it’s easy to be your friend because I love you

My dad died on Valentine’s Day from a cancer in his brain that he fought for a year and a half. 

I’ll talk about that more one day, but what I want to say now comes from the buildup and the fallout. What I want to say is not about the suffering and turmoil that I watched my dad and my family experience for that year and a half, or the milestones we hit every day that I never mentioned, like the last day he had ice cream or went outside. I want to talk about him and I will. But today, I want to talk about the aftermath.

People don’t know what to say about death and dying. They tell you they’re sorry and they could never do what you’re doing, they tell you how strong you are and graceful you’re being, admire how you’re “back to work” or “still able to have fun”. Grievers are told time and time again, nobody knows what the right thing to say is.

And we have grace. Giggle it off and nod our heads, tell them thank you and it’s okay. Because it is okay. They aren’t doing anything wrong trying to ask. We have grace and it’s not our job to, but we do.

In the days after, freezers fill up with meals and treats, company holds your hand, friends come by and help unpack things, tidy up. The days after make you think this whole thing might be survivable. You think, perhaps I needed this to see how much people really love me.

And then the calls stop coming. People know you’ve lost someone “but they were sick” and they “hope they’re at peace now” and how lucky we were to have that time.

Lucky. Yes, I am the luckiest girl alive. My dad was diagnosed with a terminal illness but how lucky am I to be able to work from home? My whole family is disoriented and devastated, but how lucky am I to be right in the middle of it? Many people lose the ones they love in an instant, how lucky am I to watch it take place over the year? Eternally lucky. 

The only way I can ever think to express how I’m feeling honestly and completely is by writing it down. Here, now. You reading. It helps me feel redeemable for the person that I am. I speak speak speak, often too much and too loudly, about everything I go through. 

That was my detriment.

You see, when people don’t want to be your friend, they will tally up little lists in their mind of all the things you’ve done that didn’t appeal to them. Your tone here, your action there, you were kind today but I’ve seen you be unkind before, that was a fun party but I didn’t like who you were as a teenager, I don’t like how you bicker with so and so.

They keep score. They note how kind they’ve been to you, the one, two, three meals in your freezer from when your dad died, and how they took time out of their Saturday to be there for his service. Well most of them!

And alas, in the midst of your survival, you come to find you’ve not been keeping up. Several bad days in a row. An absurd amount of drama. Always posting on social media, blah blah blah. And that tally begins to look less even. 

It’s easy to be your friend when your dad dies. It is much more difficult to be your friend when you start to behave like your dad died.

People want to see you rise, with grace, handle this so well and with so much poise. They want to be proud of you, amazed at how brave you’ve been. They want you to show up for them the exact same way you always have, extra smiley and nice, let them know you won’t bite. They want to tell you how strong you are, but that’s it. That’s it. They want to ask you how you’re doing, and you will need to say you’re doing good. They want to ask you what you’ve been up to do, and you will need to say working & gardening, and sleeping good, and eating healthy.

If you’ve lost someone and you resonate with the aforementioned friends, remove them immediately (if they haven’t already removed themselves!).

In the era of therapy-speak, and boundaries, and clear communication, and self care, these people have likely already diagnosed you as the problem. It’s really a shame you couldn’t hold yourself together, we were rooting for you! They “simply don’t have the capacity” to watch you suffer and “need to set a boundary” when it comes to all this emotion because “you’ve become a negative energy.” 

And the ever-so-insensitive: yeah I get (blank) but it’s not an excuse for (blank).

They’re sort of right about that. My dad dying is not an excuse to be an ‘asshole’. It’s actually the fundamental reason. The person I was with him died that day. I am trying to find her, some semblance of her, some piece of her, but right now she is dead. I’m angry as all hell. Sick to my fucking stomach. Tired. Lazy. Bored. I don’t want anything. I don’t want anything without my dad. 

Every day I wake up against my will. But I persist.

If they could begin to understand what a feat that is, then maybe this wouldn’t have happened. They wouldn’t be so overwhelmed by me, so sick of me, so confused by me. 

And here’s the worst part; they knew. They knew I was fighting for my life, through all of this, and they abandoned me here. 

This fact here is this: people don’t want to be friends with people who have shit. Baggage or problems or screaming kids or shitty childhoods or failing classes or struggling mentally or messy houses or your dad dying. It would be a lot easier to be your friend if you just had a normal life. Frankly, it’s all fucked here.

And what a view it is from here. More clarity than I’ve ever had in my life. Like the sun coming out after a tornado has nearly flattened my whole world. I see clearly now who still stands. Who always stood. 

And in the distance I hear the words that really matter. That my grief doesn’t scare them. That I’m redeemable. That I’m good. 

That it’s easy to be my friend because they love me. And friends don’t keep score. They never did.