My father's passing.

I arrived home (Qatar) from Europe, and learned via free wifi in the airport that my father, who has been in hospice care, passed away in his sleep. I've been living overseas for a year, so I'd facetimed him once in a while, but his ability to even remember that I was overseas was impaired.

I'd just gotten home with my family after a month vacation in Europe, paid for with a stipend from work. After an all night flight I checked my email, found out the news in the airport, and turned around and took a 30-hour trip to Utah, spending about ten hours in Philly.

I can't feel anything yet, but I imagine the funeral will take care of that little problem.

I need a book on how to cope with losing a parent.

Sorry for your loss, pls accept my sincerest condolences.

So sorry to hear about your loss. If you find a good book please share.

We had the memorial service in Tennessee for my dad a few weeks ago. He fell, broke his femur and caused a hairline fracture in his hip. When he got to the hospital they gave him too much morphine and stopped his heart. They revived him with cpr.

I went down the following Monday since they were supposed to perform surgery to repair the leg and the possibility was there that he would not survive the surgery. For various reasons they did not perform the surgery. I stayed till Thursday when my sisters, mother, and I decided he should be moved to hospice.

I wasn't sure how long he was going to be in hospice so decided to drive home to Indiana that night since I was missing my wife and kids. When I got to my house my wife informed me he had passed away while I was driving home.

My dad was pretty out of it the whole time I was there. I did get a smile from him Tuesday when I told him he had to recover enough for me to take him to the new Planet of the Apes film since he took me to the original back in the 60's.

He had been living on borrowed time for decades. He was an ironworker and survived an accident in Georgia with two broken legs that killed one of his coworkers. Since then heart attacks, strokes, bypasses, the loss of part of his leg from diabetes, and about two years ago a broken hip. But it is still hard to believe he is gone.

He didn't want a big, fancy funeral so we donated what organs could be used and had him cremated. Then a few Sundays ago my family and I travelled back down to Tennessee, to the farm where I grew up at from 1976 till I left for college and my mom and dad still lived at. We had a short ceremony where friends and family remembered and shared stories about my dad. Then my daughter and one of her cousins flew over the farm in the plane of one of my dads fiends and they spread his ashes. Then we had a catered dinner for everybody.

I would not be the man I am today without my father. My love of science fiction, military history, movies, and politics all come from him.

My deepest condolences. I also wish there was a book for dealing with such a loss. I lost my dad in February to cancer. You cope but accepting the loss sometimes can be difficult, especially when doing things on life that you associate strongly with him. For me, playing tennis or doing home repairs occasionally force me to choke back tears.

Sorry to hear it, brother. Went through it myself almost 3 years ago. There's no book, but you can simply go to McDonald's and watch everyone drinking their drinks to get the idea: Total suckage.

Over the next 2 months you'll have a lifetime of shit to process. Every nasty thing you said in frustration will become overblown in your head. Ignore that shit if you can, that's just your brain processing grief.

I'd say it gets easier, but I'd be lying. It's more like you form a scab, short term, that you pick at and cause yourself pain (processing) which eventually becomes a scar...the fire-poker pain changes to more of a dull throb from time to time, like a bad knee that hurts in the rain.

Best I can offer you, and I am truly sorry you have to (or anyone has to) go through losing a parent. Shit sucks.

Baruch ha Dayan emet. I am so sorry for your loss.

The only book I have read on the topic is THE JEWISH WAY IN DEATH AND MOURNING, which is not super germane for you all. It spends a lot of time on traditions like rending garments and shiva, but the chapters on grief and death are universal if you are casting about. Jewish tradition also doesn't have a lot of eschatology, so the guidance is not steeped in Afterlife 101 as it often is from Christian clergy. That said, clergy, generically, can help with this topic, be they priest, reverend, rabbi, imam, whatever. They deal with this a lot and have kind words regardless of your faith or lack thereof.

One thing I try to keep in mind is that mourning, the memorials, and all that aren't for your Dad. They are for you. If you are not getting what you need from them, then don't feel obliged to everyone else to participate. If driving your car on Dad's old routes does the trick--do that. If working on the deck is your thing--do that. Some folks light candles, some folks get ripped. You need to figure what works for you. That's the main thrust of that book: Death is a night between two days. You are going to come out of this, and like yesterday was not today, these two times will be different--but similar.

My best to you and yours.

Thanks all for the kind and helpful words and stories.

Unfortunately, I don't have any words of wisdom or suggestions.

I can only offer your family in our thoughts and prayers.

(And that goes for you other fellas as well. I didn't realize there was so much loss recently.)

Likewise, my condolences, craniac (and everyone in this thread.)

I asked a friend who recently lost her father and she recommended this: www.amazon.com/Grieving-Death-Father-Har...rds=loss+of+a+father

It's just a collection of stories from other people about their experiences, but she said it was good to read about others' having gone through the same thing (kinda like this thread.)

I'm sorry for your loss.

But I'm happy to see others supporting you so very well!

Craniac, I'm so sorry for your loss.

For most people in this world family is everything. Losing anyone you're that close with is one of the hardest things to go through. Family is what gets you through it.
My thoughts and prayers go out to you and your family.

My condolences to everyone else in the thread that have recently lost a loved one.

Sorry for your loss. I lost my dad 25 years ago, miss him a bunch. I'm thankful for all the times I got to spend with him and cherish all those memories. I'm sure you'll be doing the same in the years to come.

Hang in there during this tough time.

Thoughts and prayers with you for this. Jeb's got the right idea, I think. Grieving is something that we don't often like to mess with, because there's no blueprint for how it goes. I hope you'll be able to find a way to make some peace with it, however necessary.

Being away makes these kinds of things really hard. When I was a kid we lived in the Middle East for a four year stretch. My mom's sister-in-law passed away from breast cancer while we were gone. Even when I first moved out to Kansas City, I couldn't really be around when a cousin lost his battle with brain cancer. There's a real feeling of helplessness when those things happen, because you can't grieve alongside any of the rest of your family.

Those are obviously different situations, but my point is that not being around for this kind of thing made it harder for me to work through them. Not sure if you're experiencing anything similar to that, but that was my experience.

I had a similar experience 9 years ago. I just went with the flow. Don't even think on how you should react. Just be yourself.

My prayer with your family.

I'm really sorry to hear that, Mark. Condolences to your and your family. I'm afraid I don't have any advice for you. My dad is 73 and has Parkinson's Disease and is deteriorating fast. I keep steeling myself for the inevitable, but who knows when it's going to happen. I'm going back home to Iowa next week to pick up a car and drive it back to Texas. I'll definitely be giving the old man an extra hug before I go.