Dear Dad | From a Grieving Dad to a Grieving Dad on Father's Day

Dear Grieving Dad,

Father’s Day is loaded. I get it. Whether you are walking into this Father’s Day after a recent tragedy or a distant one, whether you have living children and yet it still feels incomplete, whether you are completely without a living baby or child to hold in your arms, or whether you don’t feel any emotion at all towards this day, it is still tricky. I have experienced all of these emotions over the past 14 years worth of Father’s Days and let me tell you, it’s hard.

Most of the time, a grieving Father isn’t really noticed. We’re sort of overlooked. Our grief sort of gets put on the back burner. Now, much of it has to do with our uncanny ability to deflect, pull up our boot straps, and put on that strong facade in order to give space for our wives to grieve. This is good and well to a certain extent. But listen to me. You are a person with emotions. You care deeply. You are not a robot. So please stop trying to be some Terminator-type machine who feels nothing. This doesn’t help anything. And it doesn’t help anyone (including your wife or you). Be honest with yourself. You miss the child you never got to hold or the child whose eyes you lovingly stared into with big plans and dreams. You are an image bearer, therefore you are full of love which means at times, you are full of sorrow, despair, hurt, and brokenness.

And Father’s Day sometimes exposes the hurt we didn’t even feel was there. So can I ask you something? Would you feel the freedom this weekend to just be honest with yourself about how YOU are feeling about the loss of your child? The moment I came to grips with the fact that I was allowed to show emotion; anger, frustration, discouragement, hurt, fear, sorrow - was the moment I began to experience some healing that I didn’t even know I really needed. 

Would you talk about how you’re doing with someone this weekend? Would you celebrate the fact that you are a dad? Would you be vulnerable and just admit that you miss your child? That you wish it could have been different? That it makes you angry sometimes? That you cry alone sometimes? That you drive away in your car sometimes and scream and curse as you try to filter through the pain? Would you just be honest? Or would you at least just try to be honest?

Like I said, Father’s Day is loaded. Maybe you don’t feel anything in regards to it. I would say then that you may need this letter more than anyone. But please take it from a dad who has lost two children and has become sort of a Father’s Day grief expert (not by choice): There is a lot of freedom in exploring the pain. And doing it with someone you trust. So don’t bottle it up this weekend. There is a lot of joy that can be found in this journey of grief.

And then know that there is a Savior that “For the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross!” A Savior who can “sympathize with us in every way, except for sin!” A Savior who lovingly looks at us and says, I am with you, in your pain, and I can give you hope! His name is Jesus. He loves you. 

I won’t say Happy Father’s Day to you. But I will say this to you: There is hope on this Father’s Day!

Sincerely, 

A grieving dad just like you