For the love of a father... is just too much to ask

I lost my father earlier this year. A bond between a father and a daughter is hard to destroy. But, I guess that assumes that it was ever there.

Do I miss my father? Or do I miss the opportunities that I never had? Did he even love me? Did I love him? I once said that I wouldn’t forgive him. But then I changed my mind. Do I want to change it back? Should I forgive him just because there’s no way he can make it better? Even though he never really tried?

“My one and only baby girl,” he said. And it wasn’t about me. Sure I wasn’t meant to see it, but it wasn’t a hidden secret. Just something that I happened to stumble across one day. It wasn’t that he had a better relationship with someone else’s daughter. It’s that he replaced me. Like I didn’t even exist. Did he ever even think about me? This is something that I’ve held onto. No one else knows about it. I never wanted to share the intimate hurt that this one comment created.

We had no connection. He knew that I was in the world somewhere. He knew that I wanted him to reach out to me. I wanted him to be the man that I deserved to know. But, instead, he replaced me. Pulling his life together was too hard. And letting me go was just too easy. Am I ready to share this detail? Will other people think that I didn’t love him? Or that I don’t deserve to be hurting? Is that how they already feel? Or do they think that I am just moving forward, free from the pain inside my chest? Free from the knowledge that my father never loved me.

I guess I just want someone to see me. I’m scared and suffering in my own mind. But I cannot quite seem to get anyone to notice. Everything is always okay. I’m fine and I will always be fine. I can’t imagine a world where that simply isn’t true. I have a deep desperation to be seen as the strong survivor that my therapist believes me to be. But, the simple truth is, I’m not strong. And no one will ever see that I’m a survivor because I’m ashamed of who I am. There’s a person that I could have been and there’s the person who I am. And they’re not the same. So many missed opportunities. So many shots that I was too “whatever” to take. Too scared? Too stupid? Too afraid? Too ashamed.

This little girl hidden in my heart, believing too hard that the world is made of good people and unfortunate mistakes. She hides in the shadows of my sins, and I’m supposed to make things okay. How can I convince her to let go of the hurt and the fear if I can’t bear to hear it?

Will the world ever remember what it did to me? Does it even know? Abandoned by my daddy’s love and left to show anyone around that I can be okay. That I will always be okay.