The Father I Pretended I Had
Each year on Father’s Day, I’ve gone through the motions. Bought the card. Said the words. Swallowed the lump in my throat. This year, I’m telling the truth.
For over four decades, this holiday has come around, and I’ve done my daughterly duty to recognize my father for the role he’s played in my life. In my family, we are expected to get a card, buy him an outfit, and call him or text him with an expression of our love and gratitude. Every year, I’ve gone through this rigamarole with an ever-increasing lump of resentment in my throat.
Why?
Most of the time, I don’t feel like I even have a father.
When I was little, he never got on the floor to play with me. He didn’t take me to parks or push me on a swing. He didn’t tell me I was pretty (unless I had lost what he considered an appropriate amount of weight). He didn’t get to know me. He didn’t support me through my breakups or other hardships. He didn’t tell me how a man should treat me.
He just… didn’t.
Here are a smattering of the memories I do have of him:
It was a rare Saturday evening that my dad wasn’t glued to the TV. We were all on the floor playing the game “Bargain Hunter.” My older sister (by 5.5 years) was provoking me to try to get me to cry. Eventually she won, and I started crying. My dad’s voice boomed “Ami - you’re such a cry baby. If you don’t stop crying right now, I’m going to give you something to cry about.”
Any time I was up late on the weekend watching TV, he’d come in my room with his remote control and turn off the TV without saying a word.
I was a junior in high school and had asked my dad to record Beverly Hills 90210 because I was working. I had forgotten that I had labeled a porno my best friend and I bought out of curiosity as "90210." It autoplayed when he put it in the VCR. Instead of talking to me about it in a loving and helpful way, he delegated the conversation to my mom who proceeded to shame me for my perfectly normal sexual curiosity.
I was a senior in high school and had won tickets to see the Smashing Pumpkins. I had already gotten into UNC-Chapel Hill, but my dad refused to let me go to the show because it was on a school night.
I was 41. I had just built my dream home in Atlanta all by myself. My parents came to visit. My mom had just lost vision in one eye and was low vision in another. She came into my home with her pistol and new gun permit (albeit legally blind) with such pride—trampling all over my beliefs and values. When I stood up to her and suggested therapy as an alternative, my dad boomed from the other room and told me to stop harassing my mom. The next morning, my parents left at 6 a.m. without saying goodbye. I later learned their intent was to punish me.
He was absent—almost zombie-like—headed to work a job he hated and acting like he had no other choice when he had turned down his dream career many times over. He’d come home at lunch and eat with my mom. He’d watch The Young & the Restless on the TV, and 20 minutes later he’d head back to the office. He’d come home from work at 5:30 p.m., turn the TV back on, watch the news and weather, gobble down dinner, help mom clean up, and plop in front of the living room TV until he fell asleep.
He had no interest in what was going on in my life. The only interest he ever showed was in my mom and her welfare.
When I was little and hungry for his attention and affection, I would go outside and “work on” my bike while he worked on his car. I can see now I was searching for a way to connect—something that might make him notice me. I would hang out by the woodpile while he chopped wood. I would help him in the garden. I can’t remember a time he ever asked what I’d like to do.
I had a lonely and sad childhood. It’s no wonder I was boy-crazy at such a young age. I was starving for male attention.
All the while, my mom would rave about what a wonderful man he was. She said it so much she brainwashed me into believing it too. I would brag to my friends about what a good dad I had—how lucky I was to have parents who loved each other. And the truth is, my dad did and does dote on my mom. He has always protected her like a hawk. He buys her what she wants and makes what she wants happen.
He has orbited her like the earth orbits the sun.
And my sister and I were their dolls—there to look pretty, behave, and be left alone most of the time.
In the 46 years I’ve been alive, my dad has only ever called me once (aside from medical emergencies). He called me on my 46th birthday—I believe at my mom’s insistence.
She had come to spend a week with me at my cabin to apologize for being a shitty and abusive mom. During her stay, I told her how neglectful and abusive my dad had been. Her reply? “If he knew you felt this way, it would probably kill him.”
Implying, of course, that my truth would make me responsible for his death.
That same trip, my mom asked for forgiveness—but never made an effort to change. My parents have always made everything about what they need from me, when it always should have been the other way around.
But I digress.
This is about Father’s Day.
So here I am—in Hawai’i—5000 miles away from my “dad.” It’s 3 p.m. where they are, and I haven’t acknowledged the day. I haven’t thanked him. I haven’t said I love him. I haven’t bought a card or an outfit—and I’m not going to.
I’m giving myself—all versions of me: the little girl, the teen, the young woman, and present-day me—the gift of telling the truth.
I didn’t have a good dad.
His neglect and abuse caused me tremendous pain. I deserved better. And I’m done pretending everything was okay.
Father’s Day is a day to celebrate the fathers who show up. Who are present. Attentive. Who know what a gift a child is and rise to meet it with love and intention.
To those fathers: I see you. I applaud you. Thank you for doing your sacred work.
And to those of you who didn’t have that kind of dad: it’s okay to let this day pass without pretending. You deserve that too.
If you’re reclaiming Father’s Day in your own way, I’d love to hear from you in the comments.
You’re not alone.
— Ami