Daniel

This post is going to be a little vague and a little all over the place.

Most of my memories of this man were from when I was very little. Parts of the gaps in my memory have been filled in by family members, so take this with a grain of salt because it might not be the whole truth. But I'll give you what I believe to be true.

My parents weren't married, but that's for the best. I'm not sure how long my parents were together before my mother found out she was having me. But regardless of that, my father left her a little after I was born. They co-parented. Like the setup, I have with Melody's father. I went to my father's every other weekend.

But one weekend he cooked up a plan. It was going to solve all of his problems and get me all to himself. He decided to brainwash me to believe my mother and maternal grandparents were sexually abusing me and force-feeding me alcohol, all at the age of 5. I still remember the conversation. It's a little fuzzy though. As memories sometimes are and this was over 20 years ago.

I was in the bathtub and my father was kneeling over it giving me a tubby. He asked me who I want to stay with, him or my mother. I had to think about it, but I always had more fun with my father. When I was with my mom I got yelled at a lot. So I told him I wanted to stay with him. The next part is a little cloudy so please forgive me. He asked me vague questions like if I felt safe with my mom. Did anyone touch me? Did they make me drink anything? Now being 5 years old, those are pretty easy questions to answer. Yeah, I got touched, I was fucking five years old. I got hugs, picked up, high fives, and held hands while crossing the street. Of course, I was made to drink things. I was a stubborn little shit. I needed to drink my milk and juice. Sometimes I didn't want to as any child does. He asked me if I was afraid of my grandfather. My grandfather was and is a large, angry, drunk man. He often got loud, threw things, hit my grandmother, etc. Yes, I was afraid of him. I think my father lead me through these questions to make it sound like I was being abused. He fed me answers like "was the drink fizzy? Did it taste bad? Did you feel weird afterward? Was the bottle clear or dark?" Being 5 years old I had no idea what I was actually saying. He asked me "Did Papa ever change your diaper? Were you ever left alone with Papa?" Yeah, I was left alone with my grandfather, he would take me for walks around the neighborhood when I was still stroller age. Yeah, he changed my diaper, my mom and Nana weren't always able to do so.

After that conversation, he got me out of the tub, got me dressed and we went to the police station that was right down the street. He made me file a police report, against my own family. But he told me it was the only way I would be able to stay with him long-term. That's what I wanted. So I told the police officer what my father told me to say. They told him that they would investigate but in the meantime, he would have custody. Now I don't know what happened between that point in time to the next one, but all I remember is us moving very very far away. We moved to a trailer park in Milton, NH. That was over 4 hours away from my mother. I believe I was there for about 6 months. There were DSS workers in and out, doing their investigation. I can't tell you how many therapist offices I've been in with one-way mirrors, with a very distinct red light that I could make out. I can't tell you how many hours I've spent in courthouses, how many lawyers I spoke to, how many times I've been asked "who scares you, your mother or father?" But at the end of all of that, they found out my father was unfit to have custody of me. I was put into foster care until they could really get to the bottom of all of it. My foster home was in Burlington, MA. My foster mother was a very sweet older lady named Dotty. I was one of the kids that live with her the longest. I remember I had foster siblings that came and went frequently. Some for a couple of days, some for a couple of weeks. After a while, I had to stop getting attached to these kindred spirits. I was there for about 6 months I believe, and I'm so thankful to this day that I got put into a stable foster home. But I still had DSS officers come to speak to me on a weekly basis, more therapist offices with one-way mirrors, and more lawyers.

They found my mom innocent. I went back to live with her and my grandparents. I went back to the school I was in before my father took me, midway through the year, to the same class of kids I was with in kindergarten. By the time I got back, it was 2nd grade. I didn't remember a single one of them. But they remembered me. I remember sitting by the office, crying because I was so scared. A few older kids came up to me all excited, saying, "oh my God, you've gotten so big! Where did you go?! We missed you!!" I had no idea who these girls were. But I eventually settled into the groove and got a little bit of stability. Never did remember who those girls were though.

I then had supervised visitations with my father at the DSS office with an officer sitting in the room with us. He was not allowed to be alone with me. After about a year of that, he stopped the visitations because he couldn't pay child support. I was about 9 years old when I saw him last.

Later in life, I became very close with my aunt, who my mother never really allowed me to be too close with. She is my father's sister, so you can guess why. But when I was towards the end of my active addiction I reached out to her. We became very close after that. When I was about 4 or 5 months pregnant, a week or so after my 24th birthday she called me and told me my father had a heart attack. He was okay, but she just wanted to let me know that she would go with me if I wanted to see him. At the time I was very focused on "fixing" my family. Trying to mend the relationships that were rocky. So I decided that if something were to happen to him, and I never got to meet him again to at least try I would never forgive myself. So I told my aunt that if she was up to it, I'm willing to go see him. We made the drive down, I was pregnant and showing. We had about an hour's drive from where I live now, back down to the city I grew up in, where he lived. So we talked about my mother and my father to pass the time. My aunt was good friends with my mom since they were little it's how my mother met my father. So my aunt knew all the dirty little secrets of everything that happened.

She filled me in on the gaps I was too young to be privy to. My father is extremely unstable. He became obsessed with me, everything day-in-and-day-out was about me. But not in the healthy normal parent way. The way that was trying to get my mother arrested so he could kidnap me from my home when I was an infant. Apparently, that happened multiple times. He couldn't hold a job and couldn't pay any bills. To the point that my aunt and uncle had to pay his bills to keep the lights on for when he had me. They even bought him groceries so I could eat. My aunt also told me that he has a substance abuse issue (well that explains where that came from), so he would often just be passed out on the couch and I was left to entertain myself. My father was always trying to concoct plans to get full custody of me so no one else could have me. It even made my aunt extremely uncomfortable with how obsessed he was, so she was always there when he had me. Just to make sure I was okay. What I didn't know was that she fought for me. She testified against my father, worked with DSS on my whereabouts, and kept tabs on me while he had me in the trailer park. I didn't know any of this, and it gave me a newfound respect for my aunt. She was the key to saving me from all of that.

We finally make it to the building I remember he was living in when I was five. We get to the door, she knocks on it and my heart is racing. I haven't seen this man in over 18 years. All I can remember is all the court dates, the yelling, the lies, and the interrogations. He opened the door and my heart sank. I look exactly like him. I have his eyes, his mouth shape, his nose, and his cheeks. I'm a spitting image of my father. He grinned, but he had no teeth. He gained a lot of weight from what I can remember. He hugged me but was very careful of my belly. "My Jessi!!!" his words were a little slurred. I noticed track marks down his arms. My anxiety was at an 11. I sat down on the couch as far away from this man as I could, my aunt sitting close next to me, making sure to keep me and my unborn Melody safe. I don't remember a whole lot of the conversation because my heart was racing and I just wanted to get as far away as possible. But I do remember him asking me about the music I used to listen to and if I still like the bands I did when I was little. He asked me about my artistic abilities, what I was going to name the baby Etc. My mother was brought up and he went on a rant about how everything was her fault, and that I would have been fine if they just left me with him (super red flag). He asked me if I wanted to go sit on the porch and talk, mind you we were on the 11th floor. I didn't know where his mindset was, and I didn't feel comfortable even being in the same room with him. I gave my aunt the signal that I wanted to leave, and we did. He wanted to get pictures, and I allowed that. He touched my stomach, where my little beautiful girl was growing, and I knew that was the closest he was ever going to be to my daughter. As we were leaving he told me that if I ever needed to that I could come live with him and (direct quote) "we could be a little family again." I noped right out of there.

On the drive back up, I almost had a panic attack, but my aunt helped keep me calm. All I was thinking was how could I possibly be related to this man. How can I look exactly like him, also have a substance abuse issue, but be so completely sane?! How could I possibly come from that man???!

I don't know. But it took me a long time to be okay again after that interaction. I was pregnant and hormonal, I had just met and lost my father in the same breath. I really had to come to terms with the fact that I'm essentially an orphan. My mother isn't fit to be a mother and my father is unfit to be a father. All I could keep thinking, over and over and over again, was that my little Melody was never, over my goddamn dead body, ever going to feel the pain I did while growing up.

Wherever you are Daniel, I hope you're doing well and could regain some of your sanity.

I may be your biological daughter, but you're not my dad.