I’m a woman, a wife, a daughter, an NHS worker and—as I’ve always said—just an “average Joe” (well, Josie, actually). But the man who raised me was anything but average. Six months ago, I lost my world. My Dad was my everything. He raised me alone from the age of two after my mum decided that children didn’t fit her lifestyle and walked out. While she spent her years in the local, well-known bar, drinking herself stupid from the moment the doors opened, my Dad was out on building sites. A man of the construction industry, he spent his days driving plant machinery and his evenings being a single parent.
He worked himself to the bone to ensure we had a proper home and food in the cupboard. We didn’t have much, but he made sure we had a holiday to Skegness every single year. I remember being a right bratty teenager, stomping my feet and demanding to go to Spain like everyone else, never realising the extra shifts and the quiet saving it took just to get us to that Butlins by the seaside.
My Dad never let me feel the absence of a mother. He was my mum, my dad, and my best friend all rolled into one. Even when I was a teenage rebel—the “anti-christ,” as I’m sure he thought at the time—he supported me. He might not have agreed with every choice I made, but he was always in my corner. When I went to university to train as a nurse, he was at the end of the phone after my longest, hardest shifts, letting me rant or cry or whatever I needed. He never once told me I was overreacting; he just backed me up.
When I got my first proper job at the hospital, he took me out for a meal to celebrate and revealed he’d been saving my whole life to do something special for me. He decided to pay off the majority of my student loan. He’d decided that this milestone was the one worth his savings. I was so thankful, even though the teenager inside of me was screaming “We could have gone to Spain!”. That was just the man he was—a master of most trades who could fix anything with his hands. When I bought my first home, he was there helping me decorate before I’d even moved in, usually grafting away while I was at work.
He was born in 1959, a man of a “tough” generation, yet he didn’t have a bigoted bone in his body. He wasn’t homophobic, racist, or transphobic. He lived by one simple rule: “If they’re nice to me, I’m nice to them. That’s how this world should work, none of this horrid shit we see.” Those were his words, and he lived by them every day.
After he passed, I had the soul-crushing task of emptying his one-bed flat. I found his whole life tucked away in storage containers under his bed—bits of art I’d made him when I was five, letters I’d sent from uni, every memory of us neatly packed away. Then, I found an envelope marked Private. I assumed it was his will.
Nothing prepared me for what was inside. There were love letters dating back to when he was thirteen. They were written to and from his best friend, the man I’ve affectionately called “Uncle” for thirty-seven years. They were sweet, raw, and spoke of a definite “true love” feeling. A secret relationship that started in their teens and never truly left his heart. I realised then that my Dad had likely only married my mum to hide who he was from a society that wasn’t ready for him.
At the funeral, my “Uncle” was devastated. You could see he hadn’t slept for weeks; the tear marks were etched into his face. He walked over and gave me a massive hug, and we both just stood there and cried. When he gave his eulogy, it was the kind of tribute you give for a partner more than a friend. I don’t know if it was because I knew the truth by then, or if it was just that obvious to everyone else.
A week later, I asked him to meet me for a coffee. We went to the Starbucks in Market Gates. I placed the letters on the table and asked him to be honest with me. He looked at me, his eyes welling up, and finally told me the truth. They had been in love their entire lives. He told me that just before I was born, when my mum’s drinking started to take over, he had begged my Dad to leave her so they could finally be together. My Dad refused. He told him he had to stay for me.
I broke down right there in the coffee shop, realising that the reason these two men couldn’t be openly happy for forty years was because I was born. My Dad thought he had to choose between being his true self and being a father. He chose me. He chose my stability over his own heart.
My “Uncle” placed his hand on my knee and said, “You made him happy. You were his world. He loved you more than he could ever love anyone else.”
My “Uncle” is bisexual; he truly loves his wife, and she is a woman of incredible grace who knew the truth, accepted their past, and accepted their friendship. But my Dad… my Dad stayed in that closet because he thought it was the only way to protect me. He was a master of most trades, but he couldn’t build a world where he felt safe enough to be himself.
Since then, “Uncle” has become like a second father to me, and his children are like my siblings. But I carry the weight of what he gave up. Love is too important, and life is far too short to hide. Please, love who you love. Be happy. Enjoy your life while you can. Don’t hide. Only clothes belong in a closet.
I only wish my Dad had understood that. He was already my hero; the truth would have only made me love him more.