The Grief of Yearning

Content Warning: mentioning of suicidal ideation and overdose

No matter how old you are, you are always your parents’ child. And we probably all want our parents to be proud of us, accept and love us for who we are and share important subjects that are close to our hearts.

Right now, the world feels quite unsafe, and subjects that in the past didn’t enter my radar are now subjects I share petitions for and encouraging memes, to show the world where I stand and individuals that they are not forgotten but supported.

I talk especially about the LGBTQIA+ community and within it transgender people.

I only found out last year, at age 54, that I also belong to the LGBTQIA+ community.

I am the A.

No, not an ally, but an ACE. An asexual person.

Finding My Identity Late in Life

After my ADHD diagnosis in 2022, followed by my autism diagnosis in 2023, last year, my life felt complete.

All the questions I had and all the confusion I felt made all of a sudden, a lot more sense.

What didn’t happen was that I could share these new insights with my family.

My mum told my dad that I was diagnosed as autistic, so the next day he called me over video and talked at me for 20 minutes until I stopped him.

He started the conversation not with, “Hi, how are you?” but launched straight into that he read up about autism and he doesn’t care what the doctor said, but he knows that I am not autistic and then started listing all the things I did as a child and inside I thought, yup, that was my autism, yup, that one, was my ADHD.

I felt angry and disappointed.

This was the last time we had a meaningful conversation. April 2023.

We never fell out officially, but we also didn’t fall back in.

And knowing my dad’s stand against LGBTQIA+ as a conservative Christian, how on earth would I ever be able to come out to my parents?

So now, I would like to sit down with him. He is 87, very ill, and who knows how much longer he will live.

We called my mum so he could say happy birthday to my son. He was in bed and could hardly speak.

Why am I telling you this?

Because there is a special type of grief, which is hidden and almost shameful to experience.

It is part of disenfranchised grief, but I would like to call it the grief of yearning.

It is difficult to explain, without rolling out your whole childhood trauma in front of people. How else can you explain that although your parents are still alive, you hardly speak to them?

How do you explain the yearning for something you never had?

I never had a heart-to-heart conversation with my dad. I once told him that I had planned to kill myself on that day.

I had planned it for a while, and during the day, I said goodbye to the world. I sat with my boyfriend, thinking that I would never see him again. I was 17 years old.

All of a sudden, he said, I need you. Maybe a few more words, but those three words pierced my heart, and I started crying.

I explained what I had planned, and he convinced me to talk to my dad.

When I came home, I told my dad that I had planned to kill myself, and my dad said, Nonsense. What you do is you take a journal, and when you feel sad, you draw a cloud, and when you feel happy, you draw a sun. That’s what you have to do. Was that helpful?

I nodded and promised myself never again to trust him with my feelings. Two years later, I took an overdose.

I am so grateful that it didn’t work, and finally, in 2020, I healed my depression, suicidal ideation and general anxiety. But that’s another blog post.

I cannot describe the sadness I feel that I can’t sit with my dad (nor with my mum) and tell him that I shared a petition to give trans people the right to self–identify their legal gender.

I want to tell him how excited I am that I connected with someone who did a talk about intersex people and how difficult it can be for those children to be accepted in their families.

That I decided I wanted to help those teenagers, since I remember so well how alienated I felt in my own family, with no one to talk to.

But the people who hurt you can’t heal you. And so, my heart is yearning for those talks that never happened and will never happen.

I feel orphaned whilst both of my parents are still alive.

I read with jealousy posts on Facebook of happy families, fond memories, how their dad was their rock and how they miss him every day.

You can’t miss what you never had. Isn’t that what people say?

Oh, how wrong they are. Maybe that works for food. There is food in the world I have never tried, so I don’t miss it, since I don’t know how it smells or tastes.

But we are born with this need to belong, to be loved and accepted, so even if you never had this in your family, you know how this should feel.

And hopefully no one ever has to go through life without ever belonging or being loved for who they are.

My kids love me for who I am. They also taught me that shouting and arguments don’t have to belong in a family.

I might not have experienced unconditional love and acceptance by my dad, but I know what I long for, and I know how love feels.

But how do you share this with people? My friend’s husband once told me that it’s important to always honour your parents. He has no idea.

Those words are only spoken by those who are privileged not to have experienced serious childhood abuse.

We need to honour ourselves first and heal the hurt we carry for decades with us. But I digress, this is another blog post for later.

The pain is not only in the yearning, but in the silence and pretence. On Mother’s and Father’s Day, we probably spend time off social media to avoid seeing all the happy posts.

Our grief is hidden, shameful, since, as compassionate people, we feel guilty for trying to protect ourselves from people who are supposed to be closest to us.

It is a yearning that will never be fulfilled. But it is not only a present problem but a symbol of our upbringing, teenage years, and every significant moment we couldn’t share with our parents.

It is a loneliness you feel so deep and so dark, without knowing how to let go of it. Or maybe we do.

Finding A Path Forward

We do know, or guess, that the solution is in letting go and accepting.

Accepting that they were never able to be close to us and care for our emotional needs, whatever their reasons were.

Accepting that this will never change, and once they die, that door is solidly closed, without any chance of ever changing, even if it was clear before the death that it would never change.

Accepting that it is our responsibility to heal what we didn’t hurt. And we have to do it without them.

Accepting that when we find compassion and understanding, we still can’t help them and probably still have to stay away, since their dysfunctional behaviour can still hurt you, like someone who, in a blind rage, throws rocks, and you can get caught in the crossfire.

So, we keep going, processing the pain, the grief, the loneliness.