A week ago my biological father died. I haven't really been able to say much about it or formulate the thoughts that spin through my mind. BK does good by checking in with me, but the conversation turns to mostly the pictures that are surfacing from his teens and 20's and the realization that I am his spitting image and 2 of my 3 children look just like his childhood pictures. I don't think I'm in denial, I think I'm just unsure how to feel.
Bio dad didn't raise me. I grew up dropping my 2 older sisters off with him for their visitation from time to time and remember seeing him often as a child and knowing that he was my biological father. I believed he didn't want me and this was why my stepdad adopted me at birth. I always was given full information about him and there was no secret that I was his child. In my teens I became more and more curious, wanting to know the DNA I came from and the answers to so many questions I had growing up. I sought him out my senior year of high school and we formed an email relationship. By the time I was 20 I was ready to visit him as my sisters had let me know his cancer or leukemia (can't remember what they diagnosed it as at the time) had become apparent. The next 14 years I would get frantic calls at various times that bio dad was not going to last long, somehow he surprised everyone and did.
I visited with my bio father twice on our own terms. The first time we met in a Mexican restaurant, I don't remember much aside from the fact that he reminded me of myself and the food. We spent a few days in town with him and saw how he lived, pictures from his life and to be honest, I remember next to nothing. We continued to email and form a relationship that was something I was comfortable with. I didn't need a father in him as he clearly had never wanted to be that to me, but access to him was important to me. The last time I saw him was a few years later right before I got married and pregnant with my oldest. We went to the drag races and watched him drive his old car as he had been a drag racer many moons before and been a pretty good one at that. Afterwards he and I and my ex spent time with him hearing stories about his life, his drag racing, and finally he handed me a packet full of professional drag racing pictures that he said he had saved for me. There were dozens and dozens and I was shocked. He told me about parts of his life, he told me had he known certain things he would have tried harder with me, he apologized and he told me he loved me.
My biggest regret in all of this is that I never called him dad nor did I ever tell him in person that I loved him. I was too tentative, too scared, too unsure of this balancing act of a relationship where I didn't just have to juggle the two of us, but also my own mother and stepfather who had raised me as well as 2 sisters and a half brother. I honestly didn't know where in the world I fit in with any of it. I always felt like the odd person out. My sisters had been raised by both my mom and bio dad and had relationships with both. My brother was 18 years older than I and had decided to not have a relationship with his father but had kept in contact off and on with us and my mother. My stepdad had done all the hard work of raising me and supporting me and put up with the issues that are bound to come to a teen girl in this type of parenting situation. And so for the last 14 years I've been unsure where I fit in with it all, unsure of my footing so to speak. Maybe that's the reality of my regret, I never knew where I fit in or who I was in the mix of all these other people and their relationships.
And so when I got the text asking if I was awake at an hour my sister knew I wouldn't be, I knew. She called later to confirm it, I've never heard my sister so unsure. She held it together but I could tell she was deeply upset and it rocked my core for a moment because I hurt for her. I hung up and wondered again, "Where do I fit into all of this?"
A week later I'm still unsure. I was unusually quiet, which upset my sisters and we've hit a place where distance is needed between the three of us. Bio dad's death has me realizing that there is a deep rut between us that we all have ignored and allowed to fester between us. Something I'm not sure how to work out, but for now I'm stepping back and taking space because there is a codependency that was formed between Bio dad and his children that I firmly said no to. The codependency and unhealthy behaviors with in my marriage led me to eventually stop pursuing more of a relationship with bio dad. I had all I could handle surviving my marriage. I stopped emailing and writing letters to bio dad probably about 5 years back, it was simply too much for me and I didn't understand the codependency between him and my sisters. After I got divorced I meant to try again with bio dad, but I never did. I'm not sure I regret it though.
But I still mourn and grieve. First my brother, now bio dad. There are only three of us left and it has me realizing how short life really is. Eventually due to the big age gap, unless something like cancer or a freak accident happens, I'm assuming one day I will be the last of us all. The only thing left between my parents. And as I look in the mirror I realize he did give me something. He gave me myself. I have sat and stared over the last week. Going over each crease in my forehead that I always hated, realizing as I look at pictures of bio dad that he has the exact same creases. I see his nose and finally realize who my own nose came from. I look at my son's ears and they are just like bio dad's. I may have nothing tangible left of bio dad as my sisters took the pictures he gave me years ago and forgot to return to me. But every time I look in the mirror, I have a piece of him. The smile, the chin, the nose, the forehead. I have his mother's eyes, but everything else down to my dark locks of hair are his. I spent years hating how I looked, always insecure and critical of my flaws. It's time to work on accepting them and being thankful that I have something of bio dad to carry with me, even if i'm unsure about how I feel about the relationship we never really had.
I'm still not ready to say goodbye. There will be no funeral and my 2 sisters made it clear they will be handling his ashes as he wanted to be cremated. So I am left to sort through my thoughts, emotions and reflections. I let go years ago, that's the easy part. I guess it's just the moments of feeling what you feel, accepting it and choosing to look to the positives. Focusing on the fact that I do have parts of him in myself and in my children and I have a few good memories and the ability to remember him telling me he loved me. All the rest isn't my job to figure out I don't think, it's my job to accept it and make the best of this life I've been blessed with. And that's what I intend to do.
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