Missing my father and the strangeness of grief.

I don't know why I keep "forgetting" that my father died in August this year.  Probably because it is too painful to really grasp.  Fully accepting his death would feel more like taking hold of a hot baking-tray straight out of the oven without oven-gloves on.  I can manage moments when I remember that he's not here anymore.  And then the pain gets too strong and overwhelming.  Just today, I popped into a local shop to buy a birthday card and I spotted their array of calendars for 2022.  Automatically I started to look for a steam-train calendar for my dad and then the grief feeling washed over me again.  It is like a wave of shock, emptiness, longing, sorrow and confusion all at once.  

The only person who has asked what my grief feels like is my homeopath, Lucy.  Amazed that someone is interested and can cope with this emotional process, I begin to tell her.  "This is going to sound odd, but I miss his physical presence so much".  She is nodding and looking unfazed by my declaration and so I carry on sharing what I feel inside.  "I can't imagine he is not here, he's always been here" I continue.  And then I tell her that I miss his physical presence so much that I have even wondered about making a kind of "scarecrow dad" out of one of his old jumpers and some trousers, with a smiling face and cosy hat.  If I had a garden, I would place him underneath a small apple tree where I could see him from my kitchen window.  Then I could sit and talk to my dad/scarecrow whenever I wanted to and he wouldn't feel invisible.  "Does this sound crazy?" I ask Lucy.

Thankfully I am reassured that this all sounds like the reality of grief, the ache to see my dad's smiling face and how his eyes lit up each time he saw me.  Outside of my homeopath's room, when I have tried to talk about my loss, I normally hear one of the many platitudes about "how my dad is still in my heart" or that "he is present in spirit".  The trouble with these platitudes is that I just go quiet.  How can I possibly admit that I miss him so much that it hurts?  That I can barely breathe if I think that he has gone.  My dad was the one solid person in my family, the one who quietly looked out for me from afar, the one who noticed some of my unique qualities and interests.  He wasn't so solid in the last few years and I became more a carer to him, but this felt right.  I still got to see him smile.  

What keeps me awake in the middle of the night is wishing I had a couple more weeks with him.   In this imaginary scenario, I would sit by his side for hours each day, holding his hand and sharing these precious last days with him.  I would say how much he meant to me and he would pass on some wisdom to me about how to continue without him.  Because if I could talk to him now, I would say that it doesn't feel right, carrying on life without him here.  Even though I am, because life does continue, mornings do come and months pass.  But something is missing and my heart feels sore, dull, blocked and yearning.  I wish I could cry tears, then the grief would flow out and move.  My grief is more like a heaviness with the odd tear and deep feelings running far beneath the surface.  Or if you lived with me, grief looks more like organising cupboards neatly, tidying, baking, keeping busy and usually saying that I am fine.  Because I am fine unless you look closely.

The thing about grief is that it is invisible unless someone is outwardly showing emotions. My fear is that my dad will become invisible, forgotten, out of physical form.  People no longer obviously ask me how my dad is doing in his care-home, with his various health-issues.  I rarely speak about him. So now there is a gaping hole.  "No one would want to read this" I tell Lucy.  Later, I realised that it doesn't matter.  I need to write to make this invisible, painful grief feel more tangible and normal.  It may also make my dad seem less like stony grey ash in a box (waiting to be buried in the church graveyard) whenever I think of him.  And that will bring back my smile.