Father’s Day is here. It’s a day that think of my own father more then I consider myself a father even though I have two great daughters that will make me feel like I’m the best dad in the world today.
My father, Frank, left us in 1996, which is a very long time ago, and at times, I can barely remember what his voice is or some of the things we did as father and son and that is something that really bothers me.
I was about 40 years old when my father died about a month before he turned 67 from Alzheimer’s disease. I say Alzheimer’s because over the past few decades if I said Pick’s disease nobody would have known what I was talking about.
It hasn’t been until recent times were Pick’s disease has come to the forefront in yet another term, frontotemporal dementia or FTD, which is one of the less common types of dementia.
The most famous person with FTD today is Bruce Willis. Many on the local music scene may remember Jerry Hludzik, who was a member of the band The Buoys and later the Jerry-Kelly Band and, of course, Dakota.
There are two types of FTD, behavioral variant FTD and primary progressive aphasia (PPA). Behavioral is damage to the frontal lobes of the brain that mainly causes problems with behavior and personality. These lobes are found behind the forehead and process information that affects how we behave and the control of our emotions.
PPA causes language problems. This part of the brain has many roles. A key function of the left temporal lobe is to store the meanings of words and the names of objects. The right temporal lobe helps most people recognize familiar faces and objects.
My father suffered with FTD and it was extremely upsetting to see what has happening to my father right in front of our eyes. A man that was calm and nice as pie had issues with authority like his bosses at work or police, for example.
This wasn’t my dad, and we knew it and something had to be done. I feared a brain tumor or something physical that was altering his behavior. A doctor from Geisinger Danville eventually diagnosed my father with Pick’s disease and to be truthful, I would have rather it be a tumor. At least you could possibly shrink a tumor or remove it. To me, the diagnosis was catastrophic.
After two years of ill behavior, the next 12 would be rough to watch, and it really tried and tested me as a son and one that had to make family decisions for my mother.
We took care of him the best way possible, at first at home with much of the pressure put on my mother, and then in a nursing home until his death, 28 years ago.
I’ve replaced many of those bad days following the diagnosis with as many good memories as possible, but again, as time goes on, those memories fade. Life can be cruel like that.
Recently, I stopped by the Denison Cemetery to visit my parent’s graves, as I have for many years, but this time I found myself very emotional. I was wishing I had x-ray vision to see them one more time, but all we see are a tombstone and grass.
I can’t tell you how many times I would be in a situation where I would have loved some wisdom from my father or to take him to see his beloved Yankees or the Philadelphia Eagles.
My daughters never really had a chance to see what a great guy their grandpa was and there’s no doubt he would have spoiled them.
Of course, my two siblings along with myself will always feel slighted by not having him around, but more so than myself, I felt bad for my mother who lived 20 years past my father and died nearly to the day of his death.
She had a tough life having immigrant parents and then losing her father when she was 9 years old. It was an awful thing for my mother to go through.
Perhaps today I will find some old photos of my father and maybe soon, set up the ancient film projector he bought to record our lives and watch him come to life once again.
Today, as I always do, I just ask my daughters to just spend some time with me, have a BBQ under the sun, relax, tell a few stories and soak in the day.
It’s always nice to spend time with my children and the older I get; the more I want to spend time with them.
You can call me selfish for wanting to spend as much time with them as possible, but honestly, I don’t want them to look back at their life feeling they did not having enough time with me as I feel about not having enough time with my own father.
Happy Father’s Day to all dads past, present and future.
Quote of the Week
“What makes a good father? A good father sets an example that his children want to follow. A good father provides for the needs of his children – both material and non-material. A good father demonstrates his love in both words and actions. A good father provides guidance in a positive fashion.” – Rob Kozak
Thought of the Week
“I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren’t trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.” – Umberto Eco
Bumper Sticker
“The imprint of a father remains forever on the life of the child.” – Roy Lessin
