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today marks a year of missing my dad’s warmth and feeling a lifetime of gratitude that we got to overlap in our time on this planet & even better, that he will always be my dad 
dominant feelings in the last year:
- longing (i would do *anything* for another hug and to tell him everything that happened in the last year)
- longing (i would do *anything* for another hug and to tell him everything that happened in the last year)
- sadness (that so many of my memories involve him struggling to breathe, all the life events ahead that he won’t be part of, and the awareness that i’ve known this for most of my life...my 11:11 wish for years as a kid was for dad to be okay & is still my automatic thought 
)
)
- anger (at the decade+ of COPD and anticipating his death, but mostly at the excruciating & unnecessary pain he experienced in the last 2 weeks of his life)
- guilt (that i was so far from my family for college & that i couldn’t be there for my mom in the way i wanted in the last year — everything was so raw that i could barely handle myself)
- gratitude (to grief friends, mostly from twitter(!!), who showed up in a big way in the last year & helped me to see that there was still life ahead (
@jacasiegel) + @ZJAyres for giving me space to process & write about my experience)
@jacasiegel) + @ZJAyres for giving me space to process & write about my experience)
- despair & loss of confidence (everything i did before this year was with his unwavering, vocal support behind me — that was the part of the loss that i didn’t anticipate & has been surprisingly difficult to maintain my sense of self-worth and confidence)
i don’t have a way to end this thread other than to say: i know i’m not the only one processing a major loss in the past year.
i hope that anyone else grappling with a profound loss (& all the changes/emotions that come with it) can feel a little less alone in the experience
i hope that anyone else grappling with a profound loss (& all the changes/emotions that come with it) can feel a little less alone in the experience
