STOPPING TO FEEL

Collins explores the life and death of her complicated father—an “adventurous, fun-loving, and generous” man who also had a “loud, stubborn, and angry” side.

The author’s father, Boris, was one of 10 children descended from Finnish and Russian immigrants, and suffered abuse during childhood. As an adult, Boris became a law enforcement officer, and he was a high-energy but emotionally disconnected parent, notes Collins. Several deaths in the family and the revelation of a dark secret during the author’s teenage years left her questioning her family history and Christian faith. When she was in college in the 2000s, her father was diagnosed with colon cancer and her parents divorced. To cope, Collins writes that she immersed herself in her law-school studies and a full-time police department job. As her father’s health deteriorated, his behavior grew erratic, she says, noting he ran 56 miles in one day to celebrate his 56th birthday, and attempted to run for governor of California. Collins married and became an attorney, but when she began having panic attacks in 2014, she began therapy and sought out a support group. As she learned more about herself, she says, she felt more compassion for her father. His cancer was eventually deemed inoperable, so he sold his home and moved in with Collins; he died in 2023, after several difficult weeks. The author took time off work and finally let herself feel and express her feelings: “Allowing myself to let my walls down and be vulnerable in front of those I love is the true gift of generational wealth Dad left me,” she concludes.

In this bittersweet work, Collins boldly confronts ambivalent feelings about a parent. Readers who were raised by, or experienced the loss of, challenging parents are sure to find her story relatable. The book presents thought-provoking questions, such as “What do you do when you learn that the person who raised you to follow a certain standard of ethics…doesn’t follow his own rules?” The author shows plenty of self-awareness, reflecting on how “no matter how deeply hurt I was by Dad’s behaviors—at my very core, I still always loved him. And because I loved him, I wanted to protect him.” However, the tight focus on the relationship between the author and her father unfortunately crowds out other family members’ stories, and how they influenced her life. One compelling section, though, describes the challenge of caring for a parent while parenting one’s own kids, which will resonate with others in similar situations. Collins is revealing about the emotions she felt: “The less energy I had for my children, the more they tried to suck it out of me…I pulled back, exasperated by their parasitic nature.” She also explores how those caring for the dying often want the experience to end, only to grapple with grief when it does. The book’s short chapters keep the narrative moving, and photographs of the author and her father effectively personalize it.

A strikingly honest memoir about a father-daughter relationship, but one that could have valuably had a wider focus.