LIFE | GRIEF
I Never Knew My Father Until After His Death
It Took Me 43 Years
I have told the story of my early childhood, and you are all probably tired of hearing it. So, I won’t go into all the details, just enough for a backstory.
I grew up in an abusive family. Once I was old enough, I escaped to an apartment at age 18. I was so busy escaping the abuse at home that I never really got to know my dad. The abuse came from my mother, and my dad just faded into the background of my life.
I was jealous of how my dad treated my brother and sister. I always felt left out. My sister was Daddy’s favorite little princess, and my brother was the golden child.
Escaping
I was the accident that shouldn’t have happened. My parents had not planned on a third baby. My dad constantly reminded me that I was an unplanned “accident” with his unkind words.
My frustrated dad took his anger out on me when tensions were high at home. He would hit me and say I was unwanted, amongst other things.
I hated my entire family, including my dad. I couldn’t wait to escape, so I moved out at 18. I got my own apartment and job. I desperately tried to escape from my parent’s house, so I married at 21. I wanted to make sure I never had to go back. In my mind, marriage would be my written guarantee that I never had to return home.
My escape was permanent. I never looked back.
I continued on with college and began my career. I didn’t pay any attention to my dad or even bother getting to know him. After all, I had made my escape. My dad was struggling with his health.
He didn’t say anything about how he was feeling. I saw my dad on a ladder at my parents’ house one day. The ladder was swaying in the wind, and Dad appeared very frail. I was scared, so I climbed up and insisted he come down.
Even though he had to be feeling deathly ill, he was painting the exterior of their house. He was up on a ladder, sick with the cancer that would take his life.
Dad’s death
My dad died suddenly two weeks later. He ended up with terminal colon cancer as a result of his time in Los Alamos during WWII.
I was 24 when my dad died. I naively thought I was a full-fledged adult, but I soon learned I had much growing up to do. I never really knew my dad. It wasn’t until I watched the movie Oppenheimer that I began comprehending what my dad went through.
My dad was drafted at the age of 31. He was the sole supporter of his family, and he had just started his own grocery store.
He was stationed at Los Alamos during WW II. The secret Manhattan Project was taking place while he was there. The Manhattan Project was the secret Project the United States was working on to create the first atomic bomb. No one knew what was happening, but many would later develop cancer from their time there.
Manhattan Project
None of the people in the area knew about the Project, but many would later develop cancer from their time there.
After I watched the movie, Oppenheimer, I started doing research on the nuclear explosion from Trinity, the atomic bomb they tested. So many people were exposed to radiation and didn’t even know it.
Ironically, all this research into who didn’t know what happened during the war struck me, as I never really knew my dad. This was a shocking revelation to me. During my childhood, I had spent all my time hiding or escaping from my mother, so I never really got to know my dad.
This was a shocking revelation to me. During my childhood, I spent all my time hiding or escaping my mother; I never really got to know my dad. The only dad I got to know was a frustrated father who felt powerless to stop his wife from terrorizing the household.
Looking back as an adult, I understand that better now.
Courtship
While stationed in Los Alamos during the war, he met my mother. She was a blind date set up by her sisters, and they communicated by letters. My mother visited a few times, but the base had restricted visitor times. So, my mother and father only met in person a few times.
My mother had a borderline personality disorder, but her family hid her disease from my dad. The sisters that she lived with screened all of her letters to him. They wanted to maintain the secret of her mental health.
My parents got married in February 1946. Right after my dad was discharged from the army.
The war was over, and everyone was celebrating. One way they were celebrating was getting married to their newly discharged man. He had just returned home, so my mom’s family wanted to marry her off so my dad wouldn’t know. He was sold a tainted bill of goods.
Married life
Anyway, long story short, my poor dad, who already had a hard life, was now married to a crazy lady. They proceeded to have three kids in short order. I was the baby.
It’s no wonder my dad was stressed out and frustrated. He had traded in one hard life for another one. As a religious family, divorce was out of the question.
Looking back from my perspective as an adult, I decided to forgive my dad for any harsh words or actions we exchanged in my childhood. That part was only a small piece, though. I spent 18 years hiding and running, then moved out to escape. But what I missed out on was that I never got to know my father.
My dad died 6 years after I moved out! When he died, I wasn’t even in town. I didn’t get to see him in the hospital to say goodbye.
His whole life was stolen from me. I never knew who he really was. I didn’t even realize any of this at 24 when he died. I was in shock, but I just moved on since I didn’t really understand what I had just lost.
Oppenheimer movie
I was looking forward to watching the movie Oppenheimer when it came out in 2023. I wanted to see where he lived during the war and understand what he experienced. I don’t know why, but I had somehow envisioned his wartime experiences in a more glamorous light.
That was the effect war movies had on us: they made war seem exciting and purposeful. When I watched the movie, I was absolutely horrified. The living conditions of the enlisted men were not glamorous at all.
A bizarre, unexpected thing happened to me. I was writing an article about my dad and Los Alamos. But while researching that story, I suddenly looked backward at my dad’s whole life.
I felt like an outsider looking into a bubble, which was his life. That’s when I was struck with overwhelming grief. How had it taken me 43 years to finally grieve my dad?
Finally grieving my dad
Writing that article and doing the research for it really helped me to grieve my dad finally.
I was overcome with sadness. If only my dad hadn’t been exposed to nuclear radiation, maybe he would have lived longer. If he had lived longer, I could have reached adulthood and maybe been able to know him. Who knows. I will never know what would have happened. I wasn’t meant to.
However, I am grateful that I finally released all those pent-up emotions. I finally grieved my dad.
I grieved his death. I mourned his hard life. I also grieved for the man I never really got to know. I’m sure he did his best with what life gave him. I’m glad I can finally see the man through all that fog 43 years later.
Better late than never.
Here is a link to the article I wrote on my dad and his time at Los Alamos
