Losing my dad to mental illness

I’ve spent the last 19 years living without a dad.

Oh, he’s out there. He’s still alive.

He just refused to admit that he had mental health issues. And they spiraled out of control. Turned him into someone hateful, spiteful, abusive, narcissistic.

There is no father left in him. And he doesn’t want to be one to me anymore, anyway.

So that’s one reason why I want everyone to deal with their baggage: I know the pain of losing someone who chooses not to.

My entire family broke up because of unhealed baggage. My Thanksgiving table now has only two people; it used to have 20. Christmases are pretty quiet. Birthdays? Same.

Emotional baggage drives people apart. BUT IT DOESN’T NEED TO.

Please—if you have any unhealed wound, any trigger, any grumpiness, any tendency to avoid looking at problems—on behalf of the people who get hurt by that every single day, do something about it.

I promise, it feels better once it’s healed.

And then maybe your daughter, or your mother, or your brother, wife, cousin, best friend, soul mate won’t have to be gutted when they lose you. Like I was when I lost my dad.

~ Jen