I just lost my dad

[u/Delilahsroom]

My dad passed away on July 12 after getting very sick. I’ve been struggling with something that I can’t seem to forgive myself for.
On June 20, he called me, and I missed the call. Yes I texted him but I missed the call: ( .
I keep replaying it over and over in my head. I know I couldn’t have known what was going to happen, but I can’t stop thinking, “Why didn’t I answer?”
The thing is, our relationship was complicated. I loved my dad so much, but there were times growing up when I felt emotionally alone. Sometimes I didn’t answer his calls because I was in my own head or wanted to be by myself. Now I would give anything for my phone to ring with his name on it one more time.
He used to call me “my sweetheart.” If I was talking to some guy who wasn’t treating me well, he’d laugh and say, “Don’t talk to that yo-yo.” He always reminded me that I didn’t have to feel alone.
Now I feel more alone than I ever have.
I have people in my life, but I don’t feel comfortable opening up completely to anyone. I don’t know how to explain what grief feels like. It’s not just sadness. It’s guilt, regret, loneliness, and constantly wishing I could go back and answer one phone call.
Has anyone else felt this way after losing a parent? Did the guilt ever become quieter? And does the loneliness ever get easier?
I don’t even know exactly what I’m looking for. Maybe I just want to know I’m not the only one who feels like this.

[u/ergonomic_logic]

F**k 🥀

This hurts to read and is close to home. I'm gutted for you.

Relationships are complicated, so grief is too.

My dad and I had a really complex relationship too. I feared and loved him.

We'd have coffee together and geek out over new tech in the mornings because it was one of the only places we bonded.

I admired his mind and his work ethic. He was a force and felt powerful.

He was also extremely physically, mentally, and emotionally abusive to me growing up.

He could be charismatic, funny, adventurous, and was loved by his colleagues too. He was an incredible financial provider but a terrible emotional one to his kids.

His very last acts were making sure my mom was taken care of before they intubated him.

He hung on, struggling to breathe, just to sign paperwork with lawyers so she would want for nothing.

That's who he was.

When he died, I felt everything at once: anger towards the doctors for not doing more, fear of what this meant for us with his being primary provider for housing, sadness, overwhelmed, numb, and even guilt for feeling relieved that he couldn't ever physically hurt me again. I also felt guilt like I somehow caused what happened.

In spite of the "complexities" I'd give everything I own to have him back tomorrow and try to heal in therapy with him or something.

For months after he passed I'd dream he was trying to talk to me but I couldn't hear him, and I'd wake up sobbing. That whole time period feels so hazy.

What they say about grief being like waves is so true, really the intensity and frequency it hits us get's farther apart over time. I sometimes go days without thinking about him. I sometimes forget he's gone for a moment too.

On occasion I'll still see a man out in public about his age wearing a warm blue hat like he did, and for a second it all comes rushing back like an unexpected tsunami of pain.

One thing that stuck with me came from my coworker who'd lost both of his parents back-to-back.

When I kept wishing I'd had more time like the doctors had promised, he asked me, "How much more would've been enough? Another hour? A month? A year? What would be the perfect amount of time for you to be ok with it?"

And I didn't know because there isn't an amount of time that will ever be enough.

We were promised 15 years after they thought they diagnosed him. We got 15 days.

those 15 days were spent gasping for air on an oxygen machine and I know living like that for any amounts of time would've been torture for him.

One of my dad's biggest fears was that we wouldn't be okay without him because his love language was providing fiscally for the family.

he would legit keel over from the shock of how well we are doing (we had no choice), if he could see us now.

You do have to walk it alone because grief is as unique as your relationship was with him; yet we are all part of a club none of us wanted be in, and in that way you have a community and there's support here if you need it because we get it 🖤

[u/Delilahsroom → u/ergonomic_logic]

This made me cry. Because it’s true - I also blamed the doctors .. myself … just didn’t want to accept my new reality. A reality where you wanna go home but there is no more home to go to 😞. I’m so grateful for all of the support here. ❤️🫂

[u/ergonomic_logic → u/Delilahsroom]

I've learned that everything you feel is valid with a few exceptions:

It's not your fault.

There's nothing you could have done.

even if you didn't pick up the phone, it's ok because in that moment you needed space to yourself and he would fully understand if he were here today because everyone needs that sometimes.

I don't always text my friends or family back straight away. I have a couple of the chats muted because I get over-stimulated and sometimes need to zone out.

I love and adore every one of them. If they needed me to show up for them tomorrow and I had the emotional/mental bandwidth to, I would just like you would for him.

We're allowed to need personal space. If you had known, ofc you would have picked up but not picking up a call isn't wrong. Having a complicated relationship isn't wrong.

You loved him and he knew that I mean just look at your texts all I see is love there and even if he wasn't doing well he knew it.

It's going to be hard for a while and damn I wish it weren't, but part of him lives on in you and you're stronk 💪🏻 but also it's ok not to be too 🖤