Dear Diary - I want my father back

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why am I awake at 5am, sneakily searching every drawer in the house till I find that one lonely Nicorette gum that's been lying there for over 6 months since I quit?

 

Stress, that's why.

 

 

(For those of you who are ex-smokers who are yelling "NOOOOOOO!" right now, let me reassure you that the Nicorette has already made me feel ill and I am SO not back on the wagon.)

  

 

What's this got to do with wanting my father back?

 

Well, that took me about three months to figure out, and I'm still not sure I've got it sorted.

 

"I want my father back.  I want my father back."

 

It kept coming to me, rising up from my subconscious, so bad that sometimes I'll mumble it out loud.  This has been going on for a while, now.

 

Ah, therapy!  Thank God for therapy - muse to my self-knowledge.

 

"It's incredible," I said to She's So Lovely, my therapist, yesterday.  "When I come in here and talk to you about what's going on with me, a massive light bulb always comes on --"  I looked up to the right and then shielded my eyes -- "and it blinds me and I want to ignore it.  Aaargh!"

 

We spend the rest of the hour - which flew by - figuring this stuff out.  So let me break it down for you, Dear Diary.

 

I was stressed out becuase I'd had a bad day at work and I'd had been too passionate in a meeting, going up against a person who is considerably higher up the totem pole than  I am and - worst of all - that I like and respect.  

 

Her team is under a lot of pressure and people are complaining about them.  I feel like we're back in high school and she's the scapegoat that all the kids are talking about behind her back because, you know kids, once it starts, it escalates, and they all turn on one person in the pack, even if only through releif that they aren't the one under attack. 

  

I have tried, repeatedly, to defend her and her team, and to get her to engage with my team and others to talk through the changes she is making, the reasoning behind them and how we will work together in future.  But she's busy as hell and kept putting off engaging with us.  Finally, she came to our meeting 20 minutes late yesterday and she just wasn't getting that we need to talk this stuff through.  So I hit out a bit.  

  

I called her to apologize later, and explained to her my high school analogy and left a rambling, insane voicemail.  I can feel you cringing as you read this.

  

Not my finest hour.  

 

So I know you're still asking, what does my stupidity have to do with wanting my father back?  And where did he go, anyway?

 

Well, he's dead, for a start, so he's not coming back.  

 

And it's not about him, really, anyway.

 

That's what I couldn't figure out till yesterday.  My father and I did not have the best relationship.  He was very controlling (hence my issues with authority - don't get me near any sexist military men unless you want to see fur fly), and I guess he did his best, but he wasn't the most approachable man.

  

So why were the words "I want my father back" ringing through my head all the time?

 

Well, because of various things, I am having to step up these days.  I am the primary bread winner, I have a job where I stand alone, a team of one, achieving goals only through influence and having to prove the concept of a role that was created as a new function, a role created especially for me.  I interface with very senior people, I have to stay positive in the face of a culture of complaint, and everything seems to take five times as long as it should to get done.  I don't have my family to fall back - they live a million miles away - we don't have the money for a vacation or major enteratainment or a spa day and retail therapy is out of the question.  

 

And so it's up to me, and there's no respite.

 

I don't have my father - symbol of strength, provider, safety net - anymore.  I can't climb up on his lap and be embraced, held and just  know that he'll take care of everything.  He isn't here to fight for me, advise me, protect me.

 

And I'm tired.  

 

And I'm scared.

 

And I'm fucking up now and then.

 

And I want my father back.

 

 

 

To read more in this navel-gazing series, click here.

 

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