What Comes Next?

[Foreign]

My Dad died today. He was 63 years old, the same age his father was when he passed. 

I woke up today and started getting my daughter ready for a birthday party. Started the day like any other day. Then my sister called and said something was wrong with my Dad, that I should get to his house. She was an hour away and so was my brother. Before I could get out the door I could hear the sirens. I knew it was for him. 

I pulled up to the house and there cars everywhere. Then I saw the ambulance. I got inside and handed my daughter to the medic and ran upstairs, past the police, past the other medics. There he was, on the floor. They were doing CPR and kept telling me that it would be better if I wasn't in the room. They didn't understand that I knew he was leaving and I wanted to be there with him, I just wanted to hold his hand and let him know I was there with him while he left. They made me leave. 

In the ambulance, I knew he wasn't coming back to us. No sirens, no speeding. I would look back to see them still giving him CPR. They took him into a room and I could see their heads. They were all standing around him, working. The Dr came out to talk to my sister, brother and I. He told us we could come in while they continued to have him on life support. He was letting us say goodbye, because maybe he was still inside that body and would know we were there? I talked to him, held his hand, rubbed his head. But there was nothing. He was taking a breath every 30 seconds, sometimes he had a pulse but just from the meds they had given him. My brother and sister were across from me crying. My dad's arms came up, his head started turning left and right, his eyes opened. His brain was still registering that the tube in his throat was uncomfortable. I asked if we could let him go. They did one more ultra-sound to make sure his heart wasn't doing its work anymore. They gave him meds to make him comfortable, and they took the tube out. We said goodbye. 

My dad and I, we've had a hard relationship. We just started to rebuild. I just asked him if we could do weekly dinners together. It made me happy to see him with my daughter. He was good with her. Last night I called him when my daughter was crying in the store because I wouldn't buy her the remote control car she wanted. When I called, I addressed him as Santa and he played along on speaker phone. 

My sister is pregnant and hadn't told my dad yet that the baby is due on his birthday. She told him in the hospital. 

My little brother saw him this morning before he left for work and asked to take him to the Dr. But my Dad said maybe after he gets out of work. 

My dad had looked up urgent care on his computer and must've gone upstairs to change so he could go. 

Where is he now? Does he know we were there with him? 

I loved my Dad. I wasn't ready for him to go. Two weeks ago I asked him to go to the Dr and he said he wasn't ready to leave this Earth yet. His fiancé was supposed to be here from Brazil for Christmas. They were finally going to get married. She is lost now. 

My Dad started a diamond mining company in Sierra Leone when I was 14 years old. As much as I felt I hated him at times, I admired him so much. 

What happens next?

 

[askdfjnak]

I'm sorry to read this.

I don't know what your relationship with your father was like, but it's still challenging to have to lose someone. Even if you didn't get along well.
When they leave a part of you leaves too.

All I can tell you is that you're going to be ok.

Not ok in the childish "let's all clap our hands and sing kumbaya" way. No. It's perfectly fine to feel sad,lost,shocked,depressed and angry. It's perfectly fine to feel anything, really.

I mean you'll be ok in the sense that your feet are still on the ground. Your daughter is playing in the background. Your niece is about to be born. Life is going to continue on just fine. As it always does.

What happens next?
Unfortunately nobody can give you a straight answer for this one. As you saw today, one minute you're at a birthday party, the next you're saying goodbye to someone.

The future isn't something you can truly own. It's one of life greatest gifts and one of its greatest curses.
One year from now you could be right where you are, or you could be on the adventure of a lifetime, or... who knows.

Just try and enjoy the ride a little.
Even the scary parts.

Edited November 7, 2016 by Marc Schinkel

[Foreign]

One week ago I held his hand, I looked in his eyes, said I love you, and told him it was okay. I told him he could go. Today I shook people's hands, hugged strangers, and said "thank you" a hundred times. I let people in the home he built for us, trying to hide the junkyard dog inside me. At the end, I sat on the floor where I found him, and cursed the ashes in my hand. After it all, his roaring laughter, his temper like thunder, his genius sense of humor, his smell, walk, charm, character, and his love... all we have left are these fucking ashes. His empty shoes, his dirty ashtray, his pillows. What is the purpose of this life?

[Foreign]

[Bob84]

@Foreign Mine was 54. There is nothing i can say to make it any better. And there is still more to come. Time does make it easyer but you dont care for this. Nore did i. 

One thing i would like you to consider is that its all memorys. Some give you joy and others pain. Just try to be aware if this simple fact. I know its not much, but it is.

Edited November 14, 2016 by Bob84

[Foreign]

@Marc Schinkel I have kept your words in mind every day - "I mean you'll be ok in the sense that your feet are still on the ground. Your daughter is playing in the background. Your niece is about to be born. Life is going to continue on just fine. As it always does." 

I know this is true, and it does bring me some serenity, it is what it is. This is life. My life is good. 

@Bob84 Yes, I've heard so often that time makes it easier, it's true. We also wait for time, we rush time, we never have enough time.

I am better today. I don't feel depressed at all. I feel okay. Somber, but not suffering. I am anxious about what the next year will bring. Death is never easy on family, and my father left a decent size estate with no will. I'm anxious about what this will do to us. So I am focusing on letting go of the outcome of this and preparing myself to walk away, possibly with the loss of siblings as well if it gets ugly. 

I am curious about why I'm not suffering so much. Maybe it's because I didn't see my Dad every day, or even every week anymore? Like his fiancé who had my father built into the routine of her daily life and into her future. Or my sister who had just recently moved out. 

Maybe it's because I have a strong faith that he has come back in another way, and that we all come back until we die without suffering. 

Maybe because I have made up my mind that I will do all things with the determination of my father now and his strength is in me.

Tonight I had class and we had a woman presenting on Native American culture. My dad was Native American. She spoke about her father who passed away in January, how he refused to be treated with modern medicine. He let himself die. So much like my Dad. He never told us his heart condition. He never got treatment. My Dad told me just a few weeks before that he wasn't ready to die. But still, he made a choice. This stays in my mind. 

I want to research death. I want to find answers. Is that attachment? 

I wonder if I can truly let go of any outcomes with my Dad's estate? Can I truly let go and watch my siblings make poor choices,pissing away everything that my Dad worked for for us? That he died for for us?

My Dad did lead an extraordinary life. When I was just 14, he left to Sierra Leone and started a diamond mining company. A fat white man (half-breed) in Africa, mining diamonds during the break of a civil war. He survived and became an African. How could I ever give up after he went through all of that for us?