Thoughts, Feelings & Everything Else

| To The Father I Once Knew |

 I know you aren't him, I know you don't know yourself anymore the way I did, and I want to say it's okay but I know it's not because I know you're not, you are no longer you ; The you I knew.

 Even though you only glanced and nodded as little me proudly showed off my tests with good marks and stickers to you , Just the smile made me the happiest little kid in the world. To me it meant you were proud, to me it meant you knew I was trying, I was trying hard to make you proud and it was only then that making you proud was my greatest achievement.

 When I was eight or nine, I remember waking up from a nap, mom was at work and you stayed home with me because I was sick, you missed work for me. When I was a child I never understood how much that should've meant, but thinking of it now it gives me reassurance that at least back then you cared enough to make the sacrifice.  

 I had woken up and the house was silent enough to hear a feather hitting the ground, I went downstairs and you were gone, I ran outside and stood crying for what felt like ages to a child. You came back eventually, you hugged me and I felt safe again; Now I am seventeen, and when I wake up and it's quiet I still cry for ages, only this time it is because of nightmares that feel too real to shake off, this time I know you won't be back to hug me and tell me everything will be okay. 

 The time when we had a water fight inside the house, and the look on moms face when you got water all over the kitchen walls never fails to bring a smile to my face, those were the good times when addiction had not infected you.

 When a parasite latches onto a host, in order to cure the host we remove it, but once you allowed the parasite of drugs, alcohol, and infidelity in, there was no removing it. This parasite latched on with no intention of letting go, it destroyed the man I knew and loved deeply, and the only one that had to let go was me. 

 The times you saved me from being hit or yelled at, the times I couldn't fall asleep until only you said goodnight to me and kissed my forehead, the times you held me as I cried, gave me love, the times before the lies, deception, and before you lost yourself, I had to let go of all of it. 

 I had a hard time doing it then, I found it easier to blame myself, to draw the blade against my skin, to not want to live anymore, It was easier to do this instead of excepting the man I once called my father no longer looked at me with love in his eyes. He had lost himself so much that his number one priority was no longer me but going out on Friday nights and coming home barely able to walk, Taking money from whoever he could get it from to fuel the addiction, that was now at the top of the list, and everyone around him payed the price. 

 College and university is one thing every student must face, or at least think about and parents must also, except you didn't think about it, you didn't think about it when you handed the money for my future off to someone who you never saw again, or maybe you did, but you didn't care, you let your body and your selfishness govern that decision and now at 17 I still pay the price, I am now faced with uncertainty of whether I will get the future I have worked so hard for or not.

 The funny thing is you weren't always like this, you were once happy, you had everything, and yet you still didn't think it was enough, was I not enough ?

 This is what I thought of, this is what thoughts you gave to a young adult who didn't even acknowledge the budding depression and anxiety to be diagnosed in the future.

 Mom kept me safe, she kept the truth from me to keep me happy and keep you looking good, truth is I really wish she didn't. She wanted you in my good graces, so I still had a father, but I'd rather not have one than have you, little did I know that when I lost you when you separated it wasn't when I really lost you. The second you took the first sip, the first hit, the first line, that was the beginning of you loosing yourself, and loosing me in the process, I just didn't know it yet.

 I fought for you, I cried to mom to beg her to keep believing you could get better because I wanted so badly to believe that I was enough to bring you back, I mean how could I not be I was your only child, but like I said, a parasite infects and this one didn't let go, nothing could change that, not even me. 

 Things have changed.

 To the father I once knew, I miss you, I miss watching Nemo with you and playing with your spikey hair until you were annoyed, I miss your smile, your laugh; I'd give anything to see that warm smile again, or to feel the safety I once did being in your arms, I'd give anything in the world to wake up to you cooking eggs and bragging about how you were learning to cook better than mom, but I know this is a fantasy that I must let go of.

 I have to let go of you, because the father I once knew is just that, someone I once knew, someone who is no longer there.

 What is here is only the shell of the man I once proudly called my father.

 I am grown up now, and I now know that it's not my fault, and I'm not missing anything, you are.

 When I graduate I'll walk down that stage with a gown that will probably be too big on me because you gave me short genes, and I'll walk down it with the biggest smile, knowing I did this, I got here, and I did it with no help from you because the truth is I didn't need anything from you. 

 You will miss me graduating, my first day of college, when I get married to the love of my life who you'll most likely never get to see either (he's pretty damn great), You'll never get to help me move into my first apartment, or meet your grandkids, spend holidays with them

 You will miss all these things. You have made your choice 

and this is me not caring, because I'm letting go, I had to at one point and as I write this at nearly eleven at night I am.

 Goodbye dad.