In my last post, I mentioned my father breaking a hip. At the time, it seemed bad, but that was nothing compared to what followed. As it turns out, the reason he was falling was because his liver was failing, and it made him unsteady and messed with his thinking.

He spent a few weeks in rehab for the hip, and at first, he was getting better. But then he was retaining a lot of fluid, and they finally sent him back to the hospital, where they discovered that his liver was failing, and it had caused his kidneys to fail as well.

He died Monday night. There was nothing the doctors could do for him but make him more comfortable in his final days.

Even though he was 76 years old, this still came as a shock to us. Just a couple of months ago, he was going about his life normally. Sure, he was unsteady at times, but we thought that was a combination of being old and taking a lot of medications for other health problems.

So now I’m grieving because his death has left a major hole in my life. With the exception of the four years I went away to school, I’ve always lived with my parents. Now it looks like it will just be my mom and me. I have to be there for her. She is only 57 years old, but she has a lot of chronic pain and needs my help to get through her days without making her pain any worse than it has to be. Before, she’d always had my dad to help her with simple tasks like cooking and shopping.

Now I feel like there’s so much more on my plate, and it’s tough to think that he’s dead, that I’ll never get to talk to him again (at least in this world).

I’ve been slowly trying to get back to some semblance of my normal life. Tonight, for the first time since he went into the hospital, I managed to do some writing. It was only 700 words, but it’s a step back toward normality.

Nothing will ever be the same again, but I know my dad wouldn’t want me to stop living my life. It will be a long process, but I feel writing is part of how I can cope.