Forgiveness

"Don't burden other people with your problems." ... I remember hearing that as a kid, but I didn't know what it meant until I was like twelve.

I remember my aunt that I was staying with at the time telling me, (with her long finger all up in my face) "people have their own issues , nobody wants to be bothered with yours... some stuff you need to keep to yourself... what goes on in this house, stays in this house." So what did I do, I told everybody ! But it was then I realized her words were some of the realist I've ever heard. She told my daddy (sisters father) that I had been going to my granny and telling her that she was "mistreating" us, my sister and I, "you better check them heifers... They staying up in my house..." Blah blahh blahh and he did nothing. He never defended us when she called us out of our names, and from then own, I kept EVERYTHING to myself. As a preteen I had developed this attitude that, MY problems were my own and it's not like anybody is going to do anything to help/fix them anyway. 

That very next summer I started being molested. Thirteen years old, Terrified! "I'm going to tell... Who am I going to tell? Will they even believe me? What if he tries to kill me? What if he does it to someone else? My momma will kill him and go to jail" ... So the silence began! This went on for three years. As I got older I kind of saw myself as being "the protector" of my little sister. It sounds dumb, but I thought as long as it was happening to me, it wouldn't happen to her. I use to wrap myself up like a burrito, in a comforter and sleep in front of the bedroom door so that he couldn't come inside the room.

Three years after all of this, I'm a sophomore in college, and STILL holding on to this. Until one week I just kept having dreams about him. In one of the dreams we were physically fighting because he had made everybody think I was lying , and that I was just trying to tear his family part. In another, he was just chasing me the entire time. In the last dream I had that week, I'd walked into my sisters room and he was standing next to her bed. I woke up in tears. I cried for two days straight, trying to piece the words together to ask my sister if he'd ever touched her. Well I finally did it, via Facebook chat (I was too much of an emotional wreck to talk to anyone), and after a lot of beating around the bush, she told me he had been molesting her as well. I was sooo furious. I told her that we had to let our momma and step-dad know. She was not trying to hear that. She did not want to say anything, and she wasn't going to say anything. "You know momma crazy... I'm not saying nothing." I didn't care, we had to let this go. One night when both of our parents were at home , I called my mommas phone and made them go into my sisters room and put me on speaker phone, and I let it all out. Of course she was mad at us for not telling her in the beginning, but both of out fears were that she would try to kill him, end up in prison, and then that leaves us where? ... Exactly !

For a VERY long time I blamed myself for what happened to my sister. Its my responsibility to make sure that my siblings are safe when my momma isn't around. I could've stopped it from happening to her , if I would've just spoken up in the beginning , and I didn't. So that burdened me for a long time but reshaped my negative way of thinking. No, you don't have to sit up and tell everybody every little thing that's wrong with you, but some stuff needs to be told. You never know what kind of blessing you can be in someone else's life, if you just speak up! 

I'm not going to say that I've completely forgiven him for what he has done to me or especially to my sister, but I'm continuing to make steps toward total forgiveness. Not for the sake of him and his family, but for the sake of me and my family. 

If you're reading this, Pray for my sister and I as we continue to forgive. 

Outcast.

I don't want to make it seem like I never had a father figure in my life. As a child, my younger sisters father took me in. He was my dad. Growing up he would come pick BOTH of us up for holidays, school clothes shopping for BOTH of us, and we BOTH received gifts from him for Christmas. Everyone in the family took me in as if we all had the same blood running through our veins. Although I haven't seen them in a while, they are still my family. I will never forget how excited I was for Christmas and summer breaks. My sister and I always counted down the days until OUR daddy was coming to get us. 

When I was eleven, my momma sent my sister and I to live with OUR daddy. I'm not over exaggerating when I say, that was THE WORST year of my life. It was like I saw an entirely different side of him. To me, he went from OUR daddy, to Lisa's (my sister) daddy. There were things that he would do for my sister that he wouldn't do for me. That year, I really had to grow up. I learned to braid so that I could make sure my sisters hair was always done, because he wasn't concerned what our hair looked like. Thanks to my cousin we had food in our stomachs before we went to bed each night. There came a point when, if I received money from my momma, uncles or aunties, I was using it to buy food and snacks so that we could eat. Yes, the struggle was real.

Along with the fact that I didn't really get along with my aunt (who's house we all lived in) the worst part about that year was when my 12th birthday came around. Now, anyone that KNOWS me, knows I DO NOT like chocolate. For my birthday, I received a chocolate cake. I didn't complain, but I didn't eat it either.

When that year was over, I was never so excited to see my momma. I vowed to NEVER step foot in that house again, and I didn't. My sisters daddy would come and get her for hoildays, as usual, but I was sticking to my word. I finally made the decision to go back and visit my extended family when I was 18. The only reason I did go back to visit was for my Nanny (sisters grandmother). She called, and asked me why I wasn't coming to the family reunion, even though she already knew. "You can't make me pay for what somebody else did." When she spoke those words to me, I knew I had to swallow my pride and take that trip. 

I LOVE the my sisters family, always have and I always will. I love OUR daddy. He didn't have to take me in and treat me like one of his own for as long as he did, and because he did I'm very thankful. Buuuut I also feel like, if you stepped up and took on such a great responsibility, why would you flip the script on me when I needed you the most? I can't deny the fact that for a year I felt like an outcast by OUR daddy. 

I'm Just Being Honest.

There are a lot of things I wish I could have had growing up. Mainly a relationship with my father.
I don't think people from both parent households truly understand how the absences of a parent can really affect a child. Whether it's short term, long term or lifetime, a girl growing up without her father does cause short term, and/or long term issues.

Nothing hurts more than when you actually want to have that relationship but that feeling is unrequited. 

Growing up, (and sometimes now) I often wondered, "WHY?" Why was he always telling me, "I'm going to take you to the movies this weekend" The weekend comes around, and I'm dressed and ready for my father to come AROUND THE CORNER and pick me up. WHY, out of a thousand basketball games that I played in, he only came to ONE? WHY? WHY? WHY? I've never gotten my answers, and I don't think I ever will.

Thinking back on it, I don't recall being sad about my fathers absence, because my momma was always their to pick up the pieces. She always knew what to do or say, but sometimes I felt like she was making excuses for him. In middle school, I found out what child support was, and I couldn't understand why my momma wasn't MAKING my father pay her. I was his child too, and I felt like he needed to pay her for taking care of me by herself. She never did. I remember thinking to myself, "how dumb can she be?" She had the power to MAKE him pay, I wanted her to MAKE him pay for not coming to my games, for not calling me on my birthday's, for not being there. Its not like he has 3 kids, I am the ONLY one. She never did. 

When I got to high school, I remember my momma saying, how she couldn't MAKE a man take care of his responsibilities, but she can and she did take care of hers. She would always talk about how time consuming going to court was, when she could be at work. I also learned that she WAS indeed, cussing my father out all those years. She just made sure I wasn't around to witness it. From then on, the amount of respect I had for my momma increased immensely. From then on, I wanted to do everything I could to make her job, as a single mother simpler. I strived to get the best grades, to stay out of trouble, and to help out around the house as much as possible.

I wish I knew the words to say, or the steps to take to "get over it".  My advice is to LOVE him, and DON'T blame yourself for their absences. Nine times out of ten, it honestly has nothing to do with YOU. God removed him from your life for a reason. Whatever they have or had going on in THEIR lives, may not have been what you needed to be exposed to. 

RELAX. RELATE. RELEASE.

RELAX. My purpose is NOT to bash absent fathers.

My hopes are that, through my post, other females that can RELATE, will see that it IS okay to be angry and hurt, but learn not let those emotions consume you. RELEASE.

I would also like to hear from other women with absent fathers. Those who are interested in submitting a post, contact me. I really believe that we can all learn and grow from the experiences of other in similar situations. 

My goal is that our stories help each other, and women like us, continue/start our journey to on releasing emotions that only hurt us.

Let's grow together!