My Daddy died last August.
No, that’s not really accurate. My Daddy began dying from
dementia in 2011 and finished last August.
My father taught me lessons as far back as I can remember. As we walked through his last eight years together, I became his caregiver—and he kept teaching. He taught me to be grateful and remember your blessings even when you neither recognize where you are nor anyone around you; to always stop and smile at babies; to always take in and treasure love given by any living being. The gift of those lessons will live within me for the rest of my days.
My experiences since his journey through a worn-out body and
mind ended have been fairly typical. When your parent develops a disease that
takes their memory, your grieving process begins as their memory fades. So, in
that sense, you are a bit further along in processing their loss. But that is
made up for by the fact that, as their caregiver, you also have to recover from
the PTSD brought on by that loss.
As my soul took tentative steps forward into a world with no parents; in particular, a world with no Daddy, my everyday life resumed…but it was different. In this everyday life he was a complete circle of memory in my heart and mind. There was no open expanse of remaining days; a punctuation mark of fulfilled eternity and reunion took its place.
As I stepped timidly forward, his deeply-rooted presence remained within me, re-shaped by his transformation. I felt my heart beginning to wrap itself tightly around its new shape. It wrapped a bit more tightly as I daily sensed the absence of his earthly presence. When the weather cooled and I wondered if he needed more long-sleeve shirts, my heart corrected my thoughts. It melted a bit when I saw his college ring in my jewelry box, and grew stronger when I felt his arms around my granddaughter as I held her close to me.
In the midst of the pain and unfamiliar cast to the world, pinpricks of light began crossing my mind. The first was a memory of his wonderful habit of telling my brother and me fairy tales with all the words scrambled together (“Beeping Sleuty” comes to mind) and of being breathless with laughter at his silliness.
One day I saw a picture of the Krispy Kreme doughnut store and suddenly I was 5 again, held on his knee and watching the wonder of dough travelling through conveyor belts, turning into special treats that only payday could bring.
In my mind, I reached for his arm again to walk down the aisle at my wedding. I soaked in his ever-present calm when storms raged around me. I heard his voice teaching in youth Sunday School class. I clung to his hands as he saved us from an ocean undertow when I was 10…
and I realized just how long it had been since any of those memories had surfaced in my mind and heart.
Those eight long caregiving years were filled instead with the pain of hearing him ask confused questions over and over again; of watching him awaken in a dark hospital bed confused and frightened; of patiently answering questions about events long past and family members long gone, and of watching him start the grieving process for them over and over.
To love him through those years, I had to be happy for him; patient with him; to persevere with medical providers because he couldn’t. I had to constantly convince myself that the way he was was, by definition, enough…because it was the only way he could be. I had to push down so many emotions and logic and pain, and happy memories only made the burden heavier. They pointed to who he had been and was no longer.
So I pushed those down, too. Without realizing, I banned them from entrance into my consciousness; locked them away in darkness.
The day he left earth, he gave me one final, precious gift. By dying he unlocked that door and set free my joy and treasure of the past. As his last breath ended my responsibility for his care, he swept away the defenses and shadows that shackled that happiness.
In the nine months since last August, the warm, dancing light of those memories has grown ever brighter in my heart.
Life often turns and leads us down dark roads. Dark they must be, and any light that shines is always hard-won and ever-dim. But they are roads, not destinations. Step by step and day by day we move along them. When the road turns again, there is hope in light that shines anew from unexpected places--setting us free to leave the past in the darkness, bask in today’s warmth, and find life in the newfound glow.
