My father and I were never the best of friends. We were more like acquaintances that just happened to share DNA. Sure he loved me, all daddies love their daughters. I loved him too, even when he hit me. Because I thought that’s what daddies did, if there daughter was very bad, they hit them.
Only thing was, the hitting was when I was about five, the real abuse didn’t start until I between the ages of eight and ten. There were a few times when my “daddy dearest” held me up against a wall by my neck until I could breathe, a few times where he hit me a lot harder then usual, and the final time, where he broke my wrist for not taking my plate to the sink.
You have to understand this, my Daddy wasn’t a drunk, he wasn’t an alcoholic, he never even drank, that’s what made it so hard for me to understand was why he did things like that, even after he and my mom got divorced and the physical abuse stopped because he was under constant monitoring, so I didn’t blame him for the divorce, I blamed my little ten year old self.
I still blame my seventeen year old self to this day. Even though I have been undergoing therapy for seven years, maybe longer, I still saw him all the time and he tried to manipulate me into hating my mother who’s only goal in life is to protect me, he works for the military, and is in Iraq as I write this, even via phone call he still tries to manipulate me and I know that I have to be the one to cut off the ties, if I’m ever going to be okay again. I know in my heart it is not and never was my fault, but that manipulation and that shadow of doubt still lingers, I often wonder if it will ever go away.
But I’ve learned something throughout all the years of abuse, of him calling a 5’3’’ seventy pound me fat, of him telling me I’m nothing but trailer park trash, of telling me that I will never amount to anything, and then saying that I can be anything but I don’t have the guts or the willpower to leave my mom so that I can become something. I did learn something in all of that, other than he needs intensive therapy; I’ve learned where my heart lies,
A piece of it will always be with him, a piece of my heart will always long for him to change and be a good father to me, my sisters, and brother, that he’ll follow me when I leave him again and he’ll say he’s sorry and truly mean it, that we can reconcile for the hundredth time and this time he wont do it again, but I know that will never happen, he’ll always hold a piece of my heart, but it’ll be the part that is broken and mangled because of what he’s done.

A piece of it will always be with my mom, who has loved me and cared for me throughout the years, her piece is whole, its like a flower, its simply flourishing with love and care, despite everything my mom went through as well, she’ll always take care of me and that piece of my heart.

A lot of little pieces will go out to my friends and family some of the pieces broken some whole, some small, some bigger then others, depending on who has cared for me and stood by me while I took the fall, and they helped me up.

And finally a chunk will always belong to me, it may be beaten up from years of hating myself and taking the blame for what my father did, but it is growing and, like a phoenix it is reborn from the ashes of a once battered and abused girl, to take full flight into the world of freedom, not tied down by what was the past, but looking forward to the day and the future. And above all else I know this to be true.

I love my father, but love does not mean I’m going to take what he dishes out, and like the phoenix part of my heart. I have cut off all ties, and I am truly free.