As Father’s Day approached, my dad would call and ask “What did you get me for Father’s Day?” 

He thought he was being funny and clever — especially since my birthday is right around Father’s Day. But to me it was a painful, mocking, in-your-face question, because he could be hit-or-miss about my birthday. 

Or, he’d remember and promise a gift that never came, when truly what I really wanted was some of his devoted time and attention.

These days leading up to Father’s Day are still bittersweet and loaded for me. 

I want to be sure the good, solid and caring, reliable men in my life — my husband, my stepfather, my father-in-law — feel special, honored and appreciated. Our families, our communities and our society all need good, honest, reliable, caring men.

And I want to honor my dad’s memory — by sharing the lessons of our relationship and how we made peace, with hope that it will help other people. 

Telling the Truth

Shopping for a Father’s Day card into my 30s was stressful because they all say really nice things. Like “Thanks for always being there” and “I have the best dad.” 

My dad was always a different kind of dad than the ideal one described in the greeting cards and on the TV commercials around Father’s Day.

He’d cheated on our families and left the heavy lifting of raising and supporting his two daughters to his ex-wives, our moms. That’s the truth. As a kid, I was entitled to my anger at him.

As adults, we can see a fuller, more honest picture of our parents as real, flawed human beings. We can’t change them. 

But we can choose compassion, to forgive, and to heal. Not necessarily for them — but for us.

I know this isn’t possible for everyone. Self-preservation is paramount. You must do what you feel is best for your own emotional health.

Still — my wish is to inspire people to do whatever they can to heal their own family estrangements and complicated relationships whenever possible.

Is there some way to make it better? A small step toward a healthier relationship?

My decision was worth the trouble. I often think of my dad, and feel peace.

“Willing to Rebuild … You?”

By June 1996 — as Father’s Day approached — I was an adult about to turn 26, and decided to stop punishing my dad. By then, we’d had our first real, honest, heart-to-heart conversation. I could see his own pain, and I knew that his insensitive, edge-y jokes reflected the way his parents and older brother talked and tried to shock each other into laughter.

So I did something different than buy a funny Father’s Day card with some fishing or golf cliché that didn’t really say much of anything. 

I sent a little gift book from the bookshop in my office building and a blank card with a handwritten, personal message pledging that I was willing to work on rebuilding our relationship, if he was. 

He was. He did. He took it to heart and tried and worked at it. 

We enjoyed a pretty good, relatively healthy father-daughter relationship for the 17 years until he died. 

It didn’t match the father-daughter clichés. I never felt like a princess. What we re-built was much better. I said exactly what I was thinking and feeling to him. I think he did the same. It was real, true and loving.  

He was there to help when I bought my first house, and to walk me to a waiting groom on my wedding day. When the end of that marriage was fresh and raw — and I melted down just looking for a tool in the basement — my dad was standing there to simply hold his arms open and let me sob and blubber against his chest. 

He didn’t say a word — Thank God! That’s exactly what I needed.

When he emerged from two weeks in a medical coma, he was disoriented and confused and certain he had been in a car crash and had brain damage. Neither was true. He could not process the details of what all happened after his appendix ruptured. The fiery car crash he had dreamed about was so much more real to him. 

I looked him straight in the eyes and said: “Would I bullshit you?” 

He shook his head no. I told him he was not brain-damaged, that it was the medications. He would be just fine. I’m not sure he believed me — but he hopefully felt some comfort.

We can’t fix it. But we can often make it a little better — and with grace that may help turn things around.

I’m grateful for the wisdom of that 1996 decision — and grateful my dad cared enough, and was still around to work at it. I know not everyone gets that. We were both better off because we patched it up. I believe it led me to a healthier, more whole and peaceful life, and was well worth the effort.

Sticking Around

This week, I’ve been listening to and transcribing the recording of a conversation with my dad’s brother from 2014.

He, too, like my dad, had a child in 1970 with his first wife, and then soon divorced. When that marriage ended, my uncle moved 3,000 miles away, and a few years later surrendered his parental rights to his son so that the little boy could be adopted by his stepfather.

My uncle spoke about his decisions as openly as he could. He agreed to my questions and recording the conversation, knowing there could someday be a book.

He spoke warmly of seeing his newborn son for the first time, and explained his decision to move away. He felt he needed a clean break. He thought his child would have a better life without him. 

My uncle spoke of his guilt over trying to re-connect 40 years later, and wanting to see his biological son, now a man with a family of his own.

I feel his pain and regret on that recording. It’s palpable to me. 

My uncle has since died.

I hope it all worked out for the best — that my lost cousin indeed had a better life with his mom and stepfather — that my dad and I had a different path that helped us grow into better people together and on our own.

If I could send a Father’s Day card to my dad now, I’d still write my own message:

Thank you for loving me. Thank you for sticking around. Thanks for never letting go, and working hard to rebuild. Thanks for doing the best you could. It was enough. It was plenty.