It's been ten years and seven months since you died, and I don't think the pain has lessened any. I'm 20 now, Dad, and I still feel like the lost little girl who found out her Daddy was never coming back. I fell apart when you died, and it seems like I'll never be whole again. I am still so angry with you for letting drugs become more important than your daughter. I'm angry with Mom, too--the drugs and alcohol have destroyed that relationship--but you're the one who's gone. At least Mom stuck around. It kills me to think that drugs are the reason I'm completely alone and lost right now. I feel like I'm drowning, and I don't have anyone to fall back on. Do you know how hard it was for me when Mom was relapsing every weekend? Do you know how scary it was to find her passed out on the bathroom floor and feel responsible for her? Of course you don't--you weren't there. You chose Fentanyl over me. Thanks to you, I didn't get to have a childhood, and now I'm a broken adult.
Your birthday was a few weeks ago, exactly one week before mine. You would have been 50. That day, along with the anniversary of your death, are the two hardest days for me to get through every year. I miss you so much, but at the same time, I find myself gradually forgetting what your voice sounded like and what you looked like. All I have left are pictures, birthday cards, and your Air Force jacket. It's so hard knowing that I'm forgetting my dad. I leave campus on Parents' Weekend every year because it's too painful to see the other girls with their dads and knowing that I'll never have that again. The other day, I had a happy moment when I was proud of myself, and the first thought I had was to pull out my cell phone and call you. It seems so stupid now, but that split second when I felt the urge to call you was so real, and I cried because it hit me for the millionth time that I'll never talk to my dad again.
It seems ridiculous to me that I still cry over you after ten years. Shouldn't this be getting easier? I hope, wherever you are, that you've found the peace you were obviously lacking. It's hard growing up and realizing just how unhappy you were when you were alive, and it's hard coming to the realization that parents aren't perfect. I remember when I used to idolize you. I miss those days. I miss you. I love you.
