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I remember when I was 4. The one person in the world that I knew would always love me, would always be my best friend was there. We were playing a silly game that consisted of me trying to run away, only to be snatched back up by the back of my shirt, held down and tickled. Then repeat. I remember being completely happy and giggly. This seems to be the last good memory that I have of that person that was any good. The rest is all sad. All seem to be tormenting me in the back of my mind.
The one major one is when I was 8. For some reason, my mom had a bad feeling about me sleeping in my bed that night. So I slept im my brothers room with him. Next thing I knew, I woke up to the sound of my mother and grandparents freaking out. It was around 3 a.m., I think. "I cant believe he was gonna kill her! Why would he do that to his own daughter?" Sounds that keep repeating in my mind, even after 20 years. He had brought a gun into the room I would have been sleeping in, and pointed it at the shape that should have been me. Then taking off when he realized he it wasn't ME. I still hear the cop telling my mom that he would quit if she would take him back. Thanks, "Dad"!
Then, after a couple of years, I am spending the court ordered weekend with him. I am 9 or 10. His girlfriend (now his wife and my little sisters mother) is D.R.U.N.K. BAD. They are fighting AGAIN. She calls me into their room, and I am always helpful at this age, so I go, of course. "Dad" didn't try to stop me. I went in, discovering a 29 year old woman who has cuts down her wrists. Not asking me to help her. No, that would have been to easy. Asking me, a 10 year old, to kill her. So, I run from the room crying, and "Dad" tells me to go get rope from the backseat of his truck. Not, "Call the cops". Nope. "Get a rope so I can tie her up". Nice impression to leave on your innocent child, "Dad". Never even a "I'm sorry you had to see this". Thanks, "Dad"!
It gets better. A couple years later, Christmas Eve, he decides in his Meth induced idiocracy that I dont need to go home for Christmas, as planned, and as I wanted. Nope. I needed to go sit at his druggie friends house, while he left to do more drugs with someone else. The guys wife, having kids of her own, decided that she was going to sneak me to the grocery store so I could make a much needed phone call to my mother. We made it out of the driveway, when her psychotic husband ran out and jerked her out of the car, beat her, and then drug her back in the house. A nice neighbor saw what was happening, and came to my aide. That is how my 12th Christmas was. Nice. Thanks again, "Dad". I can see the "CARE" radiating all around you.
Then,
I'm 15. Another court ordered visitation. This time for 2 weeks. At the end of this two weeks, I had a babysitting job for a friend of my mothers. We were going to be helping her move 200 miles away, and she asked me to go to help her son who had cancer. Had to pack as I was going to be gone 4 days. So, "Dad" decides that I don't need to pack, or go, for that matter, in his drunkenness. My brother, who was 20 at the time, used my fathers addictions against him, and popped up for a visit. He is not his father, BTW. He smokes some pot with him, gets him real interested in some stupid story, then offers to take my clothes to mom so she can pack. I say yes, and my bro's idiot wife tells me when she is able to go get into the car after I tell him Im taking a shower. So, I sneak out the window, jump in the car, and take off. My brother had to kidnap me from him. A chase ensues, he follows us for a long time, until we lose him in the ghetto. We make it home, and he has called the cops, who show up at my mothers house. Didnt press charges on my brother, or my dad for kidnapping. Tells my mom that maybe she needs to send a recorder with me on visits, but that I was now allowed to refuse them. So, this was the beginning of the end for our relationship for many years. Thanks again, "DAD"!
Then, after a long time, I learn that I have a little sister, so I start coming by to check on her. He starts growing up a little. I ask him to come to my first wedding, he says he has to work, and sends his girlfriend. Then, after my husband dies, I get a phone call, "I'm so sorry, Ill be at the funeral". Then, I move, he doesnt answer when I call. Wont come to my second wedding a few years later, his "FAMILY vacation is too important to put on hold for 1 day".
And, after many unsuccessfull tries at moving on and reconnecting, he still cant spell mine or my kids names correct. Always lets me know when fathers day is, too. Yesterday he sends a "Happy Thanksgiving" text to me. Mind you, he has ignored every text I have sent in the last 5 months. So, I say it back, and tell him to tell my little sister that I love her and miss her, and I purposefully spelled her name wrong. The reply ended everything. "You know her name is spelled _____! But have a good day anyway." Guess I know how I rate in the scheme of things, huh? Thanks, "Dad"!
I have a DAD. I met him when my mother brought him home to meet me when I was 16. My kids LOVE him, he calls me every couple days, and has helped me out more than anyone else. He was at the hospital when all of my kids were born, came in the room minutes after each delivery. I named my last one after his father. I hear this sad country song about dads, and it is him who I think of. I even made a drunken phone call to him after hearing it. He stands up for me to my sperm donor. And he has walked me down the aisle twice. He has attacked people when they were trashing me at the one moment in life when I didnt need it. And he is now raising 3 little boys whose parents have never been around. They (my nephews) call him "Dad"! So do I. Its nice to know that I am valued as a daughter to someone who never had kids till he met me. Didnt even want kids, to hear him talk about it. And he called as soon as he found out what sperm donor did yesterday. Tells me "You dont need him, honey. You got a DAD right here, and you always will!"
SO: One more time, THANKS AGAIN, "DAD"!
You succeeded in giving me the insight to know that I am better than you! I am smart, beautiful, have 4 beautiful kids that will never hurt like I did, and a FAMILY that makes me feel whole and happy. I have a man beast that HATES what you have done to me, and is raising 2 kids that ARENT his, exactly as he is the 2 who are his. You have given me more strength and courage to do what is right in my life than anyone else could have. You made me see that my kids are going to be innocent until they possibly cant anymore. Valued on the highest pedestal. And for two kids that lost their DAD, that is super awesome! And they are. I KNOW that I am a good person, and deserved to be valued for more than a pawn to make my mother and brother hurt, which is all I ever was to you. And I TRULY know that now. I know that you have never seen me as anything other than a tool to make my mom pay for leaving you. Your anger turned you into a foul person. A very foul person. One that will never influence me or mine again. I just want you to know that, "DAD".
