I’m an only child of parents who are married, yet living apart. My father however, is father to a daughter and son, 3 or more years older than me. I don’t know much about them, let alone about my father so I’d preferably not make him a big subject besides his effects on me.

Before his career took off we lived together as a family and even his family who I don’t even know anymore (I was about 2 last time I saw them) lived close by. All I remember was events of myself getting hurt, and one particular one that showed my pure heart (I had a funeral for a butterfly my cat killed lol). Anyway as he moved away for his career, my mom and I moved into my grandparents place. It started off with him visiting every weekend and sleeping over, followed by him sleeping over less too coming over less and bringing gifts as a means to make up for his lack of presences in my life. I applaud him for trying as long as he did.

But little did he know, in primary school I felt like an outsider because I was this little girl who had no father to watch her hockey games, no father to support and push her in “right” and “positive” directions. I was the girl whose father was still in the picture, but found it easier leaving her alone in this big messy world. I mean divorce has terrible consequences on children no doubt, but this, I don’t even know how to defend him because its like he held on but I just wasn’t good enough for him to actually be a father.  My mother however, was always there for me and I can’t even begin to describe how grateful I am for her. But unfortunately I always felt like her rock, and not just the good kind but like an anchor keeping her down from having and creating a better life because she had to take care of me as both a mother and father. This woman guys, I don’t know how she does it but she’s the strongest human I’ve come across in my entire existence. However, I could never find the courage to add more hurt to her life by opening up to her about my crazy childhood and yes, even till this day I keep almost all my demons to myself.

Going into high school, he made sure I went to an all girl school. Now firstly, in primary school the way I got by was through friending guys, playing rugby, cricket and whatever nonsense guys do because I felt hated by most girls who I considered friends, and funny enough got hated even more for being friends with guys. Secondly, being at an all girls school, most of my friends went to mixed schools, so not only was I in an environment I felt alienated by, I completely shut down (ps I made some pretty cool school friends but that was it – school friends). As a learner throughout primary school as well as high school he’d always want to see my report as every parent. The difference was with mine, and im sure many others experienced it too, is that he focused on my failures, which too him was less than code 7. Nothing I did was good enough, not even those few 7’s I got. That was invisible to him, not worthy of praise and motivation of doing that good again but instead the bad marks were shamed, I was shamed. “with marks like this you could save me money and work at edgars” still engraved in my mind. My mothers sad eyes still a vivid picture in my mind, her helpless voice still trying to let me know that she is sorry about my father and that I have her full support in no matter how good or bad I do.

Now as a psychology student, I’ve learned about this topic. I’ve learned that I had no control over how I then tackled my academics yet somehow, I made it to university which was my greatest accomplishment thus far. I never put in much effort because I didn’t wanna give my all and still fail in my fathers eyes. But my moms kind words and belief in me pushed me through, and no words can describe how grateful I am because not everyone has this. I’ve lost faith countless times but always found my way back and I can assure you, God knows what He’s doing. We all handle certain situations differently, but don’t think its because of you that you fail, that you’re sad, that you perhaps tackled it the wrong way, because believe me there are a billion ways I could take the things that have happened to me and make something out of it, but funny enough I feel like I’m on auto-pilot, giving God my temple to make an example of the obstacles he gives us.