I’m not here to judge anyone. I’ve been around drugs my whole entire life. My dad has always been a weed smoker and had his fair share of cocaine. However when his wife died, he started drinking more heavily and I felt unsafe with the people he would bring over to our house. He was suicidal and I was refit let the only thing keeping him from doing anything drastic. We made dinner together and I definitely gave him a sense of purpose to keep hygiene up, clean the house, etc. When I started feeling unsafe, I started staying the night at my partners more and going out to rugby events. This is when I noticed his behaviour change … he wasn’t going to work anymore, his boss slapped a big you’re fired note on our door, our landlord saw and started freaking out. I had to leave. I just started university and I was failing all of my courses and I was so stressed we would be on the street. I moved in with my partners family and saw my dad a few times a month. Little did I know my dad had started using meth … he was full of energy but not at the same time. We couldn’t hold an intellectual conversation (something that’s always been special between us). We’d always have deep talks about life but It was like he was looking straight through me. I miss my dad so much. He kept using and working construction. I would go pop by and see him working for people’s independent projects at like 11pm at night … and then at the recycling junk yard all the time. He started hoarding so much stuff and taking things apart and “fixing” them. He got gifted this beautiful drivable trailer. He ripped out everything and was living in literally just a metal shell and tossed up blankets. Now he’s officially living on the streets on “skid row” of bc. I send him an email every year in his birthday with a loving letter, because he has no phone for me to call. I call the police every 3-4 months just to make sure he’s alive. He doesn’t ever call me. Not for my birthday, not to see how I’m doing, I’m getting married in May which he knows from our last police wellness check conversation, but I don’t even know if he will show up. My dad was the kindest and gentlest soul I’ve ever known. I’ve gotten some of my best traits from him. We never had much but he’d give the shirt off his back to anyone who needed it. I’ve tried everything to get him off the street, but he has told me time and time again that he doesn’t want to. I got him a place to stay but he found a group of other meth users and ran away with them. I know that they’re his community now, and I know it’s selfish, but I feel like he’s replaced me with other people, and I didn’t think that could happen between a dad and his daughter. I know that drug use and homelessness is so complex and multifaceted. I just miss my dad. I breakdown 2-3 times a week praying to a god I don’t believe in that he will come back to me. That when I hug and see him he’s not just a shell of the person he was. That he will tell me he loves me. I feel like he’s forgotten about me. He literally has never once called me since his meth journey. Does he even want me to keep trying to get a hold of him? Or is he just wishing I’d stop bothering him?? Be honest, do you think he could ever stop?

Love a daughter who will never stop loving her dad.