I remember my dad before the drink consumed everything

I’m Sam, and I am the child, grandchild and great-grandchild of a line of alcoholics. A combination of dismissed mental health issues and a very sad family tragedy meant their only coping mechanism was alcohol. Unfortunately, they didn’t get the help back then that they so desperately needed.

It has taken me to becoming a mum myself to two gorgeous humans I have realised the way I grew up was not the norm, and it has significantly shaped the way I am today.

Struggles with anxiety and relationships

I really struggled to find friends growing up, and still do now. I find it very difficult to relate to people who have had a “normal” upbringing. I used to feel jealous, why did they get the “perfect” parents and why did I get mine?

I struggle with anxiety and have always felt responsible for other people. Whenever I have tried to open up, I have felt really dismissed. 

My mother, the one person who was supposed to be there for me, would often shout at me to stop crying, to just get over it. She once said to me that I have bad blood.

Last week I started listening to an incredible podcast about Nacoa and children of alcoholics, and that was the first time I have ever truly felt seen in my whole life.

I grew up with a dad, granny and grandad who loved me more than words could describe. They were all an inspiration to me; they were so talented at everything they did. I was pretty young when my parents split up, I was about six.

I look back on photos now and can see the huge decline in my dad. The photos go from this full-of-life confident and charming man to an empty-shelled, red-faced, scared-looking person, a person I no longer recognised.

The shouting

I remember sitting at the top of the stairs and listening to the shouting after my dad had a drink. I didn’t really understand what was going on, but it was my normal to just sit there and listen.

I watched my dad get taken away by the police more times than I care to remember. I remember being told to go upstairs and take my sister with me. I would always look out from the bedroom window, and I never knew when I would see him again. 

The mess

He would move around a lot. My mother would never come inside the accommodations, so she wouldn’t see the mess.

Every single time, I would get the black bin bag out, and start tidying up, the beer cans and the vodka bottles, one after another. I was about 7 years old, just a bit older than my own little boy now.

The last time we saw him for a while was when we went to the train station. We walked up to him and he was sitting on the floor, rocking back and forth. After some words were exchanged, my mother said we couldn’t go with him and that we wouldn’t be seeing him again.

I remember being so angry at her. After that day every time I was in public, I always thought I could see him, or the back of him, but I was always wrong. I cried myself to sleep a lot, I just wanted my dad back.

Dad was nowhere to be seen

My late teens were awful, and I was forced to leave my home. I was so angry with my dad then. He was nowhere to be seen, nowhere to help me. I felt so scared, so unloved by the people that were meant to love me the most. I grew an awful lot of resentment toward him then.

Flash forward quite some time, and 6 months after having my first baby, I was told the news that my dad was found passed away in his flat after a welfare check was done.

I hadn’t seen him since I was 13 years old, I was now twenty-three. I feel a lot of guilt that he was alone when he died and also for how long he was there before he was found. Once I heard this, the dad that I had so much resentment over, that all just disappeared and I suddenly felt only sorrow.

We had been told his body had been there for 4 weeks. He had neighbours, yet no one reported anything. It was actually my Aunty who called the police asking for a welfare check. His official date of death was a week before his 50th birthday, he was so young.

I often wondered if I had bumped into him, would I have recognised him? I had no idea what he looked like 10 years older, and that’s really bothered me. 

Ever since I was little, I would often have thoughts about Dad passing away. I think I tried my best to normalise it because I always knew it would end this way, after years and years of the same cycle.

He really did love us

When we walked into his flat, it was all very surreal. I didn’t know this person anymore, but I was rifling through his stuff. In a strange way, it felt like I was getting to know him again, looking through his CDs and paintings.

I found notes he had written everywhere. My heart stopped when I saw myself and my sister up on his wall, proudly hung up there. At that moment, I was reminded of something I had sadly forgotten, he really did love us and we were his everything, despite it all.

I organised his funeral myself. It was a huge task at only twenty-three. I wanted to make him proud, for the last time. I honestly don’t think I could have gotten through it all had I not been paired with the most incredible celebrant. She was also a child of an alcoholic. She was everything to me at this time and cared for me more at that moment than most people I knew. 

I asked for one thing, for it to not be something it wasn’t, for it not to be fake. He had burnt all bridges so I was worried people wouldn’t come, but they did. 

This generational trauma will end with me

I was so angry when people would tell me “He did this to himself”. He did do some awful things after he had drank, but I remember my dad before, before the drink consumed everything and that was a totally different person.

Now I am 28, I have made peace with some of it, and I like to remember the good more than the bad. 

I am incredibly proud of myself for figuring all this out on my own. I really wish I had known about Nacoa back then, but I know about it now, and this generational trauma will end with me. 

Sam

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