June 16th, 2019 Dear Dad, Happy Father’s Day! I know you don’t give a sh*t about any of this stuff, but the fact you’re not here this year hurts. I’ve been crying all day. I think the fact it’s on a Sunday just makes it harder. I woke up this morning and thought about how I would go to Allie’s Donuts in your honor, good excuse right? Well, it was fine until I walked out of the store and…

I haven’t been in here in some time.

Okay that was a lie. I have been on and off, just randomly scrolling.

I haven’t had much to say because so much has happened to me, my family, and my boyfriend and his family that I don’t even know where to begin.

I guess I’ll start with my dad.

He was sick. Not the kind of sick like a cold, the kind of sick that takes place after serving the us navy back in the 80s, being in numerous wars and seeing so many horrible things, only to come home and find out that if you want to stay in, they can’t pay you above what you had previously earned… they can’t pay you what you’re worth, what you have painstakingly earned.. what you deserve. So you split ways when your time is up. Honorable discharge.

But you’re so angry with everything that has happened during that served time, you want nothing to do with the military. You won’t even get the help you need because you’re so full of blinding pride, depression, PTSD, anger.. forget bringing up the VA.

And yet you’re thankful, somehow, at the same time, for Making it back alive. To be with your family, four awesome kids and a wife. You teach your kids about music, about fishing, learning how to build bird houses and shelves, you teach them a sense of humor and how to laugh whole heartedly. You teach them how to spell. You’re doing okay.

But those negative thoughts and feelings sit buried beneath the surface, waiting for something bad to happen so you can explode and think it will feel justified when you take your anger out on your wife or kids.. they may have misbehaved, but that’s a sliver of why you’re angry. They understand you are over reacting, but don’t understand why, they’re too young. Your wife urges you to get help and you won’t. Can’t.

You tried once, but ran out the door when those horrible memories and feelings would come Back. You’d do anything to run away from those feelings and your oldest daughter and wife can only understand so much, and well, there’s only so much you can say… or are allowed to say.

You start drinking on top of the cigs you’ve had your whole life. The drinking numbs the pain and memories, but it’s only temporary. You lash out when anyone tries to suggest you getting help. Your family doesn’t know what to do to make you see things need to change for the better. You slowly become an alcoholic.

Your oldest daughter is now 16, the kids that follow are 14, 13, and 12. You’ve lost your very good job and can’t pay rent, never mind bills and school clothes or supplies, even food. It’s been going on long enough that you and your family Get evicted. They move to upstate New York and you say you’ll follow behind, but you don’t. You instead tell your wife, whom has withstood everything until now, who is five hours away, that you want a divorce.

Complete and utter heart break ensues. They try to move on, but you still can’t.

They eventually end up moving back home, learning how to make ends meet.

You show up with your now ex wife, to your oldest daughters graduation, but even as the ceremony finishes in the pouring rain, she can’t find either of you anywhere. She doesn’t even know where you parked. She runs around in the pouring rain for almost half an hour looking, as numerous friends offer her a ride home. She finally finds your van. Soaking wet and hating the both of you for leaving her and her graduating ceremony like that. Who the fuck cares that it’s pouring down rain out? She’s the first in your family To graduate from high school and she knows this is the first and only Highlight to her day. She’s afraid to be too happy about her day, because she’s bracing herself for when everything goes back to the way it was, once she’s home.

One day, you decide To force your oldest to listen to you tell her she will Never amount to anything-even though she now not only goes to college full time, works part time, and (still, somehow) manages to pay for things you were supposed to be responsible for, as her parent.

She has enough of your yelling, the threats about being kicked out of the house, and tells you she’s not afraid of you. You stand back in shock and then take your anger out on the next, your only son. He won’t say anything because he knows you’re drunk like you have been a thousand times before. Your two youngest daughters are crying because they’re scared but that doesn’t phase you. You continue yelling at every single person in your family in that moment until your oldest daughter stands up and tells you to get out. Adrenaline rushed, red faced and tears in their eyes they watch your face turn a a shade of red they’d never seen, before watching you walk out, slamming the door behind you as if to make a statement- like you’ve done a hundred times before. But you know things have changed. They’re stronger now. You stay away for a few days.

Since when did your Oldest learn to have more strength and nerve than you? Especially in that moment? To be able to say loud and clear that they have all had enough and that you no longer have power over anyone anymore? To stand up and say you have no control over what they can and can’t say or do? Since when did she learn to stand up like that? And to me?

Six years go by, as she continues helping your ex wife pay for everything they and the younger kids need because the most your child care payments cover is rent-sometimes and you don’t “have” to pay her child support now that she’s 18+. She couldn’t afford college on her own because you decided to stop Being the parent you were supposed to be. So she only got through one year of college.

You’re still drinking, but eventually towards the end of seven years you not Only lose another awesome paying job, but somehow in the mean time managed to drop your pride and try to make up for things. Your family is confused by your efforts, and your oldest still barely talks to you about anything other than the weather, but at least she’s talking to you.

Word comes around at the end of the eighth year, that now you are very sick, not just an alcoholic but all those years of drinking and smoking have now caught up To you. You try to get help but leave when it comes to the harder things to think about. You try to get help again but leave for the same reasons.

You try again when a doctor finally says that you can’t have the near-life saving surgeries you need until you’re clean and sober. So you start to make arrangements. But you can only do so much on your own. You can hardly Make your own meals anymore.

You’re on speaking terms with your oldest. She moved away to Florida with her boyfriend, and she now calls you at least once a week. You cry the first time she calls, then again a few calls later, and the last call she got to make to you. The last call was her telling you that her boyfriend was going to Propose some day soon, and before he does he needs to talk to you in person and ask for her hand in marriage.

You cry and say that since they live far away and he is also navy, the young man could just call and ask you over the phone. You start to cry because you never thought your daughter would care enough about you to mention such a thing, and you’re remembering when she once said she never wanted you at her wedding. You cry and yet start to laugh because you’re happy things have come so far so well.

You finally go again to get help a week later, this time kicking and screaming because you fear it’s the end. You tell a few people at that time, that your deceased father visited you in a dream And said you won’t make it much longer.

But you’re kicking and screaming, fighting to get better before time runs out so you can see your family again, so you can see your friends and your beloved pet again.

Your heart can’t take it.

A few days go by as you seem to get stable and better, but your heart gives out again.

You’ve already had about four or More heart attacks in your life time, do you really need another? You panic but you’re conscious for when your family comes to see you. You don’t believe your daughter just flew from Florida to see you. You can’t say this, but she knows it by the way you’re crying.

The team of doctors who have been monitoring you, says they’d need to give you a pace maker. You only have about 20% of usage in your heart. You’re in and out of it, due to the pain killers you are on, but you somehow muster the strength to not only see one of your sisters after years of Not being able To, and one of your nieces, and you decide with a full conscious and clear enough voice to get the pace maker.

You never wanted a machine to keep you alive. However this is one that you won’t even know is there unless it goes off to jump your heart. You can live with that

Because it allows you to live.

Two days go by and your laughing and joking with family and actually writing things down for them to read.

But the next day, your hear gives out again. This time, it took “them” nearly 7 minutes to get you back and once they had gotten your blood pressure stable, cardiac arrest happened a second time right then and there.

By the time the family could make it to the hospital that evening, you look like a rag doll. No more than maybe 100 lbs, You can’t open your eyes, you can’t move, and you’re body now relies 100% on the machine, keeping it alive. The doctors say your heart isn’t even beating, it’s hardly quivering.

The doctors and family know this isn’t what you wanted.

The family makes one of the hardest decisions they’ve ever had to make.

They all go in one by one to talk to you, telling you about something currently Going on, maybe mentioning they won’t be able to see you again, but you don’t know what’s going on. You can’t respond.

You dont move as they eventually take out the trachea tubes and take your ivs off.. your family knows you’d never be able to come back from this double blow to the heart….