How I cope with my dad’s passing — even after 24 years
As I continue with my spring cleaning, I looked through some of my old diaries and in a lot of them, I share my deepest pains and secrets. Mostly I wrote to God about a few key topics. Dad was one of them. I know some of you will say “why so emo?” but I’ve been meaning to write about this for some years now.
Death and Birth are a part of our lives inevitably but why is it that death is such a taboo word? Why is it OK to celebrate the birth of a newborn, but it is so difficult to bring up death?
To give you some context, my dad passed away when I was 11 and today I’m 35. He passed away from fourth stage liver cancer, and after 8 months of treatment.
I’m writing this because there isn’t enough documentation of people who have lived through losing their fathers at a young age, as I have barely navigated through it, I thought I’d share this. I hope it helps some people with their journey.
Even as I begin writing, I’m already tearing up non-stop and it’s been 24 years. Trust me, it still hurts like a bitch. So the first thing I’d say is, don’t ask the mourner to stop crying. It is perfectly ok to cry and grief. In fact, I’d recommend crying as much as possible to let it all out. I’ve heard so many times at wakes, “stop crying”, “don’t cry already”. Be strong for your mom, be strong for so and so. Please shut up. We don’t need to be strong for anyone else. We are responsible for our own grieving. So please don’t ask me to be strong for somebody else. Not when I’m 11.
I also want to say to those of you who mean well and try to string a few sentences together, sometimes just being there quietly is good enough. Saying something like this “God wouldn’t allow you to go through something you cannot handle”, or “God allows things to happen to you, so you can be a testimony to others”. Just don’t. A church member said that to me at the wake and I remember it until today because that is really the stupidest thing you can say. How about you lose a dad so that your life can be a testimony for others? If I reflect today, sure… 24 years later, I can see the meaning of that sentence. But don’t say that at the wake!
Now that I got those out of my chest, let’s talk about my process.
I took a very very long time to accept my father’s passing. The first year, I just pretended I was in a bad dream and I would wake up soon and it’d be over. I lived in that denial state for probably a year? It wasn’t until my UPSR (Primary School Leaving Exam) results came out, when I thought OK this better not be a dream cause I got straight A’s. That’s when it sunk in. 1.5 years later.
Of course there is also the acceptance of death itself. I blamed God for a very long time. It wasn’t until just 10 years ago, when I finally got my answer. I remember vividly in my prayer, I ask God why… you promised when two or three are gathered, prayers will be answered but WHY? And finally after years of asking God, I guess He cannot take it anymore. I heard a strong voice say to me, “Wen, that’s what your father wanted”. I realise now, it was his call to make. Not ours or our prayers and I know my sisters will try to tell me otherwise and this is a pretty controversial claim and everybody who is going through one of this will be so angry with me for saying this because well, who wants to accept that their loved one was the one who wanted to go? I swear, I know I’m quite smart but I couldn’t conjure up something like this, I cannot possibly come up with this on my own and I heard the voice loud and clear.
Missing him was easy to manage, I could distract myself but guilt… this one can last a long time and can eat you up on the inside. I certainly felt guilty that I didn’t spend more time with him, guilty that I made him so angry that one time (this one still stings), guilty I have forgotten his voice, guilty I am moving on and being happy again. As a child, I think this was particularly hard, I didn’t know how to express this and I didn’t dare to tell my mother or my sisters fearing they would judge me further. I even felt guilty for crying, cause they are doing their best to hold it in. So for the most part, I kept it in a lot.
I felt alone in this battle to feel better. I took matters into my own hands (This is why don’t tell kids to be strong — I took that advice pretty seriously). It could be a mix of family politics, it could be moving to a new place, could be my teenage angst, I was imploding. It got so bad, I was cutting myself. Of course, my mother didn’t know. If this happens to someone around you, please do not spare the money, send them for counselling. I wished I had that growing up because it would have really saved me all those years of stupidity.
I got my first boyfriend pretty early. It was good. I had someone I could confide in, someone I could talk to. It numbs all my pain and though my mom was against it, and I know I’m not ready, I needed to hold on to someone else because I was so afraid to be left alone. So I started jumping from boyfriend to boyfriend. I didn’t stop until I was 24. I didn’t even need to choose, I just needed someone to be there for me. In this process, I hurt so many people who genuinely cared for me and I also got hurt quite a lot (a new guilt trip that I can share about next time). Heartbreaks are the worst, and I contribute to quite a few of those in my teenage years, and this is something I wish I hadn’t done. Again, something that could’ve been solved with proper counselling.
I know the government school teachers were too underpaid and had too many students to actually care but in my struggle, my school teachers really didn’t play any comforting role whatsoever. They simply couldn’t empathise and in fact, I was subjected to their bullies. One particular teacher that I will gladly call out is Ms. Juliet, my English teacher, I’m probably a difficult child during that time, but she almost always singled me out. When I needed to talk to friends, she hit me for being noisy, when I phased out and just sat silently, she called me out and provoked me. I’m not even sure how she is qualified to be a teacher. She slapped me on multiple occasions. Just FYI, it was common during my time. Puan Muthu, Puan Azni — they were all abusive! This is why it totally pays off to home school or send your kid to a private institution.
I saved the best for last, communicate.
I know it’s a super awkward thing to talk about a dead person. Who wants to get started on this when we could just avoid bringing up the person’s name and maybe try to cheer him/her up instead. That’s wrong. Sometimes it’s so important to let him/her talk about it. Shoving him under the carpet was a recipe for disaster. After my father passed, my mother wouldn’t let me talk about him. I couldn’t even get her to tell me more about dad.
So, very suddenly this person just disappears and I am void of all information about him. As if he didn’t exist and worse, he didn’t matter. We kept at it until I was in my 20s. So a decade void of information about my dad, I finally exploded. We got into a huge family fight. I shouted at my mom for removing this person from my life, for giving me no information whatsoever. And now we do talk about dad, their dating life, their past and I do get stories about my father now. So my final advice is to keep talking about the person, it’s a way to honour him, it’s also a way for the family to heal. Don’t wait a decade as we did.
These days when people tell me about losing a loved one, I brush it off like it doesn’t matter because I know you will survive it no matter how painful. I know I should care more in that moment but I take things for granted. To feel immense amounts of happiness, we must be willing to feel immense amounts of sadness. If you are ready to love wholeheartedly, be prepared also for the day your heartbreaks. Whether by death or by choice, we will depart from each other someday.
Don’t give in to fear and close yourself away from the rest of the world to avoid experiencing this pain. Love wholeheartedly. I know I’m so ready to love again, in fact, I am really hoping my family will let me adopt a dog soon.
Sincerely, I hope this helps.
