Well to start off, if you have found yourself here unsure what this blog is about I urge you to read my about page before reading this page because I’m going to dive right in.

Three years ago I, like every other young woman in the world, started a blog.  The title of it was “A Peek into my Thoughts” and the description was literally something like, “a blog about nothing specific.”  If that doesn’t tell you where I was at in life at the time, I don’t know what will.  I started that blog because I was home for the summer from College working a job that didn’t fulfill much, except for my time and I somehow thought that people would be interested in what I had to say.  I wrote probably three posts and decided that I was sharing way too much information about things that were really personal.

I think of myself as a private person (aside from the amount of pictures I share with the world via Social Media… but as far as personal matters, I’m pretty private).  After these three personal posts about some emotions and experiences that I had never even talked about with my closest friends and family I think I got a little insecure about being so vulnerable.

How I would blog was I would just sit down at my computer and start typing.  I would literally sift through my thoughts as I was clicking keys, proof read it to make sure I didn’t skip any words and then post it to the public.  If you know me that is NOT like me.  I’m careful with what I share with people.  It was kind of unheard of for me to just blab away and let all of my family and friends dive right into my most inner thoughts.

People like my mom, dad and sister really enjoyed the short-lived blog.  This is proof that I actually am pretty private, they were hearing this stuff for the first time.  Now, looking back I really wish that I would have kept these blog posts and the blog and I wish I would have kept blogging.

Three years later I’ve graduated College, I’m half way through grad school, unsure of whether I made the right choice in paths, and most importantly and traumatically, I’m without a father.  Looking back at the topics of those three blog posts makes me almost laugh at myself.  I was dealing with some other form of heartbreak that is totally and completely incomparable to the kind of heartbreak that I’ve felt in the past couple of months and that I am constantly feeling… and yet I thought it was all so crucial.  Then again, I’ve never felt pain like the pain I have felt in the last couple months so nothing really seems too crucial to me lately.

Losing my father is far more painful than I had ever even imagined or prepared myself for.  Having him been diagnosed with cancer six and a half years ago, in the early spring of 2007, it sounds morbid but I had thought about this happening.  It wasn’t always in the back of my mind but him passing wasn’t a complete shock in the sense that he had a disease inside of him for almost seven years that we all knew and lived with everyday.

Through all of the thoughts I had about the disease taking his life eventually, I never thought it all the way through.  I’m in no way saying that when I would think about it, I wouldn’t get sad.  I spent plenty of nights crying about the thought of him being gone, but it was a coping mechanism that I didn’t even realize my mind maneuvered.  It was almost as if a little person was controlling my thoughts and he or she wouldn’t let me wander too far into the reality of it all.  This little friend of mine always stopped my thought process before it got to what life would really be like without him, how it would feel to have him be gone and have to keep going.

I never prepared myself for how I would feel standing in front of his side of the bathroom, looking at his sink just how he had left it when he went in to the hospital for the last time… his mouth wash, his razor, his cologne—everything.  Sitting so still and even though that moment in time was only a few months ago, the memory seems opaque.  My memories of the week he was in the hospital and almost the entire month following all have this film over them.  Everything seems dusty and almost antique like.  My imagination brings me to think that this was him kicking up dirt peeling out on his way down to Mexico as fast as he could press the gas.  Maybe it was his way of shading my eyes from the rawness of all the pain hovering over me.  It may also have been that my eyes were pretty persistent in keeping themselves filled with tears, making life a little blurry in general.

What is clear is that no matter how you think you can prepare yourself for situations like this, you’re never prepared.  There is no way to prepare for something like this.  Mike Tyson said it best, “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.”  I think that quote is perfect.  When something traumatic happens the only way to get past it is to just simply go through it.  Experience the pain, grief, loss, heartache, anger, longing and whatever other feelings that come flying out….. acknowledge them and just simply feel them.

I’ve recently been told that the most important thing in going through something this emotionally intense is talking about what you’re feeling and what you’re going through.  I have had a huge problem with communicating my feelings in the past (So I’ve been told.. blah blah blah) so I want to make sure I’m dealing with my grief the right way and I don’t become some locked vault with explosive emotional material inside.  I’m writing this blog to document my trip through Spain but I’m also hopping that it helps me organize out my thoughts and feelings about my father’s death and helps me somehow move forward, bringing him with me in everyday.