Say the Thing: How Does a Gay Man Grieve a Father Who Didn’t Love Him?
Maybe by being the adult in the room and changing the cycle, with love.
This is the fourth and final piece in my Say the Thing series. In part one, I came out to a father who never really saw me. In part two, I wrestled with the fallout of sharing that truth publicly. Part three was a celebration of the chosen family I’ve built with my own hands. And now, part four. The hardest one. The one that asks: how do you mourn someone who never met you where you lived? This is what it means to grieve without a map.
How in the hell do I write a eulogy and obituary for a father who I’m not even sure really liked me? That’s the thought that shot through my head a few days after my dad had passed away.
I still have so much to do…
Call the funeral home
Talk cremation
Life Banc still needs paperwork about organ donation
Mom hasn’t spoken in 24 hours
There was a lot to do and take care of, and I was the adult in the room. There was no time to consider my relationship with Dad. Right now, someone needs to do the things that hurt to do. Except it won’t hurt me. Not because I’m strong — but because I’ve been trained like a fucking show pony from the age of 6 to be the “adult in the room.”
The first time I had to put a passed-out parent to bed, I was six. Mom hadn’t made it up the stairs after their friends left. I knew it was bad — the tall bottles were out, and the house reeked of smoke.
So, I did what any responsible 6-year-old-going-on-30 would do.
Woke her, got her water, and got her to bed.
Got myself quietly tucked in like a big boy.
I did good.
This is a pattern that would repeat itself continuously throughout my life.
Sometimes revolving around loved ones using drugs and alcohol.
Sometimes it was people needing someone to be strong. It was always me.
When I was 15, my Mom’s brother was hit by a car at Kamm’s Corners in Cleveland. He was a transient. Mom didn’t even know he remembered her number. He wasn’t going to live — he’d slipped into a coma. Why are comas always “slippery?” They needed her to come sign papers to take him off life support. She was falling apart. My dad refused to go.
So, I did.
I hadn’t seen my uncle in 11 years or so. Hell, I wasn’t even supposed to call him my uncle. I went as Mom’s emotional support. Because someone had to. Someone had to be the rock after she signed the papers. I’ll never forget the noise my mother made when she saw the machines that were breathing for him get turned off … because I heard her make it again when the same thing happened with Dad.
My mind had drifted… Dad’s obituary and eulogy. It wasn’t going to write itself. Of course it wouldn’t… because even in death someone was going to have to clean up after him.
I hadn’t cried.
I didn’t wail.
I didn’t gnash my teeth or look up into the sky.
…how does one even “gnash” their teeth? I should look that word up…
I wasn’t really grieving. I mean… the counselor part of my brain told me that I was actually grieving. But I was grieving a blank space. Not the loss of my partner of 50 years like Mom. Or the loss of my very best friend like my sister. This man had never looked past my surface.
… because he couldn’t stand it.
My father may have been able to guess my favorite color. But he wouldn’t have been able to tell me a single name of one of my queer “bar kids,” despite having heard the names. And he wouldn’t have been able to name either of the leather title contests I’d won despite the experiences being so incredibly life changing.
The man didn’t know ME. How the hell do I mourn HIM?
I did the right thing. I stood in front of my father’s family, friends, co-workers and others who came to his Celebration of Life, and I delivered his eulogy. I told a room full of people that he was great. Not because he’d been great to me… but because necessity demanded that someone be the adult in the room. Especially after having made all the arrangements myself, singlehanded.
I used to imagine that he’d write me a letter. Something utterly unlike him… to help express the feelings he’d never said aloud. Something simple.
“I didn’t understand you, but I’m proud of you. You did well. Not just professionally, but as a fellow human.”
That letter never came. That man never existed.
And yet I stood there and smiled and relayed to the crowd the few happy memories I could come up with. I carried that shit like china through a minefield.
I told the stories. I honored the legacy.
Because I thought it was my job.
Because that’s what love dictated, right?
…right?
This is why I didn’t get a childhood… right?
This is why I had to be the third parent to my sister… right?
This is why every lesson I had to learn was the hard way… right?
This is why I deserved to get hit… RIGHT?
This is why I got spoken to like a misbehaved, mongrel pest… RIGHT?!
Boys get tough love, and then they love their dads back even harder, because that’s how it’s supposed to go… so what the fuck is wrong with ME?! Why am I not following the examples of my father and his father and my cousins and my uncles? Why can’t I enjoy sitting down and drinking a beer and listening to Steely Dan with the man I call Dad?
Because he never gave me a fucking blueprint. He gave me silence and shame. He gave me a rulebook in which I was always offsides. See — that’s how pissed off I am… a football reference, and I don’t even know football.
…and there’s the humor… where it shouldn’t be. Because in the moments where the pain does land, and my armor is compromised, I was always good at making people laugh. Laughter covers up the tears. A giggle is a good excuse to change subjects. To make a daring escape.
Robin Williams understood this, I think.
So… I improvised.
I built love from scratch. I studied tenderness and empathy like they were a foreign language. I learned how to show up for people because, more than anything in the whole God damned world, that’s what I had always wanted. Someone to show-the-fuck-up. Not because that’s what he taught me… but because he didn’t.
And maybe that’s the legacy I’ll carry on. Not his laugh. Not his music. Not the condescending way he’d talk to people.
But this: I will be nothing like him. And in that way, maybe he finally gave me something.
My kids don’t share my blood.
But they share my heart.
…
I’ve shown my kids what a man can be. Strong, but tender. Ready to dole out tough love and still squeal like a schoolgirl when the hot guy calls them back (and I promise, I’m a world class squealer). Fathers can care about WHO you are, what makes you tick, and how those things affect you on an emotional level. And then still help you on how to buy your first car, get your first big-boy job, and how to start the house-buying process.
When my Dad died, my chosen family showed-the-fuck-up. I had drag queens rolling their eyes when I said I was fine. I had go-go boys offering to bring me dinner. I had leather titleholders willing to just sit with me without trying to “fix” what was happening.
I was allowed to be angry and scream instead of cry. Bitch instead of reminiscing. Fume instead of smile. Because that’s the mourning I needed.
And for once… no one needed me to be “the adult in the room.”
I don’t need to rewrite him.
I don’t need to excuse the things he couldn’t say or couldn’t be.
I’ve stopped waiting for the apology — not because I’ve made peace with him, but because I’ve made peace with me.
Grief doesn’t always sound like crying.
Sometimes, it sounds like exhaustion.
Like relief.
Like silence.
And maybe the softest, bravest thing I can do now… is breathe.
I survived the silence. I built the family. I said the thing.
I buried the man who never saw me.
I was strong enough to hurt.
Now I’m strong enough to heal.
