A moment of introspection.
A friend of mine is going through a difficult time right now. She's nearing the end of a long journey to find her birth parents. She recently revealed this to her father, but not her mother. He, in fear of losing his daughter, has not given her the space that she needs in order to go through this process, in fact he's been down right selfish and possessive, using love to keep her close to him. She lashed back at him for this and said some things that, if I were him, would be very painful to hear. When I read her blog about these transpiring events I felt very hurt and angry that she would speak to her father this way. My feelings confused me because they obviously were coming from somewhere within me and had nothing to do with her, so I spent the day thinking on it. Why would it bug me so much that her father's feelings might be hurt? I've barely even met the man. So what's the deal? My introspection on this has lead me to a revelation...
I'm angry at myself for not being there for my dad. I feel guilty that when asked to go visit him in the hospital, I said that I didn't want to go. I did go visit him on many occasions, but when offered a choice I chose to stay home. I didn't like going there. I didn't like seeing him that way. I didn't know what to say to him or how to talk to him. I wasn't there when he died. I never got to say goodbye to him.
One thing that I've come to understand over the years is that time moves differently with age. When I was a kid, the last 5 minutes before the bell rang often spanned the distance of years and now a year is gone in the span of 5 minutes. My dad was in the hospital for probably less than a month before he died, but I remember it as being several years. At least that's what it felt like. I remember the last time that I saw him alive. I went with my mom and sister to the hospital and he was lying in his bed with tubes sticking out of him, but he was up and alert. I brought a Star Wars toy with me to play with. I focused on my toy to avoid seeing the reality that was in front of me. I didn't want to know, see, or understand that my dad was dying. He was going to be okay. That's just the way it is. Except for the fact that it wasn't.
My mom was with him when he died. I was at home with my sister. My neighbors from across the street called and told us that we needed to get ready, that they were taking us to the hospital. I knew. I think even before they called I knew. So, we drove to the hospital. I walked down the long white hallways, breathing in the smell of sterile death.
I got into the elevator and the doors closed on my old life. I was enclosed in a metal box that moved me from one life to another. I couldn't stop it if I tried, it was a one way ticket. In that limbo between worlds, I prayed to God that everything would just be all right. I told him that I would do anything if he would just let my father be alive. I was scared and for the first time in my life I felt truly alone. There was a ding and the door slid open, revealing a scene from some alternate reality where everything is turned upside down and topsy-turvy. The first thing that caught my eye was my grandpa, my dad's father, crumpled on a chair crying so hard that no sound came from his mouth even though it was opened and a nurse stood above him trying to console him. My grandma, my dad's stepmom, was standing in the middle of the area being consoled by someone. My mom's mom and stepdad were there too. I didn't know what to do so I just stood there waiting, trying to hide myself in the middle of the room. My mom came out and took my sister and I down the hallway and sat us down on a bench. I knew what she was going to say before she said it. "Daddy died. It's okay to cry if you want." That was it. I felt the emotion welling up inside me and I choked it down and I felt something snap inside of me, something intangible. I refused to cry. I would be strong for my mom. I was the "man" of the house now and "real" men don't cry.
She took us into my dad's room and there he was, lying there in his bed. Only it wasn't him. I mean, sure it looked like him, but it wasn't him. Everything that made him my dad was gone. All that was left was a body. It had this waxy sheen to it, almost like one of those wax dummies you see in a wax museum. He looked heavier, almost flattened out against the bed. It wasn't my dad. I refused to believe that it was my dad. I never saw him die. My mom told us to hug him goodbye. I was repulsed. The idea of hugging that thing that used to be my dad filled me with revulsion. I said I didn't want to. She told me that I would hurt his feeling if I didn't hug him goodbye, or something like that. Whatever the means, the result was that I began to feel guilty. I began to think that what if I left without hugging him and that was the one thing that could have brought him back. So, I hugged the body of the thing that used to be my dad. I shudder just thinking of how it felt. I feel ill just thinking of it. I pulled away and he was still dead. It didn't work.
I told myself the lie of a child. I told myself that maybe he had faked his death for some reason and that wasn't actually him in that room. I had never seen a dead body before and what did I know. It could have been some sort of wax thing. I held onto this belief for a long time, in the back of my mind. I forgot about this idea over time, but I think that was more by distraction than by choice.
Why wasn't I there? I should have been there when he died. I should have been able to say goodbye to him. I have longed to have a final conversation with him. To tell him goodbye and that I love him. Permanently losing a parent at the age of 10 is a very difficult thing. I was old enough to know what I was losing and yet not old enough to have benefited from actually knowing him. He never transitioned from the one who you listened to or else. He never became a person to me and I regret that.
The day he died I dropped a wall around myself that is thick beyond measure. This wall surrounds my emotional self and I keep it locked up tight. Ever since then I have floated through life, physically here, but emotionally somewhere else. I do have, every now and again, moments of clarity where I am completely here in this world. I have had them enough to know that most of the time I feel vacant, not present, not whole. Right now that is who I am. The real me is caught in the fabric of space and time somewhere between this moment and the moment that I sat on that bench and refused to accept my father's death. The real me; the whole, complete, and present me, has been hiding somewhere in fear since that day. I feel like Humpty-Dumpty. I had a great fall and now I'm lying in pieces on the floor and I don't know how to put myself back together again.
So, I apologize to my friend for feeling angry with her. We all live our own Dream, write our own Story, and see the world through the veil of both. When you rip away the Dream and the Story, you are left only with the Truth and the Truth is that her relationship with her dad is not my relationship with my dad. She is acting on the emotions that she is feeling, and within our own Dream and Story, our emotions are the ONLY thing we can 100% count on being real, because they simply are and require no explanation.
To thine own self be true.
I'm angry at myself for not being there for my dad. I feel guilty that when asked to go visit him in the hospital, I said that I didn't want to go. I did go visit him on many occasions, but when offered a choice I chose to stay home. I didn't like going there. I didn't like seeing him that way. I didn't know what to say to him or how to talk to him. I wasn't there when he died. I never got to say goodbye to him.
One thing that I've come to understand over the years is that time moves differently with age. When I was a kid, the last 5 minutes before the bell rang often spanned the distance of years and now a year is gone in the span of 5 minutes. My dad was in the hospital for probably less than a month before he died, but I remember it as being several years. At least that's what it felt like. I remember the last time that I saw him alive. I went with my mom and sister to the hospital and he was lying in his bed with tubes sticking out of him, but he was up and alert. I brought a Star Wars toy with me to play with. I focused on my toy to avoid seeing the reality that was in front of me. I didn't want to know, see, or understand that my dad was dying. He was going to be okay. That's just the way it is. Except for the fact that it wasn't.
My mom was with him when he died. I was at home with my sister. My neighbors from across the street called and told us that we needed to get ready, that they were taking us to the hospital. I knew. I think even before they called I knew. So, we drove to the hospital. I walked down the long white hallways, breathing in the smell of sterile death.
I got into the elevator and the doors closed on my old life. I was enclosed in a metal box that moved me from one life to another. I couldn't stop it if I tried, it was a one way ticket. In that limbo between worlds, I prayed to God that everything would just be all right. I told him that I would do anything if he would just let my father be alive. I was scared and for the first time in my life I felt truly alone. There was a ding and the door slid open, revealing a scene from some alternate reality where everything is turned upside down and topsy-turvy. The first thing that caught my eye was my grandpa, my dad's father, crumpled on a chair crying so hard that no sound came from his mouth even though it was opened and a nurse stood above him trying to console him. My grandma, my dad's stepmom, was standing in the middle of the area being consoled by someone. My mom's mom and stepdad were there too. I didn't know what to do so I just stood there waiting, trying to hide myself in the middle of the room. My mom came out and took my sister and I down the hallway and sat us down on a bench. I knew what she was going to say before she said it. "Daddy died. It's okay to cry if you want." That was it. I felt the emotion welling up inside me and I choked it down and I felt something snap inside of me, something intangible. I refused to cry. I would be strong for my mom. I was the "man" of the house now and "real" men don't cry.
She took us into my dad's room and there he was, lying there in his bed. Only it wasn't him. I mean, sure it looked like him, but it wasn't him. Everything that made him my dad was gone. All that was left was a body. It had this waxy sheen to it, almost like one of those wax dummies you see in a wax museum. He looked heavier, almost flattened out against the bed. It wasn't my dad. I refused to believe that it was my dad. I never saw him die. My mom told us to hug him goodbye. I was repulsed. The idea of hugging that thing that used to be my dad filled me with revulsion. I said I didn't want to. She told me that I would hurt his feeling if I didn't hug him goodbye, or something like that. Whatever the means, the result was that I began to feel guilty. I began to think that what if I left without hugging him and that was the one thing that could have brought him back. So, I hugged the body of the thing that used to be my dad. I shudder just thinking of how it felt. I feel ill just thinking of it. I pulled away and he was still dead. It didn't work.
I told myself the lie of a child. I told myself that maybe he had faked his death for some reason and that wasn't actually him in that room. I had never seen a dead body before and what did I know. It could have been some sort of wax thing. I held onto this belief for a long time, in the back of my mind. I forgot about this idea over time, but I think that was more by distraction than by choice.
Why wasn't I there? I should have been there when he died. I should have been able to say goodbye to him. I have longed to have a final conversation with him. To tell him goodbye and that I love him. Permanently losing a parent at the age of 10 is a very difficult thing. I was old enough to know what I was losing and yet not old enough to have benefited from actually knowing him. He never transitioned from the one who you listened to or else. He never became a person to me and I regret that.
The day he died I dropped a wall around myself that is thick beyond measure. This wall surrounds my emotional self and I keep it locked up tight. Ever since then I have floated through life, physically here, but emotionally somewhere else. I do have, every now and again, moments of clarity where I am completely here in this world. I have had them enough to know that most of the time I feel vacant, not present, not whole. Right now that is who I am. The real me is caught in the fabric of space and time somewhere between this moment and the moment that I sat on that bench and refused to accept my father's death. The real me; the whole, complete, and present me, has been hiding somewhere in fear since that day. I feel like Humpty-Dumpty. I had a great fall and now I'm lying in pieces on the floor and I don't know how to put myself back together again.
So, I apologize to my friend for feeling angry with her. We all live our own Dream, write our own Story, and see the world through the veil of both. When you rip away the Dream and the Story, you are left only with the Truth and the Truth is that her relationship with her dad is not my relationship with my dad. She is acting on the emotions that she is feeling, and within our own Dream and Story, our emotions are the ONLY thing we can 100% count on being real, because they simply are and require no explanation.
To thine own self be true.
posted by phoenixfirerising19 | 6:53 PM
2 Comments:
It's okay. You can feel angry with me. You're entitled to your feelings, I'm entitled to mine. I tried setting boundaries with my dad a few weeks ago, and he's crossing them. I felt that being firm was the only way to get through to him. It's tough love. In the end, it's what you have to do. I love my dad. But he can't disrespect me the way he is. And you can't justify it because he's doing it with love--it's still disrespectful of my needs during this time.
Thank you for that. The funny thing though, is that I don't feel angry anymore. I realized that the anger I felt was actually towards myself and my belief that I failed my father. You were right to tell your father what you did because he kept pushing and pushing to the point that you either had to go against yourself to appease him or push back. You chose yourself and that is always the right choice, because, as the old saying goes, you are the only person you are guaranteed to be with the rest of your life. I distanced myself from my father because I couldn't handle the truth of the situation. I regret that and that is where my anger came from. I hadn't realized that until I took the time to find the source of the anger that your blog instilled in me. So, I was never really angry at you, just at myself. Thank you for helping me to open the latest in a series of closed doors.
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