Dad.
Lots of my friends have great relationships with their dads, some of them can't stand theirs. My dad was my best friend.

My dad suffered throughout his life. He was the eldest of five children of a single mother living on a liverpool council estate, he'd had rheumatic fever as a child leaving him needing a heart valve fitted in his late teens. He was an artist, and a head of art at a local school until he became manic depressive. The best years of my childhood were spent visiting him in various hospitals and living in a strange atmosphere dependent on how he was feeling while he was at home.

By the time new cocktails of drugs had stabilised his mood swings effectively I was into my mid teens and he had a grand daughter to dote on from my elder brother. I guess you could say I was pretty jealous of the attention she got from him as I'd missed that growing up.

As I got into my elder teens my dads personality started to come back stronger and stronger as drugs to treat manic depression became better and better. And I learnt to enjoy this as a young adult having finally shrugged off the sulkiness of being a teenager.

We'd go to the pub together, joke together and being a student meant I had all the time in the world to spend with him. He soon became part of my group of friends and if he didn't come out because he was spending time with my mum he was missed. He looked just like George Best, he was a big smiling lovable giant bloke who made everyone smile with his stories and was an incredibly talented artist.

In the week leading up to my 21st birthday he developed a fever. Not a big problem, he just didn't feel well enough to join us for the meal we'd planned to celebrate. He'd made the effort to join me for a drink earlier in the week though so atleast we'd done a bit of celebrating together. The doctor had been out to see him and thought it was probably just a urinary infection. Treatment given, would be right as rain in a week or so. The night after my birthday he took a turn for the worst. Despite the best efforts of the ambulance staff, and the doctors once he'd got to the hospital, they couldn't stop the bleeding that had occured due to a cyst that had ruptured on one of his kidneys. The cyst hadn't been picked up by the doctor that had visited and the symptons he was showing hadn't been noticed. He died that night.

Seriously folks. I know they can be cantankerous bastards at times, or they can seem a bit past it in the modern world. But if you are close to your dad at all, spend as much time as you can with him. It hurts every day when they're gone. (Same goes for either parent).
( Evil Bastardo, Thu 25 Nov 2010, 14:35, 3 replies)

Wow
Powerful stuff
( SauronWibble I'll hold it, you lick it..., Thu 25 Nov 2010, 16:59, closed)

I just had one of those..
'Time just stood still for a second' moments.

Powerful, Touching, and eerily straight to the point, yet factual all at the same time.
*click*
(danniekavanagh did nothing constructive on, Fri 26 Nov 2010, 15:15, closed)

Thanks for the clicks guys.
I swung back and forth about posting this but it proved quite cathartic. It was 10 years ago in June but I still feel like it was yesterday.
( Evil Bastardo, Fri 26 Nov 2010, 15:49, closed)