Dad Died, and I Don't Miss Him At All

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This may have nothing to do with Autism, but I don't know.

My dad died a couple months ago, and the time since has been "wonderful" by comparison to when he was alive. I think I should feel horrible about feeling this way, but I don't...except I do feel conflicted by the lack of compassion.

Dad and I were never "close." We were different people. We never had the father/son relationship that I would have liked. I know he tried to do his best, and a lot of "bad" things he did were done with good intentions. No matter what, he was there for me when he could have done like some and written me off at 18 when he was no longer legally obligated to support me.

Years ago, I realized I had to either cut him out of my life entirely or accept him for who he was and not expect him to be the "ideal" father. I chose to accept him as he was.

In the later years, after a stroke left him somewhat disabled, his dour mood over his loss of independence made him more grumpy and miserable to be around than before. Sometimes he said hateful things with no thought of who would hear it. Several times he said words to the effect of, "If I had to do it again, I would never have gotten married and had kids." Mom and dad had stuck it out for just over 50 years when he died.

His demise was somewhat expected, so there was no sadness or grieving when he passed. If anything I was wondering when it was finally going to happen, that trip to the ER where he didn't make it home.

Still, I feel I should miss him, and I don't.

I sometimes think about visiting his grave and saying, "I'm sorry I was such a disappointment to you as a son," or asking, "Why wasn't I good enough the way I was made?" I know he had high expectations and hopes for my sister and I, and we both fell way short, but that he frequently wished that we never existed. Those words may not have reflected how he felt ALL the time, but it was something he harbored within...the regret that marriage and family was a mistake...not a blessing.

Love isn't a feeling...it's a choice. I chose to love him and stay by him no matter how ugly it got (and it was near the breaking point at the end). Still, I wish I could say I felt "love" for him...but I don't, and it seems wrong.

If you don't feel it, you don't feel it, there's nothing you can do about that, so don't fret over it. You certainly respected him for what he did for you and in all honesty that respect was probably more important to him than love, being an elderly male and all.

Two years ago my precious lil "mom" got a stroke. Coma six months. Dropped dead

At her funeral. Eulogy made her sound perfect. Like an angel



What they said was not factually incorrect. But grossly incomplete.

Nobody talked about how she had the nerve to ask me "why did you cut your hair?". Because at that time she was homophobic. (Later she came around)



Nobody said she compared me unfavorably to other children and made me feel morally inferior

But whatever

It was a eulogy

"Eu" as in good

Not a court trial

And court trials could be biased too. Judges and juries have their own biases. It matters who the lawyer is. Rich defendants can afford expensive lawyers

It was not a PubMed controlled experiment








To her credit she did not physically or sexually abuse me. And she worked full time. Did not do drugs, go to jail etc.

And she sent my sister and me to undergraduate college.

And she went from not having a GED when she was 35 to getting a BA age. 50

That was all correct

But what about the bad and the ugly ?

She blamed me for school bullying

She had the nerve to tell me that she would strike me for dropping a banana







She told me off, enthusiastically, numerous times. For my then undiagnosed autism symptoms

And failure to attend to a special education need is a Child Protective services violation

My dad died seven years ago, after a long period of gradually worsening health, so we always knew it was coming.

I didn't feel any sense of loss at the time, probably for similar reasons, i.e. that we knew it was coming and that caring for him was taxing especially on my mum. The first I knew of it was my mum coming in to tell me while I was laying in bed on a lazy summer day, and my reaction was along the lines of "oh" followed by a long solemn silence.

Over the next few days before we'd even sorted the funeral arrangements I was rearranging things in the house in ways that I knew I'd be able to do once he was no longer here, without even thinking about it - he often said things along the lines of "you can do what you like when I'm gone" and maybe I took that a bit too literally. Feeling bad about doing that in a hurry came later.

As the years have passed since it's changed to a more, respectful feeling I suppose, there are a few photos of him dotted around the house walls and I always smile when I see them now, and think of the happy moments from before his health deteriorated. So I feel I've made up for my initial (lack of) feelings by now and no longer feel bad about it.

TL;DR if your experience is anything like mine, you might not feel anything to start with and you might feel bad about that, but you should feel gradually better and more relaxed about it as time goes on.

My belief is that whatever a person is feeling or not feeling, it is what it is, and it's right for them.

Nobody has the right to second-guess their reaction or lack thereof, or make them feel they should be feeling something else -- whether that be to feel more, to feel less, or to feel nothing.

What and who you are, and what you find yourself experiencing about anything at all in life, belongs to you, and is nobody's business but yours.

The only requirement is to try to maintain respect for others who may be different.

My FIL treated my husband about the same way (and frankly treated me like s**t) (and I don't even want to go into how he treated our son).

We also made the choice to do our best to love him.

Not too many tears here, either. A lot of damage to clean up. Not too many tears.

Don't beat yourself up. You feel what you feel; there's nothing wrong with being relieved that a difficult job has come to an end.