There was supposed to be advantages to having teenage parents

Growing up, I was faced with many challenges being the product of a teenage pregnancy. No matter how many challenges I faced, one of the positives that I thought was a given was that I would grow old and grey with my parents (all of them). We would struggle when I was younger, yes; but as I got older our relationships grew stronger and the bond was greater.  We understood each other better.

At 31, I had years before I needed to worry about losing my parents.  I faced my own mortality when being diagnosed at the age of 29 with Multiple Sclerosis.  It is something that I'm learning to live with each day, but still my parents they are in their mid-forties. My mom and step-dad, life is great.  My little brother (28) was just married the weekend before 4th of July (2014).  My little sister (22 years old) is finding her place in this world. On the other side of my life, it was messy.  My Dad and step-mom were going through a terrible divorce that had just finalized.  My brothers (12 and almost 17) were living with my step-mom about 3 hours away from my Dad. 

For the past 14 years, my Dad had been struggling with depression.  I think the first tipping point was when my step-mom lost Dana, my sister, very late in the pregnancy and had to go through delivery knowing that Dana would not be alive.  The same day, my great-grandpa passed away, and the following day was the start of my senior year of high school.  Both my step-mom and Dad lost their fathers later, one sudden and one a long battle to cancer.  Their marriage just never recovered the grief that we all faced and a long drawn out separation only added to the complications.  Add in financial issues, multiple layoffs, and my Dad breaking his leg and not being able to work after he finally had found a job; it felt like the hits for them kept coming, and there are so many more that I'm leaving out. 

The last two years of my Dad's life were probably the worst. Talking to him was like talking to a stranger.  Where was the strong, stubborn, and determined man who raised me.  Arrogant but with the biggest heart in the world. Although the saddness had been there before, both in person and captured in pictures in his eyes, the last 2 years were the hardest.  I didn't know what else to do for him.  I'm not sure if there was anything I could have done to change the outcome.  

My Dad took his life on July 16, 2014.  He shot himself in the head, after shooting holes through every surface in the house possible.  I can't imagine the state of mind he was in.  It's hard for me to wrap my brain around where he was at emotionally.  Once he was done in the house he went to his car with a gun.  When he was pulled over by a local officer, he took his life in the car on the side of the road.  A road I drive past when I go home to  Indiana to visit. He was only 47.  Just months before he promised he'd never leave me.  Yet here I am, in tears again.  I feel so selfish in my thinking.  I was not supposed to have to deal with the loss of a parent yet.  I know that it is inevitible in most situations, but the deal is when you have teenage parents and put up with all the hardships that come along with it; you get to keep them around a little longer than most.

I'm so angry that I didn't.  I feel robbed in so many different ways.  I feel robbed of never being able to see my Dad as a "Pop-pop" or the fact that the house was going up for foreclosure; so sorting through and finding closure at "home" was next to impossible.  I'm angry that he left me and my brothers.  I feel guilty for moving out of state and not being there for him more.  And I hurt.  I hurt more than anyone could ever put into words.  It just wasn't supposed to happen.  I know that that sounds selfish, but the hand I have been dealt in life has had more than it's fair share of traumatic events.  More so than the "average", and I just don't know why one more thing (and I know it won't be the last) had to happen.