While I’m writing this on April 26– I usually write my blogs the day before I post them to social media– chances are, you are reading this on April 27, what would have been my parents’ 58th wedding anniversary.
The reality is that my parents didn’t have a happy marriage. I can say that out loud and on the internet because they aren’t here anymore. It’s just like when I wrote my first book about my sister’s suicide and I had to tell them before it was published, “Remember, this is how I saw things as they happened.” Sometimes there are things you don’t say because you don’t want to hurt people.
It’s sad for me to say that they weren't happy, but I also don’t think it’s worth walking around saying they were happy when they weren’t.
And it feels like recently that I’ve had more friends lose not one parent but a second one, leaving them without a living parent. Like me.
Being without living parent makes you feel somewhat disconnected from the world because the two people who brought you into the world, who helped you become who you are (for good or bad) aren’t here anymore. There’s another thing that happens during grief though, something that happens and we often aren’t aware of so we don’t understand our emotions relating to it.
When a parent dies, we also grieve what we never had with them. For each of us that it is going to be something different because we had unique relationships. Sure, there are threads through all our relationships, but none of us has exactly the same story of our lives.
I have often told the story that my dad’s way of showing his love for me was to buy groceries. He would show up at my apartment in Muncie, Indiana, where I was attending Ball State University with a trunk filled with styrofoam coolers that had Budget Gourmet frozen dinners in them. He would never tell me he loved me. He bought me groceries. That was who he was.
My mom never wanted anything more than to have a family and I’m sure it was hard to accept that my dad wasn’t that interested in us kids (even though there were four of us), but I’m sure my dad got married and had kids because at that time, that’s what you did– you married, you had a family. Had he been a young person now, I’m not sure he would have married or had a family. That meant my mom spent her life trying to make up for what he didn’t give us. And that was hard on her because she struggled to love herself, particularly because the polio had left her with a limp that put a big hole in her self confidence.
I’m not writing this for anyone to feel sorry for me. I’m writing this because once we understand what we are grieving– because grief is confusing and sometimes we don’t understand what’s behind the sadness– it makes it easier to process and move forward.
My parents are both out of their emotional and physical pain from this life. They did the best they could with the skills and backgrounds that they had. They gave me a longer list of things than what they didn’t give me. I know they are still with me, cheering me on. If anything, I just wish this life had been a happier one for them.