Daddy's Girl

I am a Daddy's Girl. I always have been, and I kind of love it. When I was very little my dad was my champion, he would save me from nightmares and spiders and strangers. He would bring me special presents for no reason and I would treasure them.

My parents divorced when I was 11 years old. Seeing how hurt my mom was by his actions, my father fell from grace. My family fell apart, and put itself back together in a strange new way that didn't make sense to me. Slowly over the years I fell out of love and contact with my dad, and by the time I was 20 I didn't even have his current phone number. And the thing is, I was fine with that. I was angry and hurt and jealous and confused by his leaving us for another woman and I was happy not having anything to do with him. Or so I thought.

I was 24 when it happened. I was taking a self-development course that my work was making all their managers go through. A major part of it was to forgive your parents for being human. I didn't want to. I liked being from a broken family and I thought it made me edgy and cool to not be talking to my dad. And I didn't want to let him back into my life because then he could tear my life apart again. But as I was trying not to listen to the speaker, as I was trying not to see what he was saying, something clicked for me and my whole world shifted. I could see that he was just a man trying to do the best for his life, kind of just like I was. I could understand how my dad had been stuck between the family he had and the woman he loved, and if that was me would I have done it any differently? Maybe, but he did it the way he did because that was the only way he knew how to deal with it. And I got it, actually deep down got it.

I managed to contact him that day. I told him that I finally understood what had happened when I was 11. I apologized for keeping him out of my life for so long and how much that must have hurt him. I cried. He cried. We've completely rebuilt our relationship since then and the really funny thing is that I was never actually ok with not having him in my life. It hurt me to think about my future and him not being at my wedding, him not meeting my children, him not being there for the millions of mundane things that make up life. I had gotten so used to that pain that I didn't even realize it was there until it was gone.

And I get to be a Daddy's Girl again. How great is that?!