To the Girl who Misses Her Dad

Daddy & I

March 2000

Originally written June 4, 2020

Hey you,

The girl with the ache in her chest and his voice still living somewhere between memory and muscle, the one who is struggling to accept the loss of her Dad today-

I know this pain.

My whole world changed shape when my father died. It didn’t happen all at once, there was no dramatic thunderclap, but in a thousand quiet ways I noticed every day he was gone.

The air felt different, life started to play in slow motion, the ground beneath me felt less sturdy than it ever had before, hell even joy had a shadow for a while.

The hard thing about grief is that it looks different for everyone; because of that, its one of the hardest things to truly empathize with until you’ve lived it.

Not only was I sad what felt like all the time, I had lost my Dad - the safest thing I had ever known and if your like me, that doesn’t mean you didn’t have safety elsewhere. It just means that in this moment, it feels like you’ve been abandoned by the lighthouse that led you home.

When you grow up with a father who was present and steady, who was somehow both your safest place and your strictest teacher, you move through life differently. Not everyone gets that kind of love, and that is part of why this loss cuts so deep. You are not just grieving a person. You are grieving a voice, a presence, a way of being loved that made the world feel more secure.

Please know that it is ok to be sad, whether it has been one day or twenty years. Grief does not care what date is on the calendar. It does not ask permission, it is not polite, and almost always comes in a moment that will not be appropriate in your mind. It comes in waves, in memories, in songs, in ordinary moments that do not feel ordinary at all.

What you feel is real.

Cry when you need to. Fall apart when you need to and then tend to yourself too. Write it down. Go for a drive. Go for a run. Sit in stillness. Take a hot bath. Pray. Do something that helps you return to yourself.

When people used to tell me not to live in my sadness, I truly thought meant no one understood and no one cared. I thought they were telling me to get over something you never really get over. But what I learned is that it is absolutely healthy to grieve. I just learned the hard way that grief can visit without being allowed to move in. I let grief come up on the porch, kick off its shoes, eat all the food, and stay long enough to start acting like it paid rent.

There is a difference in carrying grief and letting grief carry you.

For just under a decade after my dad passed away I believed that if I loosened my grip on the sadness, I would lose him. I worried that healing would somehow mean leaving him behind; but, healing did not erase him.

Healing made more room for him, it allowed me to remember his voice without breaking, laugh at the things only he would say, and start to carry his legacy with steadier hands.

Let’s take a second right here and take a deep breath together.

Okay.

Every good thing he ever said about you still matters and still holds the same weight it did when he was here. Every truth he spoke over your life did not die with him. If he told you that you were strong, kind, giving, funny, brave, capable, and deeply loved those things are not temporary. His absence does not undo those words.

I used to think no one would ever love the way my dad did. No one would ever have my back like that. No one would ever see me flaws and all and still show up tomorrow.

Guess What?

Love still shows up…

Sometimes in family. Sometimes in friends. Sometimes in the people who stay. Sometimes in the way we learn to care for ourselves because of the things they taught us. It is not the same and it is not supposed to be. But it is real.

My advice: tell the stories, say his name outloud as often as you need/want to, talk to him when the day is to heavy, write to him when the words are all piled up in your chest, go to the places that remind you of him, listen to the songs that bring him close, let other people say his name and remember to keep saying it yourself.

Just keep living.

My daddy always said, “Go big or go home, Peanut.” So, take the trip, try the thing, make new memories, risk joy without apologizing for it and just get up and go. He is not honored by your permanent suffering he is honored by your courage to keep going.

The strangest thing about losing someone who loved you so properly is that after a while their voice starts to become your own. The advice you ache to hear from him will start to rise from somewhere deep inside of you; not because he is gone, but because he helped plant those roots the day he bacame your daddy.

Above all else I believe he would want you to be happy, healthy, and deeply loved.

And since some of us don’t hear it enough, let me plainly say:

You are still here, and that matters more than you know. You are beautiful.

You are smart.

You are worthy of love that STAYS.

Becoming a member of the ‘Dead dads’ club is a cruel induction to an empathetic and caring set of eyes. Grief is powerful in that if you allow it to it will deepen your connection with yourself and others, soften you, and open the door to qualities you were not aware you had. Compassion, perspective, courage, and strength are just a few off the top of my head.

On the days this all feels to impossible I want you to tell yourself this:

“Show up, look alert, and keep your mouth shut!”

Truthfully some days it will be how you make it through. Repeat the phrase and take one steady breath, one hard hour, one brave day at a time. Eventually you find yourself on the other side of the storm looking up at a sky you thought may never be clear again.

With LOVE <3,

Southern Peanut.