Disconnected

As proud of my father as I am, our relationship has been strained and tenuous my whole life. When I was a toddler and my parents were together, he preferred to spend his time at work or paintballing and clubbing with his friends instead of spending time with me. Once my mother and I left, he frequently missed visits while he was drunk or high; if he was home, he would lay hungover on his couch while I listened to his country music that made me cry ("Who's That Man?" anyone? He sent it to me years later when we were fighting, once). Like I said in my previous post about him, I can count the number of weeks I've seen him in the 12 years of his Army career on my fingers and toes with some to spare.

For much of my life, I struggled to believe that he loved me. I saw his failings as a father as meaning that I failed to be worth his love and attention. I thought that, since he placed his work and his hobbies and his friends and now his new family above me, it meant that I was too broken, too unwanted to be loved. (Some psychologist have, unsurprisingly, hypothesized that the lack of love from my father was the impetus behind my promiscuity with boys, but that's neither here nor here). It's taken me all of my 19 years to come to the point that, with effort, I can believe that he really does love me in the ways he's capable of.

Earlier this week, I spent the day with my step-father running errands. I joked how much easier it was for him to come into my life when I was 5 (and absurdly well behaved, clearly a trait I outgrew) than having to now raise his daughter from birth onwards. He began a discussion how much more challenging it was to deal with my father. According to my step-father, the scarce few times I managed times my father managed to be sober enough to see me, his only motivation was attempting to reconcile with my mother. As my step-father so delicately put it, "He didn't care about you at all. You were just the tool he used to see the person he really cared about, your mom."

I'm not sure many things have managed to devastate me more than having a father-figure confirm to me just how little my father cared for me. When I later told my mom, she denied it vehemently. My logical side believes her. I know my daddy loves me as best as he is capable of and shows it in the ways he can. Emotionally, though, I can't help but be ever more convinced that it really is my fault I wasn't worth my father sticking around.