Mourning my father on Father’s Day

I will spend this Father’s Day remembering my father instead of celebrating the day with him for the first time in 28 years.

It’s been nine months since my dad’s sudden passing. Doug, my father, collapsed and died while harvesting sorghum for silage in early October 2022. Since that heartbreaking day, I have felt the whole spectrum of emotions in the grieving process, along with my mother.

The concept of death is not new to me. As a farmer, my dad was conscious of teaching me about the circle of life. It’s one of the first of many lessons I remember learning from him. On our Pennsylvania farm, I assisted my dad when we had to put an injured cow or sheep out of its misery. At 20, I held my grandmother’s hand and watched the light in her eyes disappear. I also have taken life as a deer hunter.

However, my dad’s death gutted me. I was beginning a transition phase of my life, starting a new chapter with a new job in a new state, feeling what I could do alone and who I was without my hometown as my world, but that optimistic feeling vanished when he left this Earth.

The grief of losing my dad has permanently left me wounded, not only from losing his life but also because I had to part with his beef herd and equipment much quicker than anticipated. A few days after losing my father, the owner of the farm – Dad rented ground and barns to house most of the cowherd – told me that everything needed to leave the property as soon as possible.

For about a week, I cried. Every day after feeding the cows, I cried in my father’s plastic lawn chair in the hayloft. I wailed to the point my body ached and my cheeks were soaked with tears.

Driving out the long lane of the farm that I spent my youth traversing on the back of a bicycle, I sniffled, eyes red and nose pink from the hard brushing of my sweater sleeve. I avoided wearing makeup and nice clothes. I barely had the energy to shower.

Sleep was a rare commodity. I stayed awake many nights with thoughts about selling the cows and sheep, or what I was learning about the farm’s finances. Honestly, it sometimes still does.

Selling the cows

My mother and I were prodded by family, friends, and neighbors of our farming community — even strangers — to sell the farm, the cows, and the equipment. Many encouraged us to leave our livelihood and home as a way to begin a “new chapter.”

My dad had yet to be buried, and we were being pushed to think about the future — a future I couldn’t vividly imagine.

Others advised me to leave the emotion out of these decisions and “look at it from the perspective of business.” I eventually had to wire my gray, clouded brain to think in that direction.

Yet, the thought of selling his cows…

The bloodlines that my dad and I had spent years creating had become part of his soul. His greatest love was cows.

One of his favorite childhood memories was of snuggling in the barn with his first cow — a Chianina-cross — to avoid the conflicts of his parents’ unhappy marriage. The decision to sell them was killing me; the cows were an essential element to my relationship with my dad.

When I loaded up a stock trailer with a majority of the herd to be sent to auction, I knew that this ride was just the first one; eventually the ride would lead to the kill floor of the processing plant. It’s the circle of life, the way it is in the cattle world. However accepting I am to our circle of life, it didn’t make the goodbyes easier.

Watching the trailer leave the farm driveway, I felt my knees weaken. Turning to the barn, I locked myself in the hayloft and wailed — again.

Thanksgiving, Christmas, and the new year have been a blur. After a while, my hunger for life slowly reemerged. It has been nine months since my dad’s passing, and I am still triggered by the fact that I didn’t get to speak to him any time before he died, and we were forced to sell most of the cows and his farm equipment.

Doubt creeps into my head. I wonder if that’s what he wanted — he didn’t detail any plans for the farm in his will. Would he disapprove of me staying in Iowa and wanting to keep learning my new job? If he were in my shoes, would he have done the same? I will never know the answers, but my weary mind cannot shake them off quickly as a dog shakes off water.

Moving on with my grief

Eventually, I hope to heal in my walking wounded form. Grief has made me more empathic, especially those with kind hearts. When I sold a handful of my dad’s younger bred heifers to a small niche farmer, he sent me photos of the heifers with their calves — unsolicited. I didn’t expect to stay in contact, but that kind gesture has helped me know that my father’s dedication to raising a bloodline of gentle, intelligent, and genetically strong beef cows will continue.

So, if you have your father and your cows still with you, hug them both and tell them how appreciative you are of their lives still being intertwined with yours. If you don’t, you’re in my thoughts as you try to find joy today and every day with the memories of your father.