4.5 years later

My dad's birthday is the day after tomorrow on Saturday. He would be 70 years old.

I can't believe it's been 4 and 1/2 years since he passed. I still miss him every day. There is still a void in my life. I'm no longer a mess of a human being without him, but I miss him with every ounce of my being. I no longer have a mood disorder caused by grief. I am not on any medications and I sleep naturally every night. Occasionally, I have wonderful dreams with him in them. On those days, I try to sleep as long as possible to hold onto those images and the feeling of him being around.

It has been a long road to get to a point where I feel I can talk about him without crying instantly. I still do sometimes, but I can talk about him in social situations without it being awkward for everyone involved in the conversation. In many ways I feel like this is a completely separate life. The other one seems like looking back on a completely different reality, a different me, a twilight zone.

After my dad was diagnosed, he gave commands to everyone around him. Telling my mother to stay up to date with technology aka "not become a dinosaur," and to not be a pathetic widow. He gave advice and direction to everyone who visited or called him. I felt a bit left out when he didn't give me any last words. What I have come to realize is that he is ingrained in me. I am truly my father's daughter. I didn't really need him to tell me anything, because he knew I would get there on my own. I wish he could share in the excitement of my life and the fact that I have found what I think is my calling in life. He'd be proud that I took a leap and made a minimal job into a proper one with hard work and a lot of determination.  I hope I can continue to follow in his footsteps in developing people and managing projects, but it would be nice to bounce ideas off of him in the process. He never saw me settled and functioning at the highest level, but he knew what I was capable of because we were made from the same mold. I don't know if he'd have guessed I'd be full-time in the rowing world, but I doubt it would surprise him.

I'm still really awkward about knowing what to say to people when their loved ones die. I know how much it annoyed me to have people say "I'm sorry for your loss." Sometimes I responded with an aggressive, "Yeah! Me too!"  Even worse was when people said, "It'll get better." I didn't want it to get better - I couldn't imagine life being good without him in it and I didn't want to imagine a good life without him in it. It seemed like that was cutting him out of me in some way. All I can really do is tell them how much I know that hurts. I do think my life is better now than it has been, but I still hurt without him around and that hasn't changed.

I wish he knew my dog, my friends, my athletes, my co-workers and the 2012 version of me. It's still tough having so many people in my life who never knew him. The nice thing about moving to his hometown is that I occasionally run into people who knew him. The benefit of him dying fairly young and quickly from cancer is that I don't have to watch my dad grow frail over decades. He wouldn't have handled that well. I still remember him as the strongest guy I've ever met - physically, spiritually, mentally, and socially. He has set a high standard for men in my life, which I refuse to lower.

Not having my dad around has definitely changed my relationships with my mom and sister. I wouldn't have the relationships I have with them if he was still around. We have had to work to understand each other. I function very differently from them and this makes communication extra hard sometimes. They are all the immediate family I have, so we have to work at it as that is the only option to keep our family strong. I treasure them both more now that I did before. Dad would be happy to see our family unit today.

I see photos of myself now and I see my dad. I have his face and I love that. Before he died I thought my dad had kind of a silly smile and face and wasn't all that pleased when people would say I looked like him. Now I love that I can look in the mirror and recognize him. I like having the constant reminder of him looking back at me. It makes me feel that he's with me that much more, like a constant support system that encourages me to start my day right.

I still can't quite get in a pool and do laps, although I need to get over this. Every time I try, I feel like he's next to me in the other lane swimming along with me. Growing up, every time I went to the pool this was the case. When I do get in a pool, anytime I feel the rush of someone swimming by, I am reminded about swimming with him and still tear up quite a bit.

I can't go back to Jacksonville FL yet either. It's my mom & sister's favorite vacation spot, but it just reminds me of death and sadness. It was my grandmother & grandfather's place (both dead now), and the place we went immediately after my dad died to get away. It's too painful to be there still. Although there are happy memories of our vacations together there watching the ships, swimming in the ocean, rigging systems for getting supplies to/from the condo - the happy memories make it just that much more painful because they are over. It's why I had to leave Austin. Too many memories around every corner of something we had done together when he was healthy, or worse, when he was sick. Pittsburgh has childhood memories which are pure and not painful. Some corners bring back memories I thought I had forgotten completely. Pittsburgh is the right place for me to be.

Dad, I love you. I miss you.  I look forward to our reunion at the end of my life. Happy Birthday even though I'm sure you've stopped counting.

For those of you who didn't know my dad, the Rev Dr Robert D Nix Jr and want to check these out: 
4-minute video made 2 weeks before my dad died
2-minute clip I took interviewing my dad before his radiation treatment
His obituary
The blog my family kept throughout his diagnosis and treatment  search "chipnix"

Dad

They say that it hits younger caregivers harder than others. Well I believe it. I was a caregiver. I coached him through his last breath. I saw them giving CPR and let me tell you it’s not like it is in the movies. I then handed over the advanced directive that stopped it. I positioned his limp arm around me and imagined he was holding me despite the fact that he was gone. I watched the sunrise the first morning after he died. I helped arrange his funeral. I smiled and shook hands with friends and family. I read one of the readings in the service. And I have cried most nights since. I have seen a lot of doctors and they say I have a mood disorder. I’m on three different types of anti-depressants and I haven’t been able to sleep without some type of drug and even with them my sleep is intermittent at best. All this doesn’t even mention the horrible ways I coped with his diagnosis despite my stoic outer appearance when caring for him.

I seem to function best at work. It keeps me focused. My relationships there are surface level and that’s probably best. They know me as happy, energetic, efficient and responsible Joy and I would like to keep it that way.

My longest romantic relationship has been six weeks so I haven’t really been missing anything in that department, although the last guy I started dating quit on me when my dad was diagnosed. That situation was a little too heavy for a new relationship, and who knows it still might be.

Oh but work. I work at the American Cancer Society. Over forty times a day I pass by the desk where I took the phone call from my father telling me the news and my manager’s office where I went into hiding in order to weep. The patient service center that set us up with housing for out of town visitors is located in the same building and I see the specialist who helped with that at least weekly. She sometimes looks me in the eye and gives me a meek smile.

I absolutely love my job – I just wish it was in a different field. However, I have now invested five years of my life into cancer and I have the perfect background. After all, my mother is a survivor and my father died of it, it’s the perfect story for someone who works at ACS. But it’s not my motivation.; after all GIST and brain cancer are two of the least researched cancers. I work there because I love developing others, training others and this gives me the opportunity to do that.

It’s been almost a year. Am I supposed to be over this? Is it supposed to get better or as some people say “feel different?” because it feels the same to me. I want cry just as much as I did that first day I heard the news. The reason I don’t is because it popped blood vessels and gave me black eyes and I really can’t show up to work looking like that so I must show some self-control. I can hear him laughing and telling me stories.

Night-time is the hardest for me. Ever since I was little my father put me to bed. When I was very small he would tell me stories of him growing up and stories of him in Vietnam. Not the gruesome ones but stories of his buddies and the culture. As I got a bit older, despite being dyslexic, he read "Treasure Island" to me which helped start my life-long Pirate obsession. Then, in middle school, I went through a poker phase and he humored me by playing a game each night. Then in high school when I got into rowing he would give me backrubs every night. Now I have memories of him putting me to sleep and all I want is him to be here, him to pray with me at the end of the day.

I am so jealous of my older sister. She has such a great memory. She remembers absolutely everything. Most of my memories are made up of things people have told me about times when I was young. I’m a much more savor the moment type of person and tend to forget what has past. Most of the vivid memories of my dad are the ones since his diagnosis as those were the ones with heightened emotions and the most recent. These are also NOT the ones that I want to have with me. I want to remember the happy ones. So, I rack my brain trying and trying to remember others but they don’t come as easily. I remember surprising him last year for father’s day, walking the dogs with him, going to Houston with him for Christmas one year, staying up with him on long car rides navigating, delivering lemon curd dressed as an elf, but they are snippets. My sister remembers the whole story. Why didn’t we own a video camera!?!? Why didn’t I take more pictures!?!?

My dad and I were two peas in a pod and everyone knew it. We looked a like. We were both into sports. Both of our skills are developing people and managing projects. We both have the same humor and we both talk during movies in the same way. My mother and sister are carrots so we all go together, but I miss my pod-mate.

I hope I’m not letting him down. I miss him terribly. I wish I could get his advice about just a few more things.