasn’t tried to contact me once in the past ten years.
I can’t change any of that, I know, but I can focus on the here and now. I will focus on my daughter, Grace, and I will make sure she never has to go through anything like this as a child or an adult. I will focus on the father I do have in my life and let him know how grateful I am for all the love he has given me and that fact that he has been always there for me. He calls me everyday just to tell me he loves me. He IS my dad and Grace’s pawpaw.
I will chalk yesterday up to a bad day and try to move on with my life.
I can’t change my past but I can let it not affect my future.
by Band Back Together | Oct 12, 2010 | Anger, Feelings, Grief, Infertility, Loss, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Sadness |
Sometimes you don’t even realize what you have been running from, or for how long.
Until the night (why is it always at night?) it knocks you down, sits on your chest and forces you to stare directly into the eye of the storm. The night when you turned your head too casually and found it, there, staring at you from your peripheral. Angry for being ignored, pained for not being nurtured.
It is on this night that you pay for the days, months, (years in my case) of composure, the relief you have culled from choosing to ignore your demons.
And oh, I paid dearly.
Six years ago, I woke up from anesthesia an altered woman.
I have never allowed myself to mourn what I lost that day and how much of my soul has been scraped away since. I have been too busy ‘looking forward’ and ‘moving on’ and ‘being thankful’. I have kept a smile on my face and I have continued to placate myself with thoughts of ‘it could be so much worse’ (it could) and ‘I still have more than others’ (I do). But last night night, I was not thinking of how much worse it could be, but how bad it is, not caring that I don’t have it as bad as others because my situation is looking worse by the day.
And it all fell down. My feelings of frustration and inadequacy. My overwhelming pain over never being able to do what I always thought I would and could do.
It honestly became exhausting to hold down my feelings about losing part of my body, of being let down for the past four years by other parts of it. My arms and my heart gave out from the weight of it all. I have been holding my hand over that little girl’s mouth for too long but last night she was allowed to wail and cry and stomp her feet for what she has lost. For the life she felt promised, but was never and may never be fulfilled. For being the exception to the rule and for being held at arms length from almost every goal she ever set for herself.
Today, yes, I will try to get back to my zen, a place of acceptance and a place where I can build from.
Last night though, was about how much has been lost and destroyed.
by Band Back Together | Oct 12, 2010 | Abandonment, Anger, Blended Families, Coping With Domestic Abuse, Divorce, Estrangement, Grief, Guilt, Loneliness, Loss, Psychological Manipulation, Sadness, Self Loathing, Sociopathy |
I’ve never written for a blog. I mean, I tweet, but to share something so insanely personal? I can’t believe I’m doing this…but then hell, the guy with one ball had the courage to tell his story, so surely I can muster up the courage to tell mine! Single-jingle, you’ve inspired me! Well, okay, that’s a half-truth. Aunt Becky inspires me too; and can I say that I secretly want to be her when I grow up? (ed note: *blushes*)
I know you may be shocked with the title of this. I mean, come on, what parent would ever admit that they would give back their precious little heathens?
I am an eternal optimist. My glass is always almost-full & I can always find something positive in every person and situation. I am the oldest of six children, raised in a home that cherishes family. My parents are both alive and still married. My mother’s parents were married for 68 years and they raised eighteen children. My grandmother died first and when she did, my dear grandfather told me that he would die from a broken heart; and he did, six weeks later.
So, when my ex-husband (the charmer that he is) and I divorced almost nine years ago I was the second one in my mother’s entire family to divorce. As painful as the divorce was, little did I know that I would experience a pain so great, and so severe, that it would cause me to question my very existence.
My ex told me on 9-11 that he wanted a divorce; that he had never loved me. Great, gee thanks you asshole. He was psychologically and verbally abusive for most of our marriage. He wasn’t like that when we dated, or even for the first two years that we were married.
Honestly, it was as if a light-switch had been flipped the day we brought our daughter home from the hospital. He was angry with me because I was giving our newborn too much attention. WHAT?!? Are you fucking serious?? Yes, he was. That started the downward spiral of our marriage. He would tell me to do something, but when I did what he asked, he yelled at me because I either didn’t do it exactly as he thought I should, or he denied ever asking me to do it in the first place. In a nutshell, he expected me to play ball but kept changing the rules of the game without telling me.
I decided that I didn’t want our daughter thinking that our marriage was the example she should use as a basis for her future relationships. I knew our marriage wouldn’t last, but I had to wait for the right time. During our separation we worked with a child psychologist negotiating our co-parenting plan. Afterward, the psychologist told me that she believed that he was a sociopath. Perfect…and I have a child with this guy.
The first three years after we were divorced weren’t bad. We actually got along well and cooperated. Don’t get me wrong – the guy was still an asshole and thought he could/should control me, but I guess he was just less of an asshole. Well, that lasted until he met and married his current wife. Now, I’m not blaming her, but she certainly hasn’t told him to straighten his shit up. In fact, I believe that the two of them feed off one another.
You see, as parents, we all know that kids naturally try to pit us against one another, right? Well, it can be even worse with children of divorce. As soon as these two yahoos got together, they began telling my daughter what a terrible mother I am and how I must not love her because I don’t do this, or a I don’t do that. Step-monster has told my daughter that she thinks I’m a bitch; they both told my daughter that they think I dress funny, I’m stupid, I’m fat, I talk funny, etc…the list goes on and on.
I share this with you for you two reasons:
1.) If you’re a parent and pulling this bullshit – STOP THE SHIT NOW! You think you’re hurting your ex, but really what you’re doing is demoralizing and destroying your child. My divorce attorney said to us (before he would take my case), “it’s not divorce that screws up the kids, it’s the parents.” That was the smartest thing that man ever said.
2.) When I divorced, I made a promise to my daughter that she would never know exactly how I feel about her father; that while I may not agree with what he does, what he says, or how he lives his life, I would demand that she respect him as her father. I’m not perfect but I’ve done a pretty good job of this. I think I’ve called him an asshole a couple of times, immediately realized what I had done and asked her for her forgiveness.
Last July, after picking up my 13-year old daughter from an extended weekend with her father and step-family, she got angry with me and became belligerent and uncontrollable on our way home. I will say right here that I believe in corporal punishment, but only when it’s used sparingly. There are just some kids that need a good swat on the behind – mine being one of them.
So, I did what many parents have done and will continue to do and that was to swat (there IS a difference between a swat, a spanking, and a beating) her.
It was done to get her attention and only after I had pulled over on the side of the road in an effort to calm her down and talk through why she was so angry. I swatted her on the leg – she was wearing shorts – there was no redness, no mark, no nothing. That night she was hugs & kisses begging to do ‘girls night’ (girls night consists of us hanging out doing whatever she wants to do & always ends up with us giggling and snuggling in bed).
The next day she went back to her dad’s and thus began my personal journey in hell.
My beautiful, precious daughter accused me of beating her. Yes, beating her. I’ve never even kicked a dog, how could I beat my child? I may have had visions of killing severely maiming my ex, but I could never intentionally harm my child. Because my ex never questions anything that our daughter says and wants so badly to believe that I am the bitch that has made his life hell (it couldn’t possibly be because HE’S made his life what it is today), he believed her and hot-lined me.
Then, he took her to a therapist (which may just be the smartest thing the asshole ever did), and the therapist hot-lined me. It was at this point that I suddenly realized that if my daughter was so willing to make these false accusations against me, what would she say about my husband, her step-father? I emailed her father and suggested that until our daughter have several therapy sessions and we figure out what’s going on, that I thought it best that she stay with him. And there she has remained.
Working with the division of family services, or children’s division (whatever clever name your state has given it), is akin to having your annual exam (ladies) and inviting everyone in to see your vagina. They invade every freaking part of your life. Fortunately for me, the caseworker I was assigned to work with was thoughtful and compassionate.
I spoke with her on the phone and she explained to me that I was being accused of physically abusing my daughter. I felt as if I had been kicked in the stomach. I wanted to vomit. How could the child I so dearly love and would give my very life for say such monstrous things?
The only logical, rational reason I could come up with was that she was being influenced by her father and step-monster.
The case worker then proceeded to tell me that after her interview with my daughter and her father, she had decided not to interview me. Her conclusion: “This is not a case of abuse or neglect, but a custody issue and I am closing the case.” Thank God – what a relief!
My hell isn’t over. I haven’t seen or talked to my daughter in over three months. While I retain joint physical and legal custody of my daughter, I don’t want her here if she doesn’t want to be here. Do you know the story of Solomon? If not, look it up…you’ll understand me.
So, why do I not want to be a mother?
The pain I have experienced over the last three months is so intense that there are many, many days that I just don’t feel like I can go on. I have been rejected. Repudiated by my own daughter. She won’t return my calls; won’t respond to texts or emails; won’t have anything to do with me. I sit down every Sunday and hand-write her a letter updating her on what’s happening in our family. I tell her about Buddy, the family dog she left behind and how he lays down in front of her door almost every day waiting for her to come home; I tell her about her new cousin Ainsley that has a hemangioma on her eyelid and may go blind; I tell her that all of her aunts, uncles and cousins ask about her every time I see them. I also tell her that we love her and miss her.
What I don’t tell her about is the intense sadness and pain my husband and I have inside as a result of what’s been happening. I struggle most days just to get out of bed. I don’t want to go to work, I don’t want to do the things I used to love doing, I just don’t want to do anything, or be anywhere. I cried everyday for two months. There are still days when all I do is sit with a box of Kleenex and cry all day. Seriously. All day. I hate coming home – because it reminds me of her. But where else would I go? Dying seems like an attractive alternative sometimes, but then I realize that would give my ex too much pleasure. Fuck him.
I don’t want to write to her anymore. In fact, I don’t want to be a mother anymore. There’s just too much heartache and pain. Where the hell is the reward? She doesn’t respond to any of my communications, so why keep up the charade?
Through this experience I am learning what it truly means to love another human being. To be able to look past the faults of another and still love them with all your heart and soul is an incredible place to be. I’m also learning what it means to forgive. Not to just say “I forgive you,” but to really feel it in your heart.
Wait, wait, wait a minute! I’m not forgiving that son-of-a-bitch father of hers, not sure that I will ever be at a point where I can forgive him for what he’s doing to her. I’m working on forgiving her. I realize that this isn’t all her…she’s torn. She is a true ‘daddy’s girl’ and adores her father. However, she needs to bear some responsibility in this. I have to believe that as she grows and matures she’ll realize what she’s done and she’ll be embarrassed and will regret her actions.
I’ve also learned that to be rejected by one’s child is perhaps one of the most painful experiences, other than the death of a child, that a parent can ever experience. I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy. I tried that…there’s this guy that I really can’t stand, yet I pray that he never experiences the pain and agony I live with every day.
What do I say when people ask how my daughter is; how is she liking the 8th grade; how is she doing in school; what sports is she playing this year? Uh, hell if I know. Call her father. I’ve moved all of her pictures from public viewing at home – it’s just too painful. I put away all of her personal belongings in her bathroom and have redecorated it…again, too painful to see her stuff. Her bedroom door is closed and I haven’t been in there for two months. Too painful. When I go in there I am reminded of all of the love and the fun that we shared together. I am also reminded that she’s not here.
For all you out there that are divorced with children, please let this be an example of what NOT to do and remember what my attorney said, “it’s not divorce that screws up the kids, it’s the parents.” Your children deserve the best of what you have and that includes treating your ex with kindness, compassion, and respect.
I will see her for the first time next week in a joint therapy session. I’m sure it’s going to be awkward and I expect her to be cold and distant. I am going to do my best not to cry. I’m going in armed with drugs. Buspar and I have become very close friends in the last couple of months.
In my heart, my hope is that next week will be the beginning of the end of my personal journey to hell.
by Band Back Together | Oct 7, 2010 | Coping With Losing A Friend, Friend Loss, Grief, Help For Grief And Grieving, Hospice, Ovarian Cancer |
my friend is dying
of cancer
a friend. a cyber-friend.
we met 4 years ago on a grief site, called “beyond indigo.” there were about 5 or 6 of us who all came on at the same time, and we were a nice, tight little group. (these internet sites can be great…in the middle of the night, when you feel awful, someone may be on. even if no one is on, someone has written about feeling as awful as you…helpful. very.)
she is very spiritual. she follows the sufi path. she told us all in a post about an “ancestor ” shrine, so i made one for tom. and while it is mostly dismantled now it helped me. it was such a wonderful idea and i learned and grew from it.
anna’s loves name was ishaaq, and he led groups, and loved life, and was gorgeous. they played and sang together at their meetings (i am probably getting terminology wrong here, but it does not matter) he, and she, both seemed so wild and free to me. and that’s in a spiritual sense. there were problems. he had diabetes, and died from complications of it. she has major vision issues, which have left her disabled, and yet anna is a remarkable artist.
it just comes from within her. she is a shining spirit, to me, to many people. she dreams of ishaaq, and they are beautiful dreams. she never thought my “winks” were silly. i’m grateful to her.
here’s one of my favorite anna facts: many people in her religious tradition seem to take new names. she has a friend who posts on FB as Shaqeena Nonofyourbeeswax. (again, i may be a little off, but you get the picture). that is a cool friend. anna is cool.
she’s dying.
i guess, in reality, we all are, but she is, in reality. she has ovarian cancer. she had an operation and chemo, she was doing well, and now it’s back. and faced with a decision of more chemo and shitty quality of life, she chose hospice and pain management and, quite possibly, another lovely year…another walk around the sun.
(i now wish something that anna taught me to people for their birthdays….”a wonderful walk around the sun”)
you really can just be friends online these days. we’ve never met, but we have a connection. we do talk on the phone, and i’m always glad when she calls. it breaks my heart that she has to go through this. it makes me so happy that she has the friends that she does who do, and will continue to, support her. i think that her spiritual tradition is amazing about death, about crossing over and about soul-mates and eternal life. when she called me to tell me she said “i’m going to be the first to see my soulmate”…i knew what she was saying. in that instant i felt happiness for her.
i felt jealous of her.
i know anna is facing some rough times. i know she will get help from hospice and her friends, family and religious family. when she makes her transition she will be “handed off” into the arms of her beloved ishaaq. and her friends will be sad that she’s gone, that her gentle, creative and loving spirit has left this world.
i will be too. i’m her cyber-friend.
one day we’ll meet, on another plane. maybe she’ll be there wearing one of her incredible dancing outfits and she’ll sing me into another world with her sweet voice. maybe she and ishaaq will be there and they’ll bring tom to me, having befriended him on the other side.
i wish anna peace and strength and love.
i know she’ll have all of those things as she moves through her life.
by Band Back Together | Oct 4, 2010 | Cancer and Neoplasia, Family, Grief, Help For Grief And Grieving, Loss, Parent Loss, Sadness, Trauma |
On April 23, 2010 at 4:10 pm, I learned that my Daddy had a brain tumor. He had been having some trouble with the right side of his body and that had led him to the doctor. Many tests later, the doctors discovered the tumor. At that time we were very optimistic that the tumor was benign and that it could be removed surgically. The next week, on Wednesday, April 28, 2010 he went into surgery.
And our whole world changed.
After his brain surgery there were words thrown around like “oncologist,” “chemotherapy” and “radiation.” Phase III-IV Glioblastoma. Ugly words. He was in the ICU for a few days but after he weaned off the vent from surgery he was ready to “Get ‘R Done.”
And get ‘r done he did. He moved from the ICU, to the Neuro Acute floor to the rehab floor. He was told by his physical and occupational therapists that he was the hardest worker they had ever seen. Medically, he shouldn’t have gained his ability to walk and use his right arm again after his surgery. We were told with a glioblastoma tumor that the longest he had was 5 years.
Everyone grabbed on to the *5 years* part. 5 years? That’s plenty of time to get bucket list things done. Plenty of time to play with the grandkids, time to finish up projects and plenty of time to say goodbye.
Little did we know how fast things would go.
July 4, 2010 – my Mama called me and told me to “get to the hospital.”
“Are you for real? Like this is a for-real get to the hospital thing?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied.
He had been admitted a week before with odd swelling in his head. Staph infection. Brain surgery on June 29th AND June 30th. TWO DAYS IN A ROW. Of brain surgery. On July 2nd they talked about him going home and how his infusion antibiotics would work. On July 4th he was no longer going home but Home with a capital H. Wait…what?
His heart rate was high and his blood pressure was very very low. His kidneys were no longer functioning.
And then? We waited. And we prayed. We prayed for no more pain. But no more pain? Meant no more Daddy.
He held on until the early morning hours of July 13th. I received a phone call at 1:45 am and was at the hospital by 1:55. My sister looked at me simply and said, “he’s gone.”
He’s GONE. My rock. My strong Daddy. Gone.
It’s been not even three months since that day. Most days I would say I’m okay. Some days I’m simply not. The physical pain of grief sneaks up on me and overtakes my body. The anti-depressants and anti-anxiety meds don’t seem to work at all.
I miss him terribly. I have no motivation. I rearranged my bedroom yesterday and had to sit down and sob. I’m 32-years old with a daughter of my own and a house. But moving furniture in a house that my Daddy was so entrenched in crushes me. He is NOT HERE. He is not going to complete my “Daddy Do” list. He will not see my little girl grow up. He will not see *me* grow up.
You see…my wonderful Mama and Daddy saved me from a bad marriage. They let us live with them for four years. I got to live with my parents as an adult – I got to know them as my friends. My Daddy was my rock through my divorce, through losing my job in early 2010 AND through his illness. He was our family rock when my nephew was diagnosed with leukemia at the age of 7. He gave me advice on everything from what to wear to an interview to how to paint my kitchen. And now? He’s just gone.
I miss him.
by Band Back Together | Oct 1, 2010 | Abandonment, Anger, Autism, Grief, Help For Grief And Grieving, Loneliness, Loss, Parent Loss |
When you are in pain, part of you wants to shut yourself off from the world in your own discord, but there is another part of you that wants to take that pain and hand it to others – the gift of misery. In doing that, you hope that someone will see and understand what you feel; that may never happen, but it’s a chance we all want to take.
I lost my dad on July 1st of this year. The loss of a parent is devastating, full of sadness, guilt, reparations, and so on. But it is so much more…and this is my story.
My mother and father were married when I was six years old. My biological father was 5-years gone (out for milk? gone for bread? Nope. Just a loser leaving his wife and kids, it seems). So, my step-dad (and, moving forward, this will be the only occurrence in which you will see this word, because it is woefully incorrect) became my Dad. And we were instant soul-mates. My mother and my sister were always so close and so tight; when my mom and dad married, it felt like I had someone of my own.
Growing up, it was ever apparent that we had common interests and personalities. Out of seven kids, I was the baby and the proclaimed “weirdo” of the bunch. I took (take) so much heat for being “different” and “sensitive,” but my dad was always there, wanting to know about my life and wanting to know about the things that made me happy. My teenage years weren’t angsty – they were filled with friends, activities, and a parent who was there for every stupid teen-aged emotion I went through.
My adult years were tougher. I was in an unhappy marriage for many years and my first child was diagnosed with autism. I can’t begin to tell you what a blessing having my dad as my companion through all of this was. I didn’t have a husband that wanted to go to doctor appointments with me and my son (he could’ve given three shits less), but I had a Dad who wanted to be there. He wanted to learn with me. He wanted to help. He gave me time, love, understanding and peace.
And he was ALWAYS there.
And, now? I’m 35. At an age where I should be helping him in return for everything he gave to me, he’s gone. And I mean GONE. I can’t take comfort that he is “looking down on me” or “always with me” because I don’t FEEL it and I sure as fuck don’t SEE it. I feel angry. I feel alone. I have to accept the fact that the best friend that I (and my two children) ever had is never to be seen or heard from on this Earth again.
I have to look at my mom. My mother, who after so many years, is alone. I should be there for her, and GOD KNOWS I do try, but all that really does is make the absence of such sunshine that much more pronounced.
Two weeks after we buried my dad, I remarried. Two weeks after that, I was off to Europe for the trip of a lifetime. I have a beautiful family and a lovely home – but the emptiness I feel sometimes overshadows everything. How do you get through it? How does every memory that gets jogged at random times during the day not absolutely break your heart?
I miss my dad so much more than I can ever adequately describe.
