My Dad Died
The story of how it happened and my reason for writing
I have been in therapy now for a little over a year and my therapist and my family are the ones encouraging me to talk about this topic. To be honest, I do not believe anyone will care about my dad dying, it’s not your dad or your family member and there is already enough stress and sadness in the world so why would people want to know about my dead dad? but here I am, I guess I am at a point where I can write about it two years later.
Unless you were one of my close friends or a family member you would have never known that my dad died. That might have been a bad thing, I am not sure yet this is by all means not advice at all, I am still trying to figure everything out. Here is the story…
I am 24 years old and my dad was just about to turn 62 he was one month shy of turning 62. I had an amazing dad he would take me to school every day on a motorcycle and we would watch action movies together, I could always go to him whenever I had a problem and he would be so calm cool, and collected about anything, even if I believed the world was ending it was no big deal for my dad and he would help me see that. Now I don’t have a big family and I am an only child. It is just my dad, mom, grandma, and me. No cousins no aunts no anyone just us and for 24 years that was fine with me, no problem! That was all I needed.
My dad did not like doctors so he never went and get his yearly checkups or whenever he had the flu or cold he would just wait it out. My mom finally convinced my dad to go to the doctor’s office to have his stomach checked out because it was really stiff. It almost looked like a beer belly but my dad never drank any type of alcohol. For many years we all just assumed my dad was chubby or needed to go on a run more often. Some people have a muffin top, others have tummy rolls and some have a stiff beer gut that sticks out.
After my dad died for a long time I would look at overweight people and wonder if they have the same thing my dad had, I am not talking about a little overweight my dad was 6'2 and was between 250–300 pounds, he was not a small person. In theory, the weight was not the main problem, it didn’t help but that’s not what took him away from me. When he got his blood drawn from the doctor’s office, the results came back showing that his liver was failing and that is why his stomach was so big and stiff. The liver was no longer processing liquids so it was just emptying out into the stomach.
My dad had no other symptoms, or at least non that he told me about, no pain, no blood, just the oversized belly. When the doctors told us the news I was not afraid at all! my mom was and she pulled me aside to tell me to start getting prepared for a hard painful road but I did not believe her. My dad was strong! He drives a motorcycle and would constantly get into accidents and come out with mere scratches, zero broken bones! Plus we can just get a transplant or try to reverse the effects, you know drink plenty of water and organic foods, and let’s try and go on those runs now to get in shape.
A few months go by and we are going through the treatments, he is going in every week to get the liquid in his stomach drained out, my dad is looking a little skinner the liquid in his stomach is pushing against his other organs like his bladder and stomach so he is never really hungry or gets full quickly because there is no space. My dad still had zero complaints other than how dumb doctors are and why do they even go to school for 8 years when they always have to research or ask someone else or get a specialist. To this day I kind of agree with him.
I start to realize that what my mom said about my dad not being able to make it through might be right. My dad got skinnier and he is always tired, I am trying to see them every other day and I am texting him every day to see how he is doing. I am starting to hate my job for keeping me away but I need money and my parents now need money. My dad had to stop working and luckily we still had insurance but now my dad is a little stressed out over finances so he sells everything. He sells his motorcycles and his personal items and for him to sell his motorcycles was a shock for me, those motorcycles were like family to him.
There are a million other little details I can tell you and how everything sucked and is painful and my first panic attacks but I don’t want to make this article too long. In his last month, he was in the ICU a lot and in and out of the hospital rooms. I knew at this point my dad was not doing good and we needed a lot of help but I did not think he was about to die. Death was not in my mind as a possibility, people get sick and it’s a long road but you always hear about how people changed their lives and got better or got that one surgery and the medical treatment and it worked.
On my dads last day he decided to check out of the ICU, he decided that he no longer wanted medical treatment and that he wanted to go home, I get a call from a nurse while I hear my dad screaming in the background and the nurse telling me my dad is about to sign the documents of discharge and that he is refusing treatment. Now, remember my dad does not like doctors or hospitals so he can never stay for more than two days so this was not unnormal for me. While I was on the phone with the nurse I pleaded to have her wait to give him the documents, maybe I can convince my dad to stay because we needed the help.
I was too late and by the time I got to the hospital, my dad was already rolled outside in his wheelchair ready to go home. At this point it was a month of constant emergency rooms and ICUs so I was begging him to please go inside, I knew we would only last a few days at home and just end up back here and at least here he can have morphine and good pain medicines or something more than home. My dad and I argued for a few hours in the middle of the street while my dad made phone calls trying to find a ride home because I was still trying to beg him to go back inside.
We start to argue so much that he gets mad and falls out of his wheelchair, as much as I try to pick him up I can’t, I am not strong enough to lift him and I have to call 911 to have an ambulance help me lift him. As I am waiting for the ambulance I am also on the phone with my mom and my mom is on her way to the hospital, she was at work and tells me to just have him come home, that there was no reasoning with my dad to stay in the hospital. My mom and the ambulance got to us at the same time, the paramedics lifted my dad back into the wheelchair and they started accessing the situation.
The nurse on the phone earlier told me that they gave my dad Zoloft that day, I don’t remember why they gave it to him but when the paramedics asked if he had any new medications I said Zoloft. That he had Zoloft for the first time today and the paramedics were able to hold him for 72 hours because Zoloft can affect your mind in processing information. I was so relieved knowing he was going back into the hospital and that gave me three days to prepare for him to come back home and find a new treatment or to do something! all I knew is that I had a little bit of time but I was so wrong.
My mom gave both of us lectures and she can’t believe we were just arguing in the middle of the street for hours but she was not mad at us. My dad reentered the ICU and visiting hours were over so we had to come back the next day. I went home really sad and almost in shock, I never argue with my dad and I could not believe everything we had to do in order for my dad to get the help he needed. I was a little mad still but mom and I went to the hospital the next day, she tells me that dad called her last night saying that he was sorry and that he loved us. That he was going to try and stick with the treatment this time.
My mom goes in first and tells me to go in and forgive him and to go talk to him because he was not doing good. I walk into the room and he is throwing up blood, he is holding a bucket size of his own blood, he holds his arms out and I go in for a hug. We are both apologizing I say everything is ok and from here I don’t remember what else was said. I know it was all good and I know that we did not argue but I cannot remember what else happened. I just remember grabbing the bucket of blood to empty it and then having a team of nurses and doctors coming in and kicking me out.
I don’t remember how much time passed but we were just waiting in the hallway and the front desk guy would not let us into the ICU unit in order to see him and when I was able to get in all I saw was a lot of doctors working on him, they were trying to get the bleeding to stop and they were unsuccessful. Two doctors have us go into a small room to talk to us about our options when they talk to you it sounds like the words are underwater and you don’t know what to do but they are so calm and you have to stay calm because you now have to make a decision.
My dad died and he was brought back to life and the only thing keeping him alive right now was a machine. They told us that because he died he would have some brain damage and that there was no way to tell how much brain damage he would have until we in theory woke him back up or with time. My mom knew that my dad never wanted to be hooked up to a machine in order to live. Our second option was to turn off the machine and say goodbye to my dad. We had just argued for hours yesterday about how he no longer wanted to be in the hospital and my dad had already previously told us that he would never want to be in this situation. As much as we wanted to say keep him alive, keep the machine on, because what if the brain damage was not that bad! what if he didn’t get any brain damage! what if he woke back up fine like if nothing happened like if he didn’t just die! I wanted the what-ifs so badly but I also didn’t want him to suffer anymore.
He has now been sick for 8–9 months, getting worse with each day no longer enjoying the little things in life, like long drives or eating good food his life was taken a long time ago it was just the medicine and machines keeping him alive at this point and my mom and I agree to let him go. We go into the room where my dad is and we are holding his hand as the doctor injects him with something so that he won’t feel pain and turns off the machine.
……I don’t remember how much time passed and my dad never woke back up we were just telling him it’s okay and that we loved him, that we would be fine, and not to worry about us and how great he is. Then the beeping stopped on the machine and he was gone. We left the hospital without my dad, never seeing my dad ever again and the feelings and shock, and everything is a whole entire different story that maybe one day I will write but for now, that is how my dad died.
It’s been two years and things still suck, and I can’t get my brain out of the hospital room whenever I think about my dad, It’s hard to think about good memories or memories of him before he was sick but here I am. I am not sure why I am writing this I am not a writer and I do not have a following but for some reason, I just decided to write it. Sorry if there were a lot of typos it’s still hard to write/think about that day.
