Dear Papa, 

It’s another sleepless night where I find myself writing about you. Contrary to what I initially believed, I still have quite a few more tears left to shed after these past eight and half years without you and without Mom. To this day, I don’t think I will ever be able to forgive myself for not taking care of her as I promised you as you lay in that damn hospital bed dying. I was only 17 at the time and she was already so ill, but how can a daughter not feel guilty after that? She has long since forgotten me and the whole world. And the guilt is what I am left with now as I can no longer take your hand in comfort, hug you, be held by you and have my tears wiped away by you. No, instead I can only cry alone and hope for the day that Mom can be released from her mortal prison to join you in what I can only hope is a happier place.

I know they say no parent should have to bury their child, but I believe no child should have to bury a parent while the other has to be sent to a nursing home. The worst part is knowing that this will always hurt. It may not be the same everyday as it was before and some days may be just like the first, but it will always been lurking in the shadows of my mind waiting for a reminder to bring about the flood of days long gone. It will always be there because I will never stop loving you or missing you or wishing for a moment that I could see your face and hold your hand. The same goes for Mom and the person she was. Only with her, her body remains and yet I must let her go for she has left me long ago.

Now, I can only hope to make you proud by surviving that nightmare and learn to live with the reality of what it means to be daughter to no one living; to learn to thrive as an orphan, a word I absolutely feared the most as a child. There was never a monster under my bed that could make me cry as much as this. Yet, forever I must hold true what I also said to you in that same hospital bed: “You are my hero and heroes never die.“ They never do, because they live on in our hearts.

Forever your loving daughter,
Ness, Age 25