Grief and Getting Dressed.

Navigating parental loss and personal style.

My dad died a little over a year ago.  I wouldn’t consider myself a “daddy’s girl” by any means, but we were a tight family unit and because of the work I do for the family’s wine business and our frequent gatherings, I saw and spoke to him often.  His death from cancer was traumatic, and terribly sad. The grief I experienced with the loss of my dad made me disconnect from myself and the things I used to enjoy.

Throughout their 56 years of marriage, my mom was the stylish one. She is a fashion icon. She is tall, beautiful, and as an artist, has a natural sense of style and design. But my dad liked clothes and had fun getting dressed. He developed his daily uniform early on - a brightly colored polo shirt and Levi’s - and when the occasion called for it, he knew how to dress up.  His suits were custom, and his tie collection was extensive; he liked a button up shirt under a sweater as much as he liked a graphic t-shirt and aviators, and he loved a good hat (bucket or trucker preferably). He bought one pair of Levi’s 501 jeans a year, and wore them until they were perfectly faded and broken in. And I’m pretty sure, even though they looked pristine, he wore the same dress shoes my entire life (because he paid me a dollar a pair to polish them). He liked buying us clothes and jewelry as gifts and made good friends with the store owners where he shopped, only occasionally asking for help and rarely getting it wrong.

My dad embraced a uniform early on, but he had a distinct style and had fun getting dressed.

Since I was a child, getting dressed has always been a fun, creative exercise for me; one of my first fashion memories is wearing my Agnès B. cardigan backwards, so the snaps would go down my back rather than the front.  But last summer, between schlepping my kids to camp, hospice appointments, and helping my mom and sister care for my dad, I didn’t wear much more than cutoffs and an oversized t-shirt for 3 months. I’ve since dubbed the combination my Emotional Support Outfit.  We skipped social gatherings and parties – the times I typically enjoyed dressing up – and I avoided the pool, because what do you talk about when your dad is dying?

In the last days of his life, when he’d lost the ability to communicate, we began planning for a funeral without much previous guidance from him. Without any known wishes, I went into event planner mode and my sister, mom and I started making educated guesses for what he might have liked. The tasks included helping my sister and mom find dresses; buying a new suit for my husband and outfits for my kids; writing and publishing the obituary; creating the slide show, coordinating with the florist, the funeral home, the caterers and the club where the reception was held; and managing family dynamics disrupted by grief.  The meetings kept us moving forward and I used the memorial as a goal to work towards. We kept my dad in mind while making most of the decisions, but ultimately, we knew he would be happy if we were happy.

There were more occasions to pull myself together in the months following the memorial, but clothes didn’t feel good, and it was a chore rather than fun.  I felt below water and foggy; I no longer recognized myself in the mirror and found that grief had transformed my face. I relied on the winter version of my Emotional Support Outfit: jeans, white t-shirt and a sweater or simply workout clothes that I didn’t work out in. There are very few pictures of me from this last year.  I fell out of the habit of taking them and didn’t like the ones I saw, even on the rare occasion that I thought I had looked good.

Grief is solitary, exhausting, and physically painful at times. I found myself annoyed with people for not mentioning my dad and then mad when they did, especially if I was having a (rare) good day. The urge to call him was intense, and in a moment of panic, when I couldn’t remember his voice or his laugh, I un-deleted all his voicemails on my phone. I was not a present parent to my own children, and I was quick to tears and anger. The things I historically loved to do didn’t bring me comfort; I didn’t get through a book for at least a year and forget exercising.

I made a point to start getting dressed, documenting the outfits with photos and Tiktoks.

I’ve found that, annoyingly, some of the clichés about grief are true: time helps and with it, and eventually the grief becomes less intense and all consuming. I still can’t predict what will knock the wind out of me, but it happens less frequently. I still find myself thinking I’m too young to have a dead dad and it makes me angry and sad, but I can find joy in the things that remind me of my father more often – going to the vineyard, wearing the earrings that used to be his cufflinks and simply getting dressed – even if it’s tinged with sadness. And yes, I still wear my Emotional Support Outfit, but maybe it’s just my version of a uniform on those days when the grief is a little too much.

If you’ve made it this far, thank you. And maybe you made it this far because you’ve experienced something similar, grief and loss or simply the struggle to find joy in the things you once loved.  I originally wrote this essay in September, before the height of the election cycle and the subsequent, devastating outcome. I know that clothes and style may seem frivolous when the future feels uncertain but I encourage you to continue to get dressed through the collective grief many of us are feeling. This past summer, I made a point to start getting dressed for real and I will continue to do so in the coming months. I’ve been taking pictures, posting Tiktoks and I created this Substack, all to find my joy through getting dressed again. I invite you to follow along, (subscribe even!) and explore your own personal style in the process.

Fanny