its been two years.....two years of wanting to call you and tell you things, two years of amazing things that have happened and I can't tell you, no phone calls or visits no hugs or kisses.  We miss you dad we miss you every day, I know one day we will meet again and until then I'm glad your watching over us. Love you forever and always. Your loving daughter. 

Dear Dad, 

 June 29th 4:56am 

 Salt. All I can remember was the overwhelming salty taste of tears. I’ve always hated that taste but anything tasted better than the dryness that consumed my mouth from the dehydration. It happened like you see in the movies, strangers came up, asking if I needed anything; it felt strange so I refused even though it felt like I had no water left in my body from all the crying. Approximately 24 hours before the strangers, the dryness and the tears, I had no clue my life was about to change in the most dramatic way possible. I wondered what I would be doing right now if I weren’t there and that wasn’t happening. I wondered if I would be eating dinner with my family or at the gym. Everything felt like it was in slow motion but it felt like everything happened so fast at the same time. Words came at me fast but motions were slow. I knew a total of five people around me. My husband, 2 sisters and there husbands. I met so many people I’ll never speak to again. I got so many calls from family I hadn’t spoken to in months or even years. Can’t remember what was said but I remember I was touched. Every time I reach back into the deep dark corner of my memory I store that night in, it becomes more and more foggy. Faces get more grey and there’s a haze that covers the floor, and rises every time I think back. When I got there I was ushered into a room. A small waiting room, no TVs, just magazines. No one but my sister and I occupied the small room. Neither of us wanting to sit, because we were too anxious, planning out our next steps, figuring out how we were supposed to rebuild our lives after this day. After almost five minutes, which felt like eternity, my brother in law and husband came in and then the doctor said it was time to go see my Dad. All of the blood in my body drained. I was pale and felt faintly lightheaded, I didn’t know if I could even move. My brain couldn’t reach my feet to tell them to walk but somehow I did it anyway. The mindless moving of my feet, one in front of the other. I felt like a robot. I couldn’t reach my thoughts and my thoughts couldn’t reach me. I felt so weak, as if the building was crumbling down all around me, pebbles and boulders weighing me down and I couldn’t do anything except not understand why this is happening to us, of all people. We were good people, why did God choose me? Still putting one foot in front of the other, I couldn’t process the people talking at me. I couldn’t remember names and I couldn’t remember how to open my mouth and formulate a sentence. It felt like there was a force field around me shielding me from everything going on. I just wanted to get to where I was going and be there. I wanted to figure out how to fix everything that was happening. I wanted my boring life to be normal again. I wanted to go home and go to bed and wake up at 7:30 a.m. to get the kids ready for school the next day. I wanted to have a night like every other night I have had in my entire life, but unfortunately it wouldn’t change, no matter how many times I prayed, and wished, and begged. Finally getting to my destination I could barely catch my breath, it felt like I had just ran a mile, my heart was pounding and I can still remember not understanding why my chest was rising and falling so quick and deep. I couldn’t get enough air. I couldn’t breathe fast enough. I reached my destination, a place I never wanted to reach in my life, a place that no one ever wants to reach. As I walk I feel an entire tsunami of emotions ranging from confusion to anger to a deep, deep sadness that never really left my bones. As it crashed, it nearly knocked me over. It was another small room. I walked past the curtain to see my best friend, the man I looked up to the most, the person I most aspired to be in my life lying down, unconscious in a hospital bed that looked about two sizes too small. He looked uncomfortable. I was mad about that. So many things protruding from his body, needles, patches with wires, arm bands and probably the worst of all; the breathing tube. That was my least favourite. He looked so helpless. Things happened, people moved around quickly and then we were told there was nothing else could be done for him. I toke ahold of his rough, heavy hand, another tidal wave washes over me. The sadness finally swallows me whole as I choke out words. “I love you, and please don't leave us” I just remember rambling on, trying to make sure he knows how much he was loved by everyone in his life, not knowing whether or not he understood or if even heard me at all. Two years after that day I can still fully feel all these emotions. It hurts. I miss him every day. Until we meet again Dad I love you!!

There are days that I can deal with the pain.  When I remember that all he ever wanted for his children was for us to be happy, I realize that nothing would devastate him more than knowing that his death caused even a second of unhappiness.

But it hurts. My two older daughters were 7 and 5 before he died, but my youngest daughter was only 2 and will never know firsthand the depth of her grandpa's love for her. She will never feel the security of knowing that, other than her parents, there was a man who would move mountains for her. Of course, I can tell her stories, but a story can’t replace the feeling of his hugs or scruffy beard kisses on her cheek and forever giggling about it. It's been 18 months without you Dad and time hasn't healed anything. 

Forever and always Dad I love you ♡ 

It's been 600 days since I have seen your face. Having an emotional moment today Dad you've really been on my mind lately. May each tear and each fond memory be a note of love rising to meet you!! Until we meet again forever and always Dad I love you xo

You play it over and over in your mind it never goes away when you watch someone you love dearly take there finally breath. #missyoudearlyDad

Dear Dad: The nights are long and cold, the sun is hardly around. Christmas time is approaching in 21 days, and snow will soon cover the ground.

Yesterday you would have celebrated another birthday yesterday we would have been a family together celebrating you and all you were. Yesterday we would have heard you call us hunny. Yesterday we would have told funny stories and fond memories of the past...

But yesterday you were not here yesterday we never heard hunny or funny stories we were not together as a family we didn't get to celebrate you we did not get to celebrate your birthday.

Today we morn the loss of you today we sit back and remember all the great things. Today I wished for what you always wanted. Today I cried. Today I wished for my dad back.

I miss you more then words can Express I love you dad.

Till we meet again your loving daughter 

P.s. Your gonna be a grandpa again....and maybe a great grandpa I'm doing a surrogacy and your grandson might be having a baby!!!

Those who know its been a year since my father unexpectedly passed away.... So please excuse me if I have trouble getting through this, we miss him more than I can put into words on a daily basis, but even more so on my wedding day, when I know he would have loved to have walked me down the aisle like every girl dreams of. 

I wish I had 5 more minutes

One more time with him

To share a cup of coffee with him

And hear his voice again

I'd tell him that I loved him

And he would know how much I meant it

'Cause you can love a lifetime

In 5 more minutes....

Really....miss your face

Dear Dad:

These days I count how long you have been gone in milestones (4927.50 hours) , and now that my wedding is coming upon us in 133 days. I now wonder how can I possibly survive my wedding day without you by my side, smiling and laughing. Even though I can no longer hear your voice, I still see your face and I can feel your love. You’re still with me, in my laughter, my smile, my tears and in my writing.

Love never dies, it simply evolves.

Love forever and always,

Your daughter ♡

I've learned alot these past few months....I've learned that things don't always turn out the way that you planned, or the way you think they should. I've learned that there are things that go wrong that don't always get fixed or get put back together the way they were before. I've learned that some broken things stay broken, and I've learned that you can get through bad times and keep looking for better ones, as long as you have people who love you. Today I had a few moments of tears because the thought of our Dad not with us during Christmas made me choke up I miss him dearly. As we opened up our presents I wasn't prepared for this special gift that my sister had picked out for me it was very fitting to get the tears aflowing and has a special place up on my mantle close to my father's place of rest. I can't thank you enough Heidi Sturm I absolutely love it.

Dear Dad,

Dad ...its hard to believe you are in Heaven this year, spending your first Christmas season up there.

The nights are long and cold, the sun is hardly around.

Christmas time is approaching, and snow has covered the ground.

Trees and lights are twinkling, stockings are being hung.

The Christmas spirit is all around, as carols are being sung.

This year Christmas is not the same, just a yearly memory.

This house is not a home anymore, because you are not here with me.

There will be sadness; there will be tears when we wake up on Christmas day,

For this will be the first without you, oh how I wish heaven was just a mile away.

As we sit around the Christmas tree, emotions will be sad,

Gifts for them, gifts for me, but none of them will say DAD.

All I want for Christmas is to see your smiling face,

I know it cannot happen because you are in a better place.

Please...DAD ring a bell for me on Christmas day,

So I will know you got your wings and that you are ok.

I am not looking forward to Christmas, but I know it's something I have to live through.

I hope there is Christmas in heaven, because it is not the same here without you.

Forever and always Dad I love you.

It’s hard to believe it’s been almost 5 months since I said goodbye. The absence in my heart still yearns louder than ever. A missing piece, forever lost and irreplaceable. All that remains are memories. I grasp onto them with all my might, trying to savour each one. But as time trickles by like sand in an hourglass, so do the memories I have of you.

I still find it hard to look at photographs without feeling overwhelmed by sadness. I tread cautiously through a minefield of memories in fear of setting off an explosion of emotions. Every reminder of your absence too agonising. Picture perfect times wrap themselves around me with comforting arms, only to be broken by falling tears, shattering my reminiscences into tiny pieces.

And yet I long to keep your memory alive. I yearn to reminisce the times we shared, minus the heaviness in my heart and with only happy tears tickling the corners of my eyes.

I've been putting off writing this letter for weeks. I know writing these are too painful. But there are only so many excuses I can muster. There are only so many times I can busy myself or place fragments of reminiscences into boxes for rainy days.

Today, it only seems right to break open the box of memories that helped suture the hurt in my heart. As I sit clutching onto black and white flashbacks of days gone by, the heavens have unbuttoned and the rain crashes to the ground.

Dad, there isn’t a day that passes when I don’t think about you or wish you were still here. There isn’t a day that goes by when I don’t wish that monochrome memories will breathe life in a sea of colour and liveliness.

Our final goodbye.

I walked away in disbelief/fog that you were gone. In disbelief that I’d never see you again. The thought too unbearable to even contemplate.

People tell me that time goes on, but, to me, this is the saddest part. The thing is, for months I didn’t know how to grieve. I thought grief was an intense sadness that I could somehow push through and get past. I was wrong. Grief may change its form, but it is never ending. Like an ocean, it comes in ebbs and flows. Sometimes it is calm and soothing, other times the waves can be rough and overwhelming. A feeling of drowning in your own tears.

Although the months have passed, I still think about you every day. I still long for you to come back and fill the voids you left in our lives. The empty chair. The empty space. The emptiness in our hearts.

Your granddaughters look at your pictures everyday and tell me how much they miss you daily and it breaks me all over again.

As much as I would like to turn back time, I can’t. Life goes on and the hands of time can only move forward. Yes, you were taken too soon, but I feel incredibly honoured to call you my father. I feel privileged to hold pocketful’s of happy memories and to have spent 30 years of my life with you.

It’s true how we don’t see the true value in something until it becomes a memory. I used to worry that my memories of you will fade, but I have realised that what we have once enjoyed so deeply, we can never lose. Those times become a part of us, forever ingrained into our hearts.

I miss your smile, your voice, your sense of humour and wit.

I miss the way you made everything better.

But mostly, I miss you.

Forever thinking of you,

Your daughter ❤

As I travel through the forest of firsts and other challenging moments in the midst of my shock and sadness, I am forced to let go, one finger at a time.  For me, the milestones have been hard, but some of the most difficult things to get past so far for me have been the ones I didn’t see coming. 

The Flashback Moments. The first time I went to the hospital with Rui the same one with my dad and knowing he wouldn’t be coming back. In the public bathroom in the food court I almost had a panic attack when the flashback hit, and the unexpected flood of emotions that swept through me was shockingly debilitating.

The toughest of these Flashback Moments so far, though, was getting into my Dads vehicle the first time and he wasn't the one driving it. During all of these times, my mind is pulled back to another time.  Sometimes it is to a happy, healthy time, but more often it’s to darker days that let me know I am still heavily in the midst of grieving.

Then there are The Stinging Moments, those that rub salt into my wounds. The times when I am watching TV and the story line is one in which a character is dying. When I close my eyes to go to sleep at night and all I can picture is the image of my dad’s frailty at the end. The times when I’m searching for a contact on my phone and his name automatically pops up. Those are the times I keep forgetting to expect, the ones that leave me with a just-slapped feeling that I’m not sure will ever go away. 

The most frequently occurring difficult times for me since Dad went on ahead have been The Empty Chair  Moments, the ones in which I am startled again by his absence.  I think about him many times each day, I fall asleep with tears on my pillow almost every night, and I talk to him in the car pretty often so that part of missing him has become part of my routine these days. Family gatherings are so tough without him. I keep thinking about how he would’ve loved the things that we are all able to do, the ones that he now isn’t here to do … playing with his grand kids, dining and dashing, listening to the conversations and the laughter.  All of those moments together that feel so great except for the fact that he’s missing.

With all of these unexpected moments, I am left to wonder: Does it get easier when these firsts happen again as seconds, and then thirds, and then so on? Do the shock and the pain lessen as the time when he was here gets further and further out, like a balloon floating in the sky?

I am just so mad at the world right now and just want to scream why him and that its not fair!! 

Thinking of you on your special day                   Wishing you were here with us                                   and hadn’t gone away.                                                   We always talk about you                                            and all the things, you used to do

And so this comes, filled with love

that we keep, only for you.

Happy 65th Birthday in Heaven Dad

When I look back, there are just so many special memories that we both have shared. All these wonderful memories are now flashing in my mind as I celebrate your birthday. I love and miss you so much that my heart aches. Sending you a million hugs and kisses today!!

Forever and Always Dad I love you xoxo

Hey Dad,

This morning I woke up missing you more than normal. Perhaps because its almost Thanksgiving time and our first holiday without you here or maybe because I am going through alot of emotions lately. Nonetheless although you've been gone just over three months now, the pain is still so fresh. 

I don't know how I've come this far. The day you died I wasn't even sure how I was going to make it through the day. I don't know how I am going to get through the holidays there's always going to be an empty seat at the table no more infamous dining and dashing to complain about. 

I've made many mistakes that sometimes I get down on myself because I just want you to be so dang proud of me. Then I remember that you are. You are always in the front row even in heaven cheering for me to get back up even when I stumble. 

Thank you for being you. Every imperfection, flaw  and perfect aspect of who you are. There isn't one thing about you that doesn't inspire me daily. I'm so proud to be your daughter and I'm sorry I didn't say that enough when you were here. Still you loved me more than anyone ever has and even will.

Thank you for believing in me. For not giving up on me and always having me chase my dreams eventho sometimes they were outrageous. You wanted so much for me, you wanted me to be happy, to be loved and live a life with little regret as possible. Even though it's been hard I still try everyday to live up to those goals of yours. 

Dad the holidays are going to be really hard without you please give me the strength to get through them.

Nobody can understand the broken heart that comes from a little girl losing her Dad. While the initial wound goes away the scars and bruises stay forever. 

I'm thankful for the 30 years I had with you but wish that it wasn't so easy to want 30 more. 

Forever and always Dad I love you xoxo 

Dad,

I’m just a few weeks into planning whats suppose to be the best day of my life (June 16th 2018 ) and I feel like you died all over again. Lately, I have found myself constantly telling strangers that you are deceased, sending me crashing into those ferocious waves of grief. 

From the flower that I am supposed to pin on your suit to our father daughter dance. Every single time I tell someone that you will not be attending they respond with a sad face and offer condolences shattering my heart all over again.

We want this to be a celebration of love and we are trying to weave you into our wedding day in various ways. But it’s not the same, and boy oh boy does it hurt. They sell memorial pins and I can hang a photo of you on my bouquet. Some magazines tell fatherless brides to reserve a chair in your memory or light a candle for you. All agonizing reminders that that I will be a fatherless bride.

In the hospital before you past away I cried harder than I ever cried. I told you how terrified I was to lose you. I begged you to stay because you couldn’t miss my wedding, I needed you in my life, forever preferably. It sounds so selfish, because you were in so much pain, but I didn’t want to let go. The fear of losing you was an agonizing gut wrenching pain. 

Thank you for loving me, supporting me and guiding me Dad not a day goes by that I don't think about you or even burst into tears. Forever and Always Dad I love you ♡ 

I miss my dad. He loved me for who I was and accepted me for who I'm striving to become. Dad's are strong for a reason. Their strength gives us a sense of protection. Now that your in heaven Dad, I know that you will continue to protect me. Thanks for being MY Dad. I will always love and miss you terribly until we meet again. Forever and always Dad I love you.

Dad. I feel like the whole world is living and I am in limbo. I miss you so much. I keep wanting to pick up the phone and call you and I know I can't. I'll never stop missing you but I know in time the pain will start to fade. Already I find myself thinking of you in a happier light. Not ill and in pain as he was at the end but the way he was for most of his life. Happy, positive and always making me laugh. He was truly one in a million and I'm so lucky to have had him as my Dad. I thought I'd always appreciated him when he was alive but now he's gone I look back and realise I had no idea how blessed I was to have him around. That saying about not knowing what we have until it's gone is SO true! Forever and always Dad I love you ♡

Hey Dad (having a hard time tonight could really use one of your hugs right about now)

I write to you not only as your daughter, but also as one of the many people who have missed you over these last 50 days. Nobody can understand the broken heart that comes from a little girl losing her father. While the initial wound goes away, the scars and bruises stay forever. Words can't describe how much I miss you I'm having a hard time tonight I'm over emotional it's getting the best of me. Just know that you'll always be in my heart and that every time I see a 4:56 on a clock, I'll think of you.♡♡ 

Hey Dad ♡ 

It's been 48 days now without you and time definitely doesn't make it any easier. I’ve come to realize that when someone you love dies, you don’t just have to say goodbye to him at the time he passes away but also at every crossroad.  I’ve discovered that there are endless firsts and tough moments to get through, not just obvious ones like holidays and big events, but many others that are equally if not more challenging to struggle through under the heavy blanket of grief. Probably the most difficult times for me since your passing have been The Empty Chair Moments, the ones in which I am startled again by your absence.  I think about you many times each day, I fall asleep with tears on my pillow almost every night, and I talk to you in the car pretty often so that part of missing you has become part of my routine these days. I miss you dearly forever and always Dad I love you ♡

If I only had five minutes the day you passed away, I would have had time to tell you all the things I needed to say. I never got to tell you how much you mean to me, or that you were the best dad, better than any man could be.

The last time that I talked to you I wish I would have known. I would have said I love you, and kept you on the phone. If I only had five minutes, the morning you passed away, I'd give you one last hug so tight and see your great big smile. I'd tell you that I don't think I could live without you, not even for awhile.

I'd kiss your cheek and take your hand and tell you it's okay to go and tell you that I'll miss you, more than you'll ever know. But you were gone so quickly, one last car ride you'd take.

Before you even knew it, you were standing at heavens gate. Now God has called upon you, It's time to get your wings.

To leave this life behind you, and enjoy all of heavens beautiful things. So wait for me in heaven Dad, don't let me come alone.

The day the angels come for me, please be there to bring me home.

Forever and Always Dad I love you ♡ 

Hi Dad,

Its been 38 days since you past away. Today, I thought about your laugh and came to the horrifying realization that I can’t remember what it sounds like. I just don’t remember it clearly I feel like I am losing pieces of you. I felt paralyzed with this shame and disbelief, as if I couldn’t recognize my own face. I closed my eyes, tried to quiet the rest of the world. I took a deep breath. I saw your smile and heard your laugh faintly. That’s the funny thing about death: just how alive it really is. The way it can sneak up on you. Playing Heads Up 7 Up, touching you without knowing it was coming. Death slips into moments it should have no part in. Every grand moment is a reminder of the loss. The empty seat. The empty space. The hollow smile. Death should not be in the ceremony, but there it is, waving to me. I don’t want Death to follow me like this Peter Pan shadow I did not ask for. I want to remember you. Your laugh, your arms. Your love. I do not want to remember the Death.

I went through your things last week. I opened your urn for the first time ever. I even picked up the bag that contains you, took it out and placed it next to me. Looks like a mound of dust. It’s really not scary, just dust. It’s weird, but it didn’t make me uncomfortable. I found it soothing. You were there with me, in some way. I really miss you to the point it hurts. I will keep your memory alive and keep them going in your grandbabies who miss you dearly everyday. You were taken away from us far too soon. Until we meet again Dad forever and always I love you ♡