Can you tell I have daddy issues?

I was watching All American Season 5 when Billy Baker died. His death made me cry, and I’m not one who cries over shows. But Billy’s death was different. Billy’s death caused a pain in me that I didn’t try healing from. Watching the people around him crumble was the hardest. Watching people lose their father. Watching people lose their mentor. That was the hardest. It was hard because I know I’ll experience a pain like that because I’ve experienced a different type of pain from a different type of fatherly loss.

It was when Spencer James was going to therapy that opened my eyes. They all leave me. Everyone leaves. My dad, father figures. Males in my life tend to leave.

My uncle left when I was 4 to be a monk, my dad left when I was 6 because he didn’t know how to father. My fatherly figure left when he moved to SC, my grandpa got sick and passed away without saying goodbye, my uncles moved to NC.

There are so many more, but one common theme remained. They all left because of what they wanted, because of what they needed. And I wasn’t what they wanted or needed.

I’m dispensable. I needed them, but they never needed me. They can move on and be with their families. What they don’t know is that they stripped me of mine.

I’ll never know what a father's love feels like. I don’t think I want it at this point. But it hurts knowing that other people experienced it and I never will. He’ll never walk me down the aisle; he’ll never meet his grandkids. He revoked all privileges when he left. He revoked all privileges when he didn’t fight for us. He revoked all privileges when he had kids he wasn’t capable of loving.

I pray my kids never feel this pain.