THIRTY ONE

 August 1-August 9 2021

Trigger Warning: Suicide. This post is heavy and sad so skip it if you need to. 

On Sunday August 1st I got the tragic news that my Dad had passed away, he had taken his own life. This has been the most shocking, horrible thing to ever happen to our family. My dad was always our steady, rational, strong one. We are heartbroken over his loss, especially to lose him in this devastating manner. We still have so many questions that will never be answered. He leaves such a hole in our lives and will be forever missed until we are reunited with him someday.

In sharing how my dad died, I want to raise awareness and end the shame and stigma surrounding suicide, however, I always want it to be known, especially to my children (who I primary write this blog for) that my Dad was so much more than how he died. He was funny, he was hard working and dependable, he served people and taught us to serve also. He had a testimony of the gospel and lived up to what he believed. He and I were a lot alike and so much of who I am comes from him. Here is a post I wrote about him on Instagram. 

 I was always a daddy’s girl since I was a baby and he and I were a lot alike. He is the one who taught me to love nature by taking me fishing and hunting and teaching me to identify plants and animals. He was a great Dad and he loved being a Grandpa. I thought we had so many more years left. There was so much more wisdom I wanted to learn from him. It’s heartbreaking to lose him like this, but I know he’s going to be watching over us until we meet again. 💔

That first week is a blur. Definitely the worst week of my life as the waves of grief washed over me frequently as I tried to wrap my head around what had happened. I couldn't eat or sleep well. On Monday morning I took Moses and headed down to my parents house to help plan the funeral. Leland was able to take the week off work to watch the kids while I planned the funeral. 

I had recently read the book Being Mortal by Atul Gawande, so I actually had thought of how things would be as my parents aged and passed away. However, I thought I had many many years before those things happened. My dad was only 50. He had so much more life to live. My dad was only 22 when I was born, and since  I had my first child at 20, he should have had so many years being a young, fun grandpa. It's just heartbreaking and tragic.

 The funeral ended up being nice. I think it was how my dad would have wanted it. I never realized how much goes into a funeral, or how it feels to grieve such a loss. I had imagined it but never experienced it myself. I hope if anything comes from this experience it's that I can be understanding and empathetic to people in my life who go through similar losses. 

It's only been a month, but already the shock has started to wear off and the loss has started to sink in. It's feels like it's a new part of me that I will always carry with me. I don't really have anything profound to say about losing my dad. It's just so hard and sad.  It has made me so dedicated to taking care of my own mental health, and in doing all  I can to ensure my children are healthy, both mentally and physically, even when it goes against the grain or people might judge me for it, I am going to make sure that we all always have access to whatever help we need and cut anything out of our lives that isn't serving our health.