Hi. My name is Bob Livingstone and I am sixty-seven years old. I am a psychotherapist working with children, teenagers and adults. I have been in private practice for over thirty years in the San Francisco Bay Area. Some of the areas I like to focus on are grief and loss, trauma/abuse, and divorce.

My father died suddenly almost fifty-two years ago when I was fifteen. His death led to my interest in dealing with grief and loss/death and dying. I have struggled with issues related to his death most of my life.

He was having stroke symptoms for a while, but no one talked about it. One November 1966 day he was driving and was pulled over by the police for driving erratically. He was taken to the hospital where he died two days later.

Recently I have had many moments when tears flowed down my face. I was moved by other’s stories and my own. I asked myself, “What did I lose when my dad died?” I believe that I am brave and clear enough to share these thoughts and feelings:

I lost my connection to the most important male figure in my life. My father’s death demolished my sense of having an anchor and intensive stability. Without my dad, I floated around without any gravitational pull.

I lost my innocence. At age fifteen I learned that death is real and doesn’t just happen to other families or on TV. I learned early on that life can be brutal. It would have been nice if I could have learned this lesson much later in life.

I lost any sense of security. I learned that tragedy could happen at any moment. I became hyper-vigilant and attempted to guard against any possible threat to my safety. The “threats” were often irrational, but I was triggered by fear of abandonment. This lead to a life long struggle with anxiety and it’s flip side-depression.

I lost faith in other adults. Most of the other possible male role models were either indifferent to me or had severe character flaws such as being dishonest, racist and mean. Even though I was filled with self-doubt, I relied on my own sense and experiences of events to get me through.

I lost self-confidence and self-esteem. It seems like many in my suburban New Jersey community treated me like I was suffering from some kind of disability after my dad died. I missed a lot of school because I didn’t see the point of going. I have the experience of teachers telling me that I was too dumb to go to college way before my dad died. I didn’t see a future. I sought out girls to comfort me because I felt so desperately alone.

I lost the ability and willingness to trust. My fear of others leaving me was compounded with the experiences of being abused and neglected by other adults. I didn’t have a voice when I was a teenager. I didn’t know what having a voice even meant or why it was important. I felt invisible much of the time. I felt ashamed of all my negative thoughts and feelings which led to become more isolated internally. I think I fooled most people. Those that actually cared about me thought I was functioning at a higher level than I actually was. Those who didn’t care continued to ignore me.

I lost the ability to have a strong connection with my father after he died. When he died, we weren’t on the best of terms. His strokes effected his brain functions and he was angry much more than before. When he died there was a huge sense of incompleteness because we had not resolved an argument we had. I also lost the good memories of our life together. The amygdala part of my brain sensed danger when ever thoughts of him would come up so I learned to remember the upheaval and discard the love.

Tears are rolling out of my eyes, but I am finding peace in the sadness. The act of writing these losses down on paper transforms them to truths and finds my voice. When I was fifteen, I had nowhere to turn. Now I have other friends and my partner Gail to turn to. I can also look to myself for answers because I know I am the only one who holds them. You have just spent the last few minutes experiencing my voice. You can find yours and teach your children to find theirs!

I used to believe that each time I had a new memory or feeling about my dad’s death, that I was in a dysfunctional, stuck state and I would never get over his loss.

I now know that the loss of a loved on is something that you don’t get over. Grief like life continues to evolve.

I used to view my own therapy with dread. I would wonder when am I going to find closure and accept my dad’s death. I now know that these desires are what we are taught and are myths. I now am excited to attend my weekly therapy session. I feel I am always on the verge of learning something new about myself and that is truly a gift.

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