Grieving as a Father: Seven Months After Losing Saoirse
It’s been seven months since Saoirse left us. Seven months since I became a father to a daughter who lived for three days. And I’m still figuring out what that means.
The first thing I want other fathers to know is this: grief comes with a delay. At least it did for me. I cried. I grieved. I felt things. But now, seven months in, I’m realizing that all the grieving I’ve done before – all the baggage I was carrying around – has been amplified by losing my daughter. It’s like Saoirse’s death turned up the volume on everything I hadn’t fully dealt with yet.
The Body Knows
Grief lives in my body in a way I’ve never experienced before. There’s this ball of energy inside me that wants to get out, and I can feel every muscle tensing throughout my whole body. This isn’t like regular tension where you feel it in your shoulders or your stomach. This is different. It starts in my gut, sometimes moves to my chest – in the beginning, my chest felt like it was literally on fire. Everything comes at once. Your whole body is on fire and there’s nothing you can do but feel it.
When that tension comes, when that energy needs to release, I often end up in bed crying, or I need to get out into nature and just… let it process. In the beginning there was anger. Now it’s mostly sadness, pain, and this unease feeling that’s trying to tell me something. The hard part is we’re never taught how to listen to our feelings, how to actually BE with them. And I believe that’s one of the most crucial things about being human.
The Escape Route
After Saoirse died, I threw myself into work. I found a job as a web developer and went full on – all or nothing, which is how I operate. Part of it was grief, part of it is just how I function. But looking back now, I can see it was an escape route. When things get too big to feel, I pour all that fire into something else instead.
Here’s what I wish someone had told me: you can’t outrun this. Your grief will wait for you. It will build up. And if you keep pushing it aside, it will explode. Mine has, a couple of times. The grief leaks out in other ways – the overwork, the body tension, the intensity of everything.
Putting Your Own Grief Aside
I’ve noticed I sometimes put my grief in the background because Maria, my wife, has more needs. She’s Saoirse’s mother. Her body carried our daughter. Her grief is… I don’t know, more visible? More immediate? But when I put mine aside, it doesn’t disappear. It builds up. And that’s not healthy for anyone.
Fathers need to grieve too. We just do it differently. I’m still figuring out what kind of help I need, what support looks like for me. That’s always been a journey – finding the right people. I do a lot of self-work. I’m aware. But what I really need is help going deeper into my feelings, being guided to really FEEL them instead of analyzing them or working around them.
Becoming a Father to Myself
Here’s the thing that surprised me most: I became a father when Saoirse was born, and I’m still a father even though she died. But there’s no daughter to take care of in a physical way. So what does my fatherhood look like now?
I’ve realized that what I would have poured into Saoirse – all that care, that nurturing, that protection – I’m now giving to myself. I’m fathering myself the way I would have fathered her. Taking care of myself. Setting boundaries. Letting go of old fears. Standing up for myself. This isn’t selfish. This is what she would have needed from me, and it’s what I need from me.
There’s a power in me that has been awakened through this loss. I can feel it even if I can’t name it. It’s like I’m a hot air balloon that wants to rise, but I need to throw off all the sandbags first – all the old baggage, the fears, the patterns that don’t serve me anymore.
The Amplification of Everything
Since Saoirse died, everything has gotten more intense. All my feelings are amplified. And honestly? It’s great. I mean that. It allows me to feel so much more, to move through life with more authenticity. Yes, it means there are moments when my feelings take over and I make different choices, choices that don’t always go as planned. But then I realize I’m not sure I wanted the “plan” in the first place.
Fears used to make me do things, make choices I didn’t really want. Now there’s no chance to move in a direction that isn’t true. When that unease feeling comes up – when my gut tells me I’m not in the right place, that I’m not taking care of myself, that I’m moving where I shouldn’t go – I cannot ignore it anymore. It will literally crumble me if I try. And that’s good. That’s my body, my daughter, life itself telling me: pay attention.
What I’d Tell Other Fathers
If you’re reading this in those first raw weeks after losing your child, here’s what I wish someone had told me:
Take care of yourself. Ensure that you are nurtured. If you don’t find anyone who does it for you, then really take care of yourself. Set your personal boundaries. Make them strong enough that you can stay in your bubble while the world spins around you.
Don’t make decisions because you think it’s “best” or because everyone says it’s what you should do. Everyone wants the best for you, but you have to make decisions from where you ARE. That’s incredibly difficult because all your feelings are everywhere and it’s not easy to make any decisions. But be true to yourself. This is the most important thing.
For me, I needed action. I needed routine and stability. Maybe that’s a father thing, maybe that’s a man thing, maybe it’s just a me thing – but I couldn’t sit around dwelling. I needed to go out into the world and DO something. Even if that meant going overboard, even if that meant working too much, I needed that motion. Your path might be different. Listen to what YOUR body, YOUR gut is telling you.
Seven Months Later
To the version of myself from May, the father who just lost his daughter: You’re gonna do well. You created the stability you needed, even if it was with a lot of fire and going overboard. The whole journey is a good journey. You won’t regret anything.
Take it easy. But also, not too easy.
I’m still figuring this out. The grief still comes in waves. My body still carries what words can’t express. But I’m learning to listen to it, to be with it, to let it move through me instead of around me.
And sometimes, in the most unexpected moments, there’s grace. Recently during a massage, I saw my shadow on the floor holding Saoirse. Just for a moment. Was it real? Was it my imagination? I don’t know. That’s the beauty of life – we don’t always need to know.
If you’re a father walking this path, know this: You’re not alone. Your grief is real and valid even if it looks different from your partner’s. Your body is trying to tell you things – listen to it. And you’re still a father, even though your child is gone. What you would have given them, give to yourself now.
That’s how we honor them. That’s how we keep being their father.