Missing my Dad
Missing my Dad
September 17th, 2007:
My beloved dad was in the hospital, I thought he said he was going in to get his intestines cleaned out. He had Crohn’s and a complication from living a lifetime with megacolon, where he was born with a very large colon. His mother was told to push fruits and vegetables. As a teenager I saw him drinking orange-flavored fiber goop. That’s what he called it; “my goopy goop”.
His stomach issues got worse when both he and I ate bad seafood in Brendizi, Italy, the next day we took a boat to Greece, where we were sick for most of our stay in Athens. My mother had skipped the seafood- she was allergic to most of it, so she didn’t get sick.
The last time I saw him alive, he was having massive cramping from whatever the doctor had given him. He yelled at me to get out of the room. As i left with my attendant, he let out the most agonizing sound of pain that could be heard as we got on the elevator. Little did I realize that would be the last time I would hear him say anything, or be conscious enough to make eye contact .
The next morning, a lady from the retirement home he lived at, called to say dad had pneumonia; I was immediately worried. I went to see him. he was hooked up to tubes breathing for him. He wasn’t able to communicate. At some point a doctor told me he was not likely to survive. We called my sister in maryland, who at first thought I was blowing things out of proportion. She had just visited us and it was Yom Kippur and she resisted, but eventually my cousin and I were able to make her understand the severity of dad’s situation.
My cousin and I had power of attorney. I knew dad’s preference to not be on life support. When my sister arrived, we all agreed it was time to turn off life support. I wanted to be in the room, but my sister said daddy’s preference would be to be alone to die. We got into a yelling match. I finally said, you can do what you want, and I’ll be with him.
She was sitting with daddy when he woke up briefly while I was getting lunch. She talked to him, and told him who had been in to see him; many cousins, and of course me. She said tears ran down his face. My cousin Meera, came running to me and said dad was awake but to hurry, we ran up to the 7th floor, and my attendant told me to give him a big hug, so I got out of my wheelchair and gave a big hug… the last one ever.
My sister and I didn’t have time to cry and grieve, we had to go through daddy’s things. I had no idea why he had so may new shirts in his closet. I guess he ordered them from a catalog. He was probably bored. We looked through his cd collection, and I smiled because there were many cd’s from PBS specials. We saw one of Sting’s cd’s. I brought home two shirts and a necktie of his and several CDs. The rest of my cousins and nephew took his cameras. I saw a large book of negatives and took those. My sister took daddy’s diplomas and his dissertation which had us stumbling over the big words a psychology phd would know.
Every birthday I miss him, every holiday I remember how my attendant and I would go to the barbecues at the retirement home . and of course I get depressed each anniversary of his death. Sometimes it sneaks up on me, since August 27th is when my mother passed from cancer when I was 35.
Daddy was my rock… When I was in high school, he and I would watch the 11 PM news and then eat our bedtime snacks. And i would talk about most anything with him, as did my sister a few years earlier. He was happy when I got married, and when I left my husband, he smiled and said; Now you have an Ex… He was the calm one to my mother’s fire. so, yes I miss him. I keep him in my heart as much as I can.