The following is an article we published earlier this week that Dr. Colleen wrote to honor her father on Father’s Day. She reveals how they have had a wall between them for many years, one that has been slowly coming down. Her dad read the article and sent a response, it was so moving we decided to republish them both together below. Happy Father’s Day!
Honoring My Dad
(Yes, he is very much alive and well!)
Father’s day is coming up and I feel inspired to talk about what my dad means to me.
It’s interesting that I am even wanting to do this, because it is usually my mom that I want to gush about. She and I are very close and she has been my champion for, well, as long as I have been alive! This is not to say that my dad doesn’t support me too, but it’s different with my mom.
My dad is the most focused person I know. He is a retired computer programmer and is now an energy healer…like me. Our birthdays are 2 days (and 25 years) apart. We are both Aquarians. His primary focus is to help people heal, as is mine. The weird part is that I have felt like there is this competition between us regarding this subject. I don’t know if he has experienced this feeling like me, but at times it seems palpable. However, as of late, I have been feeling it melt away, and now I can allow myself to really begin to appreciate who he really is.
I am very much a blend of my parents. I am emotional and artistic like my mom, and can be very mental and aloof/detached like my dad. But I am starting to let go of these labels that I have attached to him and can now more clearly see him becoming much more emotional and magical. He is deeply touched, so often, by talking about healing and helping people that he will openly start crying while we are talking. I do that too. He is so purely passionate about this and I am choosing, right now, to start celebrating this part of him.
My parents will be married for 48 years this month. Growing up, I have witnessed them fighting and struggling, but also I have seen them hugging and kissing and talking about how much they love each other, despite their differences. Watching them through the years has had a profound effect on me as a married person, knowing that there will be ups and downs, but to always strive to grow together. And now, almost 48 years later, they would tell you that they are more in love than ever. I love this!
My dad has always been the breadwinner in our home and my mom stayed home to raise us kids. This is something that they agreed on when they started their life together. My dad always worked and we never went without. In the early 80’s, my dad was laid off from his programming job. He took a number of odd jobs, including selling books door to door until he got another job in his field. This might not sound like much, and being a teenager at the time, I probably didn’t appreciate what he did. But I do now. I don’t recall any complaints about this seemingly menial, and possibly humiliating work for someone with many years of professional experience and a college degree. He simply did what he needed to do to support his family. I find this to be really beautiful and I am so grateful that he is my dad.
Despite him being fearful about a lack of money for much of his life, he has forgiven many a loan to my brothers and me so that we could have an easier time when we were struggling. He is one of the most honest, straight shooters I have ever met, and even though I haven’t always appreciated this quality in him, I do now. He is a loyal friend, a faithful husband, and a gifted healer and it is time for me to let go of the old bullshit I have held regarding him.
Honestly, sometimes he makes me a little (or a lot!) crazy because when he is interested in something, that’s all he wants to talk about, sometimes bombarding me with this new info before he’s even said “hi”. But I see a lot of myself in him and know that his heart is in the right place and simply gets so excited about life and the possibilities…just like me.
I used to fantasize about having a dad like I see on TV: the gushy sweetheart that tells me I’m pretty and how smart I am and how proud he is of me. But that isn’t him, although I think he does think those things. And my life isn’t a TV show, so who cares. I appreciate that me and my 2 brothers got to grow up being allowed to be ourselves and do what we were called to do without pressure to be who he may have once desired for us. I have to say, we Aquarians do love freedom!
He has, throughout the years, attempted to reach out to me, but I think that I have created some pretty serious walls between us and would now like those to soften and disintegrate. I believe there are absolutely no mistakes as to who we are born to, no matter how seemingly wonderful or awful the experience. There are many lessons that I have learned by him being my father and I wouldn’t trade them for anything, because they have made me who I am today.
Anyway, I really do love and appreciate my dad, for everything he is, and wish him a wonderful father’s day. Maybe it’s time for all of us to reflect on what our fathers have given us, despite the outward appearance.
After I wrote this, I sent it to my dad. I kept checking my email to see if he had responded…nothing all day. I finally couldn’t take it anymore and called him. I asked if he had checked his email and he said yes. I asked, sheepishly, if he had gotten my email. He replied with a quick yes. Then there was silence. I finally asked if the article was ok. After some time, he responded yes. It turns out that he was so choked up with tears that he simply couldn’t talk. He slowly, in few words, said that he was composing a response as we were speaking and we said goodbye. The following was what he sent me. All I can say is that his response was not only unexpected and beautiful, but has also set some major healing in motion.
Honoring My Daughter
My daughter was 9 pounds 9 ounces when she was born. She looked like a little Eskimo baby; makes you wonder! I was hoping for a son, but shortly after seeing her, I forgot all that. She was so cute! I couldn’t have imagined how I could have designed someone like that. I’ll never forget carrying her across the threshhold into our house. It was such a strange feeling that we had another person living with us. I so enjoyed playing with her and carrying her everywhere. She slept between her mother and me most of the time; we liked that. We did our best to love and protect her. We knew she was smart. At a young age she learned names of animals that we had never heard of. Does Tamandua Anteater sound familiar?
But as the years proceeded, I became more distant/detached. I have no answer for that. By 7th and 8th grade there was a pretty big wall between us, and yet I loved and cared for her, but that sounds like an oxymoron. Unfortunately, that wall, was up for a lot of years.
When it came time for her to start college, we paid for 1 year at San Diego State University, but she wanted to go elsewhere. I think she just needed to leave home. We couldn’t afford to pay for her going away to college so she showed a LOT of spunk and got a student loan to go to UC Davis. I really respected that, because I would have caved in and settled for going to school where I didn’t really want to.
She has the Aquarian urge to help people so after graduation she got a job in social service. Let’s just say she knew she could help people in some other way than that and burned that bridge! I’ve never been able to burn bridges. So she went to chiropractic school and before she even got out she was learning another form of chiropractic. So she went into practice and got married and now, of course, I thought now she’ll settle down. But I’ll be damned she spent a lot of money to learn another form of chiropractic. And I’m thinking why can’t she just practice what she learned? So as she is learning Nutrition Response Testing she came down from Sacramento to visit. She had some DVDs for NRT and I asked to see what this Freddie was teaching. Well it opened a new door for me. I learned how to do it, unofficially, and eventually this set me up for many years later when I had an unexpected chance to learn a healing modality. She came down once a month to do NRT on me and some of my friends. With her help and Standard Process, my prostate healed and she taught me so much. I actually learned where body parts were! I believe we started to take some chips out of the wall between us.
So she keeps taking NRT classes in Florida and OMG she falls in love with some guy from Alabama. YIKES! What is she doing? Well this guy saw how terrific she was and dropped his practice, his wife, and Alabama for my daughter; THAT WAS SPECIAL! Change doesn’t come easy for me. She showed me that you have to follow your dream, regardless of what it might cost. That takes a lot of strength!
In the following years, I believe we have kept chipping away at the wall and we will keep at it. I believe we have respect and love for each other. I know I love to talk with her about things; especially things that interest me! (-: She is smarter than me and knows things that I need to learn. She has brought me so many gifts and helped me heal in various ways. She continues to amaze me by changing course quite often by acting on new ideas. Now I just think it’s cool. So as a result, she is married to her dream man, practicing as she is led, and is doing what she started off to do; help people.
Well, that’s my daughter and I’m fucking proud of her!
Jeff Lorenz-
Until next time!
Dr. Colleen
