Happy or Sad
July 27, 2015 12:19 PM
How do I deal with my unexpected strong feelings about my estranged father's death in light of my recent discovery that I am pregnant?
I have been thinking of nothing but getting pregnant for a while, after experiencing one stillbirth and one miscarriage over the course of the past two years. I will be six weeks as of tomorrow.
Tomorrow I will also be driving across town to join my siblings and mother as we "pull the plug" on my father, who had a sudden cardiac arrest yesterday afternoon and doesn't seem able to recover. His health has been declining for several years since his heart attack and diagnosis with congestive heart failure.
I honestly had no idea I was going to be SO upset about this as I am. My father and I had some good times before I hit puberty, and he wasn't a purely bad person, but he became significantly emotionally and sometimes physically abusive, which got worse the older I got. He left my mother in financial ruin about 8 years ago and ran off with his former high school girlfriend to California. My relationship with him became less and less over time, but it wasn't a fade away. It was a series of ugly fights and hopeless debates about my feelings vs. his, trying to reconcile, ever failing. About 4 years ago, I flew out to LA and told my dad my mom still loved him (which she does to this day) and that everyone wanted him to come back and would forgive him if he did. He basically laughed in my face that day, and ever since we've spoken rarely and we haven't had any of the close, tender moments we used to.
My siblings took more of an approach throughout this time of placating him. No matter what horrible things he said or did, they did not react or expect/demand him to stop or change in order to have relationships with them the way I did. They judged me for my approach to the issue, considering me prideful to not pursue a relationship with my father regardless of what it was or wasn't. And I never agreed or cared... until now.
Last night I held his hand as he laid there in a medically induced coma and cried and told him I loved him and what a wonderful man he was and how much I didn't want him to die. I am crushed and confused by all of this. All of a sudden it feels like he is a different person than he was for all these years, and that I was the one who misconstrued the situation and made a mistake distancing myself from him. Why couldn't I just accept him for who he was and try to get some good out of things the way everyone else did? I thought about all the times he tried to call me or text me and I blew him off in anger. I feel like I can never forgive myself for giving up my chance to have one last memory of him.
I also feel like I just don't care about being pregnant anymore, and this years' long project has been sapped of all its joy, which seems like it will never return. I've read extensively online in past pregnancies about what to avoid, and the stress of grief has come up. It was one of the reasons why I didn't go to the hospital to see him before this event happened, because I thought he was going to make it and go home like every time before and we'd have time later to talk when I wasn't newly pregnant and still in such dangerous territory for miscarriage. I didn't want to risk the anger and disappointment I always felt when I opened my heart to him again. He was only 55 for goodness sakes.
I have a therapist but I just need MtaFilter right now. I'm hoping someone has been through something like this and might have something to say. Or even if not, might be able to reassure me in some other way, or help me understand why I feel so lost and how this could have possibly snuck up on me. I honestly thought I was more self-aware and that cutting him out of my life emotionally years ago would make his eventual death feel more that like of an acquaintance than a treasured parent.
I have been thinking of nothing but getting pregnant for a while, after experiencing one stillbirth and one miscarriage over the course of the past two years. I will be six weeks as of tomorrow.
Tomorrow I will also be driving across town to join my siblings and mother as we "pull the plug" on my father, who had a sudden cardiac arrest yesterday afternoon and doesn't seem able to recover. His health has been declining for several years since his heart attack and diagnosis with congestive heart failure.
I honestly had no idea I was going to be SO upset about this as I am. My father and I had some good times before I hit puberty, and he wasn't a purely bad person, but he became significantly emotionally and sometimes physically abusive, which got worse the older I got. He left my mother in financial ruin about 8 years ago and ran off with his former high school girlfriend to California. My relationship with him became less and less over time, but it wasn't a fade away. It was a series of ugly fights and hopeless debates about my feelings vs. his, trying to reconcile, ever failing. About 4 years ago, I flew out to LA and told my dad my mom still loved him (which she does to this day) and that everyone wanted him to come back and would forgive him if he did. He basically laughed in my face that day, and ever since we've spoken rarely and we haven't had any of the close, tender moments we used to.
My siblings took more of an approach throughout this time of placating him. No matter what horrible things he said or did, they did not react or expect/demand him to stop or change in order to have relationships with them the way I did. They judged me for my approach to the issue, considering me prideful to not pursue a relationship with my father regardless of what it was or wasn't. And I never agreed or cared... until now.
Last night I held his hand as he laid there in a medically induced coma and cried and told him I loved him and what a wonderful man he was and how much I didn't want him to die. I am crushed and confused by all of this. All of a sudden it feels like he is a different person than he was for all these years, and that I was the one who misconstrued the situation and made a mistake distancing myself from him. Why couldn't I just accept him for who he was and try to get some good out of things the way everyone else did? I thought about all the times he tried to call me or text me and I blew him off in anger. I feel like I can never forgive myself for giving up my chance to have one last memory of him.
I also feel like I just don't care about being pregnant anymore, and this years' long project has been sapped of all its joy, which seems like it will never return. I've read extensively online in past pregnancies about what to avoid, and the stress of grief has come up. It was one of the reasons why I didn't go to the hospital to see him before this event happened, because I thought he was going to make it and go home like every time before and we'd have time later to talk when I wasn't newly pregnant and still in such dangerous territory for miscarriage. I didn't want to risk the anger and disappointment I always felt when I opened my heart to him again. He was only 55 for goodness sakes.
I have a therapist but I just need MtaFilter right now. I'm hoping someone has been through something like this and might have something to say. Or even if not, might be able to reassure me in some other way, or help me understand why I feel so lost and how this could have possibly snuck up on me. I honestly thought I was more self-aware and that cutting him out of my life emotionally years ago would make his eventual death feel more that like of an acquaintance than a treasured parent.
You will not feel the way you do right this minute in 24 hours. Nor will it stay the same over 5 days, 2 weeks, 4 months, 20 years.
This situation is many things: a shock, sad, difficult, shitty timing, complicated. We always recontextualize people in death, and grief is a neurological process as much as emotional and pretty much nobody gets a voucher to skip it no matter how self-aware or compartmentalized or abused or theoretically okay you are. A death is the death of possibility, of future reconciliation, that he'd come to his senses.
You are upset because your father died. Whether or not he was a good father, or always a good father, you had a deeply intimate relationship with him. It was still intimate even when you weren't in contact, when you were angry, when you resented him. It is okay to be upset, and it is unavoidable whether you wanted to be upset or not, so allow yourself the feelings you have even if they are "wrong" or paradoxical or if they change from moment to moment. All the things you feel are fine and normal.
posted by Lyn Never at 12:54 PM on July 27, 2015
This situation is many things: a shock, sad, difficult, shitty timing, complicated. We always recontextualize people in death, and grief is a neurological process as much as emotional and pretty much nobody gets a voucher to skip it no matter how self-aware or compartmentalized or abused or theoretically okay you are. A death is the death of possibility, of future reconciliation, that he'd come to his senses.
You are upset because your father died. Whether or not he was a good father, or always a good father, you had a deeply intimate relationship with him. It was still intimate even when you weren't in contact, when you were angry, when you resented him. It is okay to be upset, and it is unavoidable whether you wanted to be upset or not, so allow yourself the feelings you have even if they are "wrong" or paradoxical or if they change from moment to moment. All the things you feel are fine and normal.
posted by Lyn Never at 12:54 PM on July 27, 2015
I'm so sorry you're going through this, and through the other losses you've endured these past two years. Please remember, too, that the hormone storm of being 6 weeks pregnant can really throw your emotional equilibrium for a loop and make you react in ways you otherwise wouldn't.
As I read this I think about how your father taught you some incredibly important lessons - particularly important as you embark on your own parenting journey. First, he taught you lots of things not to do. There's value to you and your future child in that. Second, he taught you how deep and lasting the impact of a parent on a child can be, even when it doesn't seem that way on the surface. That's incredibly valuable for you to remember, too. And finally, his actions put you in a position of creating your own boundaries, standing up for your own mental health, and making (and living with) your own hard choices. Not everyone learns those things before becoming a parent, but you have. If you had accepted his abuse over the years - or worse, lost the ability to even see it as abuse - you would be launching into parenthood in a far, far worse place than you are now.
So, you can honor your father's memory for the things it taught you, and you can turn some of that pain into something good by using all those lessons to be the best parent you can be.
posted by Ausamor at 12:57 PM on July 27, 2015
As I read this I think about how your father taught you some incredibly important lessons - particularly important as you embark on your own parenting journey. First, he taught you lots of things not to do. There's value to you and your future child in that. Second, he taught you how deep and lasting the impact of a parent on a child can be, even when it doesn't seem that way on the surface. That's incredibly valuable for you to remember, too. And finally, his actions put you in a position of creating your own boundaries, standing up for your own mental health, and making (and living with) your own hard choices. Not everyone learns those things before becoming a parent, but you have. If you had accepted his abuse over the years - or worse, lost the ability to even see it as abuse - you would be launching into parenthood in a far, far worse place than you are now.
So, you can honor your father's memory for the things it taught you, and you can turn some of that pain into something good by using all those lessons to be the best parent you can be.
posted by Ausamor at 12:57 PM on July 27, 2015
It sounds like you've been grieving the loss of your father for much much longer and now all of that's coming to a head. I am so sorry; I hear your grief and wish I could give you a hug. One thing I want to float out there is this: IME, Society guilts abuse survivors into giving forgiveness when their abuser dies because thinking ill of the dead is some antiquated taboo left over from days of religious superstitions and the belief that there is no such thing as abusive parents, only bad children. All of your emotions are normal and valid and understandable -- but know that you do not need to force yourself to romanticize any memories of your father over the realities of the abuse he levied towards you and your family. Both can exist and it doesn't make you a bad person to temper the bad with the good and vice versa. Sending you love and good thoughts.
posted by Hermione Granger at 1:03 PM on July 27, 2015
posted by Hermione Granger at 1:03 PM on July 27, 2015
The way you've described your father here, I personally don't think you've made mistakes in how you've dealt with him. I would have reacted the same way as you did, perhaps with even less patience and compassion. You are not a bad person.
I had a similarly complicated relationship with my dad. He died of cancer a few years ago, but he was lost to me years before that as a result of terrible end-stage alcoholism. He was a very sick man for a long time, and after years of waffling I cut him out of my life because it was too painful for me to watch him slowly commit suicide. I don't regret it - it was the right decision for me. There are people who would question my decision - people in my own family who did question my decision - but they weren't in my shoes and my body and my brain. I did what I had to do. And so did you. Your family members who are giving you a hard time here are wrong, plain and simple. There aren't universal absolutes when you're dealing with complicated family relationships.
With a few years' perspective, what I really regret about the entire tragedy of my dad's life is that I never had the father I wanted to have, and his death meant that whatever small shred of possibility there was that I could ever have that father was actually, completely, and finally gone. And that's sad, there's no way around it. But it's also a reality that that small shred of possibility was probably not ever there to begin with. He was never going to change and get better and magically be a solid, reliable, and loving parent to me. It just wasn't possible. It's okay to recognize and mourn that your dad wasn't who you wanted and needed him to be, and to accept that your reaction to the way he treated you and your mother was valid and understandable. Maybe you can learn to acknowledge that he was a broken person who was worthy of love, but maybe not of opening your whole heart to. It's hard to find the line there, I know.
With time you are going to be okay. You're doing fine and everything you're feeling right now is normal and expected. This is hard.
posted by something something at 1:07 PM on July 27, 2015
I had a similarly complicated relationship with my dad. He died of cancer a few years ago, but he was lost to me years before that as a result of terrible end-stage alcoholism. He was a very sick man for a long time, and after years of waffling I cut him out of my life because it was too painful for me to watch him slowly commit suicide. I don't regret it - it was the right decision for me. There are people who would question my decision - people in my own family who did question my decision - but they weren't in my shoes and my body and my brain. I did what I had to do. And so did you. Your family members who are giving you a hard time here are wrong, plain and simple. There aren't universal absolutes when you're dealing with complicated family relationships.
With a few years' perspective, what I really regret about the entire tragedy of my dad's life is that I never had the father I wanted to have, and his death meant that whatever small shred of possibility there was that I could ever have that father was actually, completely, and finally gone. And that's sad, there's no way around it. But it's also a reality that that small shred of possibility was probably not ever there to begin with. He was never going to change and get better and magically be a solid, reliable, and loving parent to me. It just wasn't possible. It's okay to recognize and mourn that your dad wasn't who you wanted and needed him to be, and to accept that your reaction to the way he treated you and your mother was valid and understandable. Maybe you can learn to acknowledge that he was a broken person who was worthy of love, but maybe not of opening your whole heart to. It's hard to find the line there, I know.
With time you are going to be okay. You're doing fine and everything you're feeling right now is normal and expected. This is hard.
posted by something something at 1:07 PM on July 27, 2015
Self-aware doesn't mean you don't feel or that you don't care. Just that you're aware of how you feel and you try to process it with awareness, just like you're doing now.
You can grieve many things here - the loss of your dad, the loss of your relationship as he used to be and then what happened in the later years, and the lost potential for what could have been, and what you wanted it to be. Cutting him out doesn't seal off the hurt from all this loss.
Grief can make you second guess yourself. Grief can make you want to bargain, or to wipe away all the real life details and start a revisionist history.
Of course you love your dad. For better or for worse, kids love their parents, even the crazy-making parents. If you have a heart in your chest, you wish him well, period, even though you took the steps you needed to feel balanced and ok.
It can be hard to celebrate a pregnancy now because you've also experienced loss there as well. So you've had loss with your dad and now fear of loss with your early pregnancy, and this timing coincidence would be overwhelming to anyone's emotions. So I could see why you'd feel "flat" about the pregnancy. Try to push "grief = pregnancy problems" out of your mind. It won't do any good and will just add more stress and guilt.
I'm sorry about the loss of your father. Congrats & best wishes for your pregnancy.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 1:12 PM on July 27, 2015
You can grieve many things here - the loss of your dad, the loss of your relationship as he used to be and then what happened in the later years, and the lost potential for what could have been, and what you wanted it to be. Cutting him out doesn't seal off the hurt from all this loss.
Grief can make you second guess yourself. Grief can make you want to bargain, or to wipe away all the real life details and start a revisionist history.
Of course you love your dad. For better or for worse, kids love their parents, even the crazy-making parents. If you have a heart in your chest, you wish him well, period, even though you took the steps you needed to feel balanced and ok.
It can be hard to celebrate a pregnancy now because you've also experienced loss there as well. So you've had loss with your dad and now fear of loss with your early pregnancy, and this timing coincidence would be overwhelming to anyone's emotions. So I could see why you'd feel "flat" about the pregnancy. Try to push "grief = pregnancy problems" out of your mind. It won't do any good and will just add more stress and guilt.
I'm sorry about the loss of your father. Congrats & best wishes for your pregnancy.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 1:12 PM on July 27, 2015
People are complex, and I think sometimes we have a tendency to focus on the negative aspects of a person while they are with us, and then only see the positive aspects when we are without.
It sounds like your father was a complicated man, and that you have both good and bad memories of him. He was important to your upbringing and your life experiences growing up, and that leads to a connection that you've made in your mind, one that is hard to fully remove through distance or rationalization. That's a part of who you are today. It's good for you to grieve that loss, as confusing as it may be.
Your choices with respect to your relationship with your father weren't wrong., no more wrong than your siblings' choices. You had very good reasons for doing what you did, both for your sake and the sake of the pregnancy. And now, you are feeling guilty for not doing more to try and improve the relationship. I can relate to that, and I'm sorry you are going through this, because it can feel like there was never a right decision to make. All I can say is that it's important to remember that you were never the sole person deciding how your relationship with your father went. It was a two person commitment, and you did your part. Nothing is wrong with that.
In time, you will return to care about your pregnancy. You're going through one of the most difficult things anyone can go through, and it makes sense that nothing else feels important right now. For now, you can take care of your pregnancy by taking care of yourself. It's good for you to work your way through this by talking to people here and elsewhere, and coming to terms with it in your own way.
posted by Skephicles at 1:16 PM on July 27, 2015
It sounds like your father was a complicated man, and that you have both good and bad memories of him. He was important to your upbringing and your life experiences growing up, and that leads to a connection that you've made in your mind, one that is hard to fully remove through distance or rationalization. That's a part of who you are today. It's good for you to grieve that loss, as confusing as it may be.
Your choices with respect to your relationship with your father weren't wrong., no more wrong than your siblings' choices. You had very good reasons for doing what you did, both for your sake and the sake of the pregnancy. And now, you are feeling guilty for not doing more to try and improve the relationship. I can relate to that, and I'm sorry you are going through this, because it can feel like there was never a right decision to make. All I can say is that it's important to remember that you were never the sole person deciding how your relationship with your father went. It was a two person commitment, and you did your part. Nothing is wrong with that.
In time, you will return to care about your pregnancy. You're going through one of the most difficult things anyone can go through, and it makes sense that nothing else feels important right now. For now, you can take care of your pregnancy by taking care of yourself. It's good for you to work your way through this by talking to people here and elsewhere, and coming to terms with it in your own way.
posted by Skephicles at 1:16 PM on July 27, 2015
You made the best decisions available to you at the time you made those decisions, and regretting those decisions now is the path straight to heartache and pain. You will come to see the decisions you made as the right ones because they were the ones you made, hindsight or not. Give it time.
It's okay to feel your feelings, but feelings aren't facts. Ride the wave and accept that your relationship with your father was fraught and complicated and you made the right decisions for you, and that the circumstances right now may seem to call into question your past actions but are really just shining a spotlight on them for illumination, not judgement.
posted by juniperesque at 1:20 PM on July 27, 2015
It's okay to feel your feelings, but feelings aren't facts. Ride the wave and accept that your relationship with your father was fraught and complicated and you made the right decisions for you, and that the circumstances right now may seem to call into question your past actions but are really just shining a spotlight on them for illumination, not judgement.
posted by juniperesque at 1:20 PM on July 27, 2015
I'm so sorry you are going through this.
There isn't a single emotional track for situations like these. People are complicated, relationships are complicated and grief is complicated. You can love your father and hate him. You can cut him out of your life emotionally and still secretly wish that he would come back and change and be the loving father you always wanted. He could laugh in your face when you suggest he comes back and begs forgiveness, and he could also secretly be ashamed and horrified at his own behaviour, and respect you for speaking your mind and love you as much as is possible for a father to love a child.
All these things can be true and valid at the same time. And it's exhausting, being simultaneously mad at someone and also loving them and being afraid you'll never get the chance to talk to them again and also knowing that this is the end of your dream of "renaissance dad". Your feelings of loss and grief are totally understandable, and the guilt of wondering if you could have done things differently is a natural follow on from those. And I've been pregnant, so I am just going to say that I can't imagine the extra churn and turmoil that comes from throwing early pregnancy and grieving a parent together.
What might help more than thinking "what's done is done" is looking at your own response, and the complicated tangled mess of your feelings, and realising that his feelings were probably every bit as complicated and messy. And if you are sitting by his bedside crying and telling him what a wonderful father he was, I'll bet that underneath all the hurt feelings and bad behaviour, he loved you every bit as much, and thought you were a great kid. He tried to be in touch with you. He loved you.
None of this makes your past behaviour bad or unforgivable. You did the best you could do at the time. It's not dishonest or inconsistent to now grieve his loss. And you don't have to feel bad about doing what seemed best to you at the time.
With the pregnancy also, you can think of yourself as having multiple emotional tracks. You can be happy about the baby and sad about your father. One doesn't have to taint the other. Try and let your grief about your dad unfold without the extra stress and pressure of feeling guilty, and you may find that your natural excitement about the pregnancy returns. Maybe take the opportunity to talk with a therapist or counselor so that you can unburden yourself about it all.
Again, so sorry this is happening to you. You're not alone and you will get through this, and so will your baby. It's going to be ok.
posted by yogalemon at 1:25 PM on July 27, 2015
There isn't a single emotional track for situations like these. People are complicated, relationships are complicated and grief is complicated. You can love your father and hate him. You can cut him out of your life emotionally and still secretly wish that he would come back and change and be the loving father you always wanted. He could laugh in your face when you suggest he comes back and begs forgiveness, and he could also secretly be ashamed and horrified at his own behaviour, and respect you for speaking your mind and love you as much as is possible for a father to love a child.
All these things can be true and valid at the same time. And it's exhausting, being simultaneously mad at someone and also loving them and being afraid you'll never get the chance to talk to them again and also knowing that this is the end of your dream of "renaissance dad". Your feelings of loss and grief are totally understandable, and the guilt of wondering if you could have done things differently is a natural follow on from those. And I've been pregnant, so I am just going to say that I can't imagine the extra churn and turmoil that comes from throwing early pregnancy and grieving a parent together.
What might help more than thinking "what's done is done" is looking at your own response, and the complicated tangled mess of your feelings, and realising that his feelings were probably every bit as complicated and messy. And if you are sitting by his bedside crying and telling him what a wonderful father he was, I'll bet that underneath all the hurt feelings and bad behaviour, he loved you every bit as much, and thought you were a great kid. He tried to be in touch with you. He loved you.
None of this makes your past behaviour bad or unforgivable. You did the best you could do at the time. It's not dishonest or inconsistent to now grieve his loss. And you don't have to feel bad about doing what seemed best to you at the time.
With the pregnancy also, you can think of yourself as having multiple emotional tracks. You can be happy about the baby and sad about your father. One doesn't have to taint the other. Try and let your grief about your dad unfold without the extra stress and pressure of feeling guilty, and you may find that your natural excitement about the pregnancy returns. Maybe take the opportunity to talk with a therapist or counselor so that you can unburden yourself about it all.
Again, so sorry this is happening to you. You're not alone and you will get through this, and so will your baby. It's going to be ok.
posted by yogalemon at 1:25 PM on July 27, 2015
as someone who also had a difficult relationship with her father, who died suddenly - there's no real way to reconcile why you feel the way you do in the immediate. at the time of his death, my father and i were barely speaking, as we hadn't been for a few years - like you, my other sibling thought i was in the wrong. i was okay for about 30 minutes following my mother calling me with the news. then everything sort of fell apart for me (luckily, my boss at the time was very understanding of me basically sobbing all over him). then i got it back together. i loved my dad, basically, even with his faults (and they were legion). but he was still my dad. he was still the guy that sort of tried to raise me as well as he knew how. so it sucked. some days it sucked a whole lot. some days it didn't suck at all. he was definitely a complicated guy, as it sounds like your father was. try to give yourself a break - you did the best you could with the info you had at the time that made you feel the way you did, as we all do. it took me a while to come to that, but it's how i reconciled some of my feelings, and it helped.
as far as your pregnancy, it's okay to feel not much about it right now. grief, no matter how much you knew it was coming, and even if you didn't, is kind of an all-consuming thing in the short term - all shock and not a whole lot of relief. it gets easier, even in a few days, hours. take as gentle care of yourself as you can, and ask for help from people when you can't. my parents had been divorced forever when my dad died, and there was some serious bad blood between them, but my mom really stepped up for my dad in his declining years, and also for my brother and i when he died. she was there to do a lot of things that we wouldn't have thought of at all, small things that you don't realize - i.e., did you eat? go outside and take a walk. etc. if your mom is good at this stuff, lean on her. lean on each other. gather your good friends - this is truly what they are there for, and they love you.
i'm sorry for your loss.
posted by koroshiya at 1:28 PM on July 27, 2015
as far as your pregnancy, it's okay to feel not much about it right now. grief, no matter how much you knew it was coming, and even if you didn't, is kind of an all-consuming thing in the short term - all shock and not a whole lot of relief. it gets easier, even in a few days, hours. take as gentle care of yourself as you can, and ask for help from people when you can't. my parents had been divorced forever when my dad died, and there was some serious bad blood between them, but my mom really stepped up for my dad in his declining years, and also for my brother and i when he died. she was there to do a lot of things that we wouldn't have thought of at all, small things that you don't realize - i.e., did you eat? go outside and take a walk. etc. if your mom is good at this stuff, lean on her. lean on each other. gather your good friends - this is truly what they are there for, and they love you.
i'm sorry for your loss.
posted by koroshiya at 1:28 PM on July 27, 2015
When my estranged father died suddenly, the pain and sorrow hit me much much harder than I expected, and for a long time I was confused and wondering if I should really be feeling that way. The details of my relationship with my father differs quite a bit from yours, but I wonder if there is some overlap in how the news affected us. For me, I came to realize what I was mostly grieving was the relationship we never had, and never could have. That relationship I idealized was just never possible, given his personality and challenges.
I am so sorry you are going through this. It's so tough, and shocking, and heartbreaking in so many ways. I agree with the above point that time will continue to evolve your feelings on the past and your father's passing. If need be, seek the help of a grief counselor who can help you accept the past and come to peace with yourself, your history, and your future. You, and your baby, deserve every happiness.
posted by JenMarie at 1:35 PM on July 27, 2015
I am so sorry you are going through this. It's so tough, and shocking, and heartbreaking in so many ways. I agree with the above point that time will continue to evolve your feelings on the past and your father's passing. If need be, seek the help of a grief counselor who can help you accept the past and come to peace with yourself, your history, and your future. You, and your baby, deserve every happiness.
posted by JenMarie at 1:35 PM on July 27, 2015
My estranged father died unexpectedly at the same age. There's a lot that's different about your situation so I won't presume to speak to aspects I haven't experienced, like your feelings about your pregnancy, but maybe it will help to share what I went through.
I had cut off contact with my dad out of self-care a couple of years prior to his death. He was emotionally abusive and I had to make decisions for my own mental health. During this period he was also not speaking to his own parents or my two sisters; it was accepted fact among everyone who knew him that he was a volatile and difficult man who burned through relationships. Nevertheless, after he died, I had people saying things to me implying or outright stating (in one case yelling) that I should feel guilty. Others were hurtfully cavalier, as if because he had been so awful, I must not even mind that he died. It was incredibly traumatic for me and I felt misunderstood by almost everyone, and didn't really understand my own feelings either. Your statement that you thought that cutting him out of your life emotionally years ago would make his eventual death feel more that like of an acquaintance than a treasured parent--I didn't suddenly feel like I had lost a treasured parent, but I definitely felt like I had lost the treasured parent that I never had, and now never would have.
Losing a parent that you're not close to is, I imagine, even more difficult in many ways than a close parent, because it's never going to get any better. The way it was is the way it is forevermore. The person who died got the last word, and the shitty state of your relationship is now sealed in amber. You cut them off out of a desire to make things better somehow. And now they never will be.
That was about 15 years ago now. As I've aged my feelings about the whole thing have softened and I see the way it played out as being almost inevitable, and mostly I just feel sorry for both of us. I do feel a sense of resolution, finally.
So, I don't know that I have any particular advice for you. I just want to say that it's hard, and many people won't understand what you're going through. Most people, when a parent dies, get nothing but sympathy. For you to have first been robbed of having a good parent, and then robbed of the shred of hope of ever having a good parent, and then to be accused of being a bad daughter while grieving these losses is really, really hard. So let me just say it from my heart: I'm sorry for your loss.
posted by HotToddy at 1:42 PM on July 27, 2015
I had cut off contact with my dad out of self-care a couple of years prior to his death. He was emotionally abusive and I had to make decisions for my own mental health. During this period he was also not speaking to his own parents or my two sisters; it was accepted fact among everyone who knew him that he was a volatile and difficult man who burned through relationships. Nevertheless, after he died, I had people saying things to me implying or outright stating (in one case yelling) that I should feel guilty. Others were hurtfully cavalier, as if because he had been so awful, I must not even mind that he died. It was incredibly traumatic for me and I felt misunderstood by almost everyone, and didn't really understand my own feelings either. Your statement that you thought that cutting him out of your life emotionally years ago would make his eventual death feel more that like of an acquaintance than a treasured parent--I didn't suddenly feel like I had lost a treasured parent, but I definitely felt like I had lost the treasured parent that I never had, and now never would have.
Losing a parent that you're not close to is, I imagine, even more difficult in many ways than a close parent, because it's never going to get any better. The way it was is the way it is forevermore. The person who died got the last word, and the shitty state of your relationship is now sealed in amber. You cut them off out of a desire to make things better somehow. And now they never will be.
That was about 15 years ago now. As I've aged my feelings about the whole thing have softened and I see the way it played out as being almost inevitable, and mostly I just feel sorry for both of us. I do feel a sense of resolution, finally.
So, I don't know that I have any particular advice for you. I just want to say that it's hard, and many people won't understand what you're going through. Most people, when a parent dies, get nothing but sympathy. For you to have first been robbed of having a good parent, and then robbed of the shred of hope of ever having a good parent, and then to be accused of being a bad daughter while grieving these losses is really, really hard. So let me just say it from my heart: I'm sorry for your loss.
posted by HotToddy at 1:42 PM on July 27, 2015
as someone who also had a difficult relationship with her father, who died suddenly - there's no real way to reconcile why you feel the way you do in the immediate.
I had a similar situation, and mine was also like yours sounds which is to say: lonely. Your siblings took a different path which means that even though you are all grieving, your grief is different from theirs. Sometimes it's nice to have someone to share those feelings with, to help you feel okay about them. The googleable term is "complicated grief" and other than the fact that time will help, here are some pieces of advice for you
- There are definitely baby hormones wrapped up in this. I say that not to excuse it but just to help you understand the strength of your feelings, and maybe your surprise at them. You are on drugs and that's okay.
- Over time you get to close the book on your relationship with your dad and reflect on the entirety of the situation. For now you're just feeling like maybe the story ended wrong and that's hard. Part of my conflicted feelings were the absolute relief (and guilt about that relief) that someone who was an occasional unrepentant asshole to me could not hurt me anymore. That's a hard lesson to learn even if it's ultimately inevitable. You tell it to yourself a lot as you build distance but it's really not until someone dies that you're like "OK, that's actually DONE"
- I still have times where I feel like you do, that maybe it was me and my rigid boundaries that took an ambiguous situation and made it very black and white, at the expense of my relationship with my dad. But then I talk to other people who knew him, and who knew me, and whose opinions I respect and decide that the decisions I made worked for me and that I was working with the best evidence I had at the time. There are many ways to view the situation, it's taken me time but I'm mostly right with my decision. And I think being open and having doubts is a normal part of being human.
So as other people have said, this is all HARD and there was probably not a clean path through this that wouldn't be. Even if you're self-aware, it's hard. You stuck up for yourself in the face of someone who hurt you which is a principled and sometimes difficult decision. It's also a lonely decision. Be kind to yourself and feel okay about minimizing contact with your siblings (who are also hurting and may channel that into being less than gracious towards you) if you need to. There's no one right way to grieve. Time will help.
posted by jessamyn at 1:56 PM on July 27, 2015
I had a similar situation, and mine was also like yours sounds which is to say: lonely. Your siblings took a different path which means that even though you are all grieving, your grief is different from theirs. Sometimes it's nice to have someone to share those feelings with, to help you feel okay about them. The googleable term is "complicated grief" and other than the fact that time will help, here are some pieces of advice for you
- There are definitely baby hormones wrapped up in this. I say that not to excuse it but just to help you understand the strength of your feelings, and maybe your surprise at them. You are on drugs and that's okay.
- Over time you get to close the book on your relationship with your dad and reflect on the entirety of the situation. For now you're just feeling like maybe the story ended wrong and that's hard. Part of my conflicted feelings were the absolute relief (and guilt about that relief) that someone who was an occasional unrepentant asshole to me could not hurt me anymore. That's a hard lesson to learn even if it's ultimately inevitable. You tell it to yourself a lot as you build distance but it's really not until someone dies that you're like "OK, that's actually DONE"
- I still have times where I feel like you do, that maybe it was me and my rigid boundaries that took an ambiguous situation and made it very black and white, at the expense of my relationship with my dad. But then I talk to other people who knew him, and who knew me, and whose opinions I respect and decide that the decisions I made worked for me and that I was working with the best evidence I had at the time. There are many ways to view the situation, it's taken me time but I'm mostly right with my decision. And I think being open and having doubts is a normal part of being human.
So as other people have said, this is all HARD and there was probably not a clean path through this that wouldn't be. Even if you're self-aware, it's hard. You stuck up for yourself in the face of someone who hurt you which is a principled and sometimes difficult decision. It's also a lonely decision. Be kind to yourself and feel okay about minimizing contact with your siblings (who are also hurting and may channel that into being less than gracious towards you) if you need to. There's no one right way to grieve. Time will help.
posted by jessamyn at 1:56 PM on July 27, 2015
I am so sorry about your situation.
I honestly thought I was more self-aware and that cutting him out of my life emotionally years ago would make his eventual death feel more that like of an acquaintance than a treasured parent.
Both my parents are alive, but my understanding from friends who've had parents die is that it is always surprisingly difficult, and even more so if the relationship was not a good one. So don't beat yourself up about the strength of your feelings. My understanding is that the way you are feeling is normal. Like other commenters have said, the death of your father means you know now, with finality you didn't previously have, that you'll never be able to have the relationship with your father that you wanted. And that is sad, no matter how remote the chances were. So it is reasonable, and okay, for you to grieve.
Are you worried that tomorrow your family might judge you for your reaction? You sound like you might be. It may be worth thinking through in advance how you'll respond if somebody reacts unkindly to you. Like, if you get a sense they are thinking "dissolved girl shouldn't be taking this so hard because they were estranged anyway," or something like that.
This will be hard for your entire family, and everybody will have unresolved feelings. There is no right or proper way to feel, and nobody should judge anybody else if they feel unexpectedly sad or angry or relieved or really any particular way. Everybody has suffered a loss. Don't let anybody shame you for feeling how you feel. He was your father. Give yourself permission to mourn this.
I'm glad you have a therapist: that will help. Good luck tomorrow, and afterwards. Time will help, and you will heal. I'm really sorry, and I'll be thinking about you.
posted by Susan PG at 4:52 PM on July 27, 2015
I honestly thought I was more self-aware and that cutting him out of my life emotionally years ago would make his eventual death feel more that like of an acquaintance than a treasured parent.
Both my parents are alive, but my understanding from friends who've had parents die is that it is always surprisingly difficult, and even more so if the relationship was not a good one. So don't beat yourself up about the strength of your feelings. My understanding is that the way you are feeling is normal. Like other commenters have said, the death of your father means you know now, with finality you didn't previously have, that you'll never be able to have the relationship with your father that you wanted. And that is sad, no matter how remote the chances were. So it is reasonable, and okay, for you to grieve.
Are you worried that tomorrow your family might judge you for your reaction? You sound like you might be. It may be worth thinking through in advance how you'll respond if somebody reacts unkindly to you. Like, if you get a sense they are thinking "dissolved girl shouldn't be taking this so hard because they were estranged anyway," or something like that.
This will be hard for your entire family, and everybody will have unresolved feelings. There is no right or proper way to feel, and nobody should judge anybody else if they feel unexpectedly sad or angry or relieved or really any particular way. Everybody has suffered a loss. Don't let anybody shame you for feeling how you feel. He was your father. Give yourself permission to mourn this.
I'm glad you have a therapist: that will help. Good luck tomorrow, and afterwards. Time will help, and you will heal. I'm really sorry, and I'll be thinking about you.
posted by Susan PG at 4:52 PM on July 27, 2015
Oh, I am so sorry. It's clear from this question how much you loved him, and that you tried -- in ways that were very different from your siblings but very heartfelt -- to make a connection. You couldn't have just placated him because that wasn't you, and if your flight out had led to a reconnection, maybe others would be saying "why didn't we think to try a more passionate approach to reconnecting with him?" You brought your full self to it, and then reacted accordingly when it didn't go well, and I wonder if you couldn't stop blaming yourself for not being like them, and instead see what was really beautiful and loving and passionate about your own approach, however imperfect it might've also been.
What I'm really writing to talk about is being pregnant. I haven't lost a parent yet, but I am in my first trimester, so I read your question through that lens. And at 6 weeks, I didn't realize how much the hormones were starting to mess with my body and my emotions. I've had some of the feelings you mention -- that things were already drained of the joy I wanted them to have, that I was causing problems even by living my life as best I could -- so I think they're incredibly natural. That doesn't make them easy, but I think it's very common to go through a let-down or period of anxiety when it becomes obvious that your pregnancy is going to be as messy as the rest of reality.
And you're not just dealing with normal messy reality right now, but one of the hardest things that life brings. I'm so sorry for your loss, and for it to have come at this time. :( I can completely imagine that it might be hard to hold the joy of finally being pregnant while feeling such grief and guilt. I'm sorry that you aren't able to just have this be the season of your pregnancy, and that it's also a time of dealing with grief and loss. I believe a person can hold both of those things (I actually think they could be compatible in a certain way), and just this brief question from you gives me confidence that your grief won't cause problems for the baby; you sound like a resilient person going through a hard time. But I'm sorry that you aren't getting to go through these two life transitions as their own separate things.
And then, there's the actual physical piece of pregnancy, which could already be impacting you. I'm only a few weeks further along, but already, I've gotten a bit better at discerning nauseous vs. not nauseous and exhausted vs. having energy, and at perceiving the waves of emotion as waves as I go over them. I now suspect that at 6 weeks, I was mildly nauseous and tired and emotional so constantly that I couldn't even see it. Being pregnant was a scary new reality that I didn't really understand (still don't), like heading out on a boat after being on dry ground for years. There's this phase of being constantly thrown off balance by the shifting of the waves and even wondering it the boat will tip over any second.
For me, it helped to just settle in and get used to being really kind to yourself, to crying when you need to cry, to resting when you need to rest, to eating when you need to eat (or at the earliest sign of the nausea starting to rise). Just keep taking your prenatal vitamins and eating healthy food and resting as much as you can. I hope you're surrounded by lots of love and support from your friends and your therapist.
I am so very sorry for your loss. Losing a parent is so hard.
And, when you're ready to hear it, congratulations!
posted by slidell at 6:12 PM on July 27, 2015
What I'm really writing to talk about is being pregnant. I haven't lost a parent yet, but I am in my first trimester, so I read your question through that lens. And at 6 weeks, I didn't realize how much the hormones were starting to mess with my body and my emotions. I've had some of the feelings you mention -- that things were already drained of the joy I wanted them to have, that I was causing problems even by living my life as best I could -- so I think they're incredibly natural. That doesn't make them easy, but I think it's very common to go through a let-down or period of anxiety when it becomes obvious that your pregnancy is going to be as messy as the rest of reality.
And you're not just dealing with normal messy reality right now, but one of the hardest things that life brings. I'm so sorry for your loss, and for it to have come at this time. :( I can completely imagine that it might be hard to hold the joy of finally being pregnant while feeling such grief and guilt. I'm sorry that you aren't able to just have this be the season of your pregnancy, and that it's also a time of dealing with grief and loss. I believe a person can hold both of those things (I actually think they could be compatible in a certain way), and just this brief question from you gives me confidence that your grief won't cause problems for the baby; you sound like a resilient person going through a hard time. But I'm sorry that you aren't getting to go through these two life transitions as their own separate things.
And then, there's the actual physical piece of pregnancy, which could already be impacting you. I'm only a few weeks further along, but already, I've gotten a bit better at discerning nauseous vs. not nauseous and exhausted vs. having energy, and at perceiving the waves of emotion as waves as I go over them. I now suspect that at 6 weeks, I was mildly nauseous and tired and emotional so constantly that I couldn't even see it. Being pregnant was a scary new reality that I didn't really understand (still don't), like heading out on a boat after being on dry ground for years. There's this phase of being constantly thrown off balance by the shifting of the waves and even wondering it the boat will tip over any second.
For me, it helped to just settle in and get used to being really kind to yourself, to crying when you need to cry, to resting when you need to rest, to eating when you need to eat (or at the earliest sign of the nausea starting to rise). Just keep taking your prenatal vitamins and eating healthy food and resting as much as you can. I hope you're surrounded by lots of love and support from your friends and your therapist.
I am so very sorry for your loss. Losing a parent is so hard.
And, when you're ready to hear it, congratulations!
posted by slidell at 6:12 PM on July 27, 2015
Tomorrow will be 17 years to the day my dad passed suddenly at 55. We'd also had a contentious relationship and I never got the chance to really put any kind of closure on it, which was so terribly difficult the first few years. Sometime around the fifth anniversary I was able to move past the hard memories and focus on the good ones. Then with each year it got easier and more peaceful. Like so many parents out there he was dealing with his own demons, and trying to do the best he could.
I don't have children of my own so I can't speak to the physical strain you're under right now, but when I interact with my friends' children I've noticed to tend to point out things my father showed me. Games or songs he'd taught me, like when I was three and I used to put my feet on top of his and we'd "dance" around the living room like some sort of drunk Frankenstein's monster. My friends' daughters love that shit! That's what I choose to remember and pass along now.
Be good to yourself right now. Make sure you're eating, that's always hard to do when you're grieving. Don't dwell on what you can't change. I wish you the best and am thinking of you & your family & your little one.
posted by wheek wheek wheek at 8:08 PM on July 27, 2015
I don't have children of my own so I can't speak to the physical strain you're under right now, but when I interact with my friends' children I've noticed to tend to point out things my father showed me. Games or songs he'd taught me, like when I was three and I used to put my feet on top of his and we'd "dance" around the living room like some sort of drunk Frankenstein's monster. My friends' daughters love that shit! That's what I choose to remember and pass along now.
Be good to yourself right now. Make sure you're eating, that's always hard to do when you're grieving. Don't dwell on what you can't change. I wish you the best and am thinking of you & your family & your little one.
posted by wheek wheek wheek at 8:08 PM on July 27, 2015
The death of a parent is a huge thing, stirring up emotions that go all the way back to a time you hardly remember. Knowing he's going to die is making you remember the daddy you used to have when you were little, times when you were close and things were good. There's nothing strange or wrong about grieving that. You don't have reason to feel guilty about your difficult, complicated adult relationship with your father, but the little girl in you doesn't see it that way because this is her daddy dying and she is terrified and sad.
You're not dwelling on the bad things he's done in your adulthood. Your pregnancy and everything else seems like an abstraction, because you are suddenly confronted with losing the man who meant so much to you once. It's a huge, awful thing, and nothing you feel right now is wrong or even totally unique. Almost everybody goes crazy for a while, when they lose a parent. Feeling weird is not weird.
You're going to be dealing with death and grief, and that will be very difficult. But as you go through this, try to remind yourself that everything isn't just loss and sadness. You have a life growing inside of you. Put your hands on your belly and really feel that. You're going to be raising a new human being in this world. You have a chance to pass along the good things your father did, and you can learn from his mistakes. He's dying, but you're very much alive and your child is on the way. Life goes on.
I'm sorry this is happening to you. But you'll get through it, and life will go on.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 1:22 AM on July 28, 2015
You're not dwelling on the bad things he's done in your adulthood. Your pregnancy and everything else seems like an abstraction, because you are suddenly confronted with losing the man who meant so much to you once. It's a huge, awful thing, and nothing you feel right now is wrong or even totally unique. Almost everybody goes crazy for a while, when they lose a parent. Feeling weird is not weird.
You're going to be dealing with death and grief, and that will be very difficult. But as you go through this, try to remind yourself that everything isn't just loss and sadness. You have a life growing inside of you. Put your hands on your belly and really feel that. You're going to be raising a new human being in this world. You have a chance to pass along the good things your father did, and you can learn from his mistakes. He's dying, but you're very much alive and your child is on the way. Life goes on.
I'm sorry this is happening to you. But you'll get through it, and life will go on.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 1:22 AM on July 28, 2015
I don't know if it might help, to say that part of the grief is that you are missing a father - not this person, but an abstract person who would have behaved like a father, and had you round for Sunday meals and taken you to sports games, and hugged and congratulated you when you got a promotion and whatever it is that idealised fathers do. That ideal father would have been so happy to be a grandfather, and would have been stocking up on kids' toys already!
That's something that you're allowed to want, and you're allowed to grieve when it seems shut off to you, even if (or especially if) the guy you're sitting next to was never going to be that father.
posted by emilyw at 1:33 AM on July 28, 2015
That's something that you're allowed to want, and you're allowed to grieve when it seems shut off to you, even if (or especially if) the guy you're sitting next to was never going to be that father.
posted by emilyw at 1:33 AM on July 28, 2015
I am so sorry for all of your losses. There are many good answers related to your grief about your father, but I wanted to comment specifically on the feelings you're having around your pregnancy. I lost my baby son a year and a half ago, and subsequently suffered a miscarriage. I am currently pregnant again, in my third trimester, and in my experience the ambivalence you're feeling about your pregnancy is very normal--even without the other stresses in your life. Pregnancy after loss is very, very hard. You no longer have the confidence that everything will turn out okay, and it can feel so dangerous to hope. The early days of a pregnancy are some of the hardest, since you have little to no information on what's going on inside. Feeling this way now doesn't mean that you'll never be happy, though, or that you won't love your baby. The best advice I ever got about grief (and feelings in general) is to just let yourself experience whatever you're feeling at the moment, without trying to force yourself to feel the "right" things. Your feelings will not harm your baby.
posted by booky at 11:48 AM on July 28, 2015
posted by booky at 11:48 AM on July 28, 2015
This thread is closed to new comments.
The biggest mistake many people feel when they are pulled to the limit is thinking that this is how they will always feel. It's very very likely that you will regain your enthusiasm for having a child, but that's impossible to gauge when all of this is so new. You're still processing.
Do try to forgive yourself even though I don't think you're able to be blamed for anything. Be kind to you.
posted by inturnaround at 12:43 PM on July 27, 2015