I remember coming in this thread last year and feeling really bitter and frustrated with my life and ended up posting some very insensitive and misguided posts against fathers out there. and for that I apologize NT.
My pops passed away in 2009 when I was 18, and I really don't think I've ever given myself the chance to grieve his passing properly, even still. Im in a better place than I was last year, but Im still not fixed. Its tough being in my 20's, living in NYC trying to figure life out, and not having your dad by your side. There are definitely rough days where I am mad I cannot call him for help, or sad days where I just want to let him know of the small victories I achieved that week, but more than anything I just wish he were here to see me develop as a man and come to slow and maturing realizations about HOW MUCH he's done for me and my brother growing up, realizations we really could not even grasp as children, realizations I'd just like to tell him Thank You for.
A lot of people close to me ask me how I'm doing around this time every year, and in the past it would always send me into a lonely spiral of frustration, anger, unfairness, just the works. And I won't go so far as to say I still don't have traces of those feelings in me right now, but I am working very hard towards becoming a better me and my outlook on my relationship with my father increasingly feels that I am one of the luckiest dudes on the planet to have been fortunate enough to call him dad for even 18 years of my life.
Wishin' good vibes on all NT fathers and children out there