One of the most bittersweet, yet painful things about my stepfather leaving our lives was having to face the reality of my relationship with my dad.

When we were young, and my parents were together, he was always there, and there were special times that he would take us to our favorite playgrounds and make me my favorite sandwich for lunch.

When my parents divorced, it’s like he gradually divorced my brothers and I, also. We would still have those moments where we wound spend time with him on the weekends, but he was mentally distant. It was something that I didn’t understand, but I felt lucky that I was getting the “love and attention” from Pastor, my stepdad.

When Pastor left, it opened up a gaping hole in my heart that I only knew that my dad could fill. Surprisingly he didn’t come to the rescue like the little girl in me thought that he would. This led to anger and resentment towards him. I also felt abandoned and unworthy of love.

I remember my mother talking on the phone with my dad and telling him everything that Pastor had been doing me throughout the years. I’m not sure what he said to her, but her response was, “Maybe if you didn’t do what you did, someone wouldn’t have abused our daughter!” Since then, he never mentioned it or even talked to me about it.

During the time, he had just married a woman who was mean to us and didn’t want us coming over her house every weekend, so my dad would get us every other weekend. Something that he never was, was protective over his children. It’s something that I never understood.

When I got old enough to choose, I decided to stop going over their house all-together. By that time, I was so angry and depressed, I would take it out on him, writing him e-mails, and being even more distraught when he didn’t acknowledge or answer them.

For years I would seek his attention, and the urge to be close to him would pour into my adulthood. When I started to have children, I wanted them to have a close relationship with their grandfather, and I was very vocal about it. He would come for their birthdays and give them each a gift at Christmas, but for me, that wasn’t enough.

It took me years and it wasn’t until recently that I came to a realization that he is who he is, and, like it or not, I had to accept it. When I say recently, I’m still accepting it. It’s been a long road of processing, but I’m dealing. It also doesn’t hurt like it once did.

I realized that a lot of my self-worth was wrapped in how my father reacted toward me. There is a lot of self-worth that a little girl gets from her father telling her how beautiful and important she is. Or protecting her from the “bad guys” that come into her life.

Not only was I dealing with the aftereffects of childhood sexual abuse by the hands of someone who was a father figure to me, my own father didn’t want anything to do with me. It was enough for me to believe that, maybe, there was something wrong with me.

It wasn’t until I learned about my father’s upbringing and how his distance didn’t begin and end with me, that I was able to stop internalizing it so much. Also, looking at my dad as a person who has his own story and reactions to them, gives me just enough compassion to not take things so hard anymore.

Scriptures that have comforted me when I felt fatherless:

• Psalm 27:10: “When my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will take care of me.”
• Psalm 68:5: “A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy dwelling.”
• Psalm 10:27-8: “O Lord, you hear the desires of the afflicted; you will incline your ear to do justice to the fatherless and the oppressed, so that man who is of the earth may strike terror no more.”

Through these scriptures, God constantly reminds me that I am special, loved, cherished, and His child. It diminishes the lies that I once believed about myself. I am not worthless; I am worthy of love, and I didn’t deserve to go through the things that I did. Although my earthly fathers broke my heart, my heavenly father is mending it through His love for me.