It’s Too Late for I’m Sorry, Dad…

You can’t control your destiny, but you can cope with it.

By Jessica Spadaccino
Staff Writer

My mother and father a few years before I was born. His rockstar lifestyle led him on a "Highway to Hell".
Photo Courtesy of Jessica Spadaccino.

“What’s the most confusing day in Bridgeport?” he asked. I knew what was coming, so I just raised my brow at him and shrugged. “Father’s day!” He exploded into laughter; I didn’t. I hardly knew the man, and that explains why he wasted his breath telling me that ignorant piece of information he called a joke.

Although I didn’t feel it right away, something about that statement seemed to cut right through me, and I had to step out of the crowded room at my friend’s party. I thought about that statement all night.

As I was growing up, it was only my mother and me. I guess when my mother grew tired of my nagging, “Am I adopted?” question every father’s day, she decided to let me meet my maker. I met my father for the first and last time at a broken down McDonald’s in Bridgeport, my hometown, when I was seven years old. My Godmother brought me to meet him because my mother couldn’t stand the sight of his thin frame and pale skin. I was scared upon first sight. I remember it was like looking into a mirror, but he was a stranger to me. He wanted to hold me, but I wouldn’t let him. He compromised and sat me down next to him, as I clenched tightly onto my Muppet Babies Sticker Book (I loved those things). He loosened my grip, opened to a random page, and looked at the colorful characters. “Who’s that?” He asked me, pointing to a fuzzy little creature holding drumsticks. I didn’t know.

Every day I think about my father. His ghostly white skin, the bags under his eyes; I understand now why my mother didn’t want me around him. He died of a drug overdose in an alley by himself in November, just a few months before I turned eight years old.

I know for a fact that there are a LOT of parents here in the Housatonic Community, but are you really there for your kids? How often do you tell your children you love them? How much time do you really spend with your child? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, fifty-nine percent of American children will live in a single-parent home at least once during their minor years. According to www.Fatherhood.org, an estimated 24.7 million children do not live with their biological fathers, and about forty percent of these children have not seen their fathers during the past year. This is a serious issue.

There is a reason it takes a mother and a father to create a child. It has been proven, according to www.dadsindistress.asn/au, that seventy-two percent of adolescent murderers, sixty percent of rapists, and seventy percent of long-term prisoners grew up in father-absent homes. About sixty-nine percent of victims of child sexual abuse came from homes where the biological father was absent. Eighty-four percent of teens hospitalized for psychiatric care come from single parent homes, and seventy five percent of teens who commit suicide are from single parent homes. According to www.children-ourinvestment.org, Eighty-five percent of all children who show behavior disorders come from fatherless homes.

My father wasn’t there for my first steps, or the first time I rode my bike without training wheels. He wasn’t there to kiss my “boo-boos” when I was hurt. He was not there to tell my boyfriends to take good care of me. He never told me I was worth more, or that he loved me no matter what. My father wasn’t present for my proms. He didn’t tell me he was proud on my graduation day. He wasn’t there to protect me from all of the other men who physically and emotionally hurt me over and over again. He wasn’t there when I got my driver’s license, and he won’t be there to walk me down the aisle on my wedding day.

Thinking of these memories is dangerous. I like to think of myself as a strong person, but to this day it upsets me when I see a father and daughter holding hands. When it comes to my father, I put on an act like I know everything, and nothing emotionally phases me, but I am wrong in doing that. I am not a drug addict, an alcoholic, a murderer, or anything else those numbers try to tell me that I am, but I do have emotional problems that will never be fixed.

To all of the parents reading this article that have never met your children before, or have not been there for your children- go out and find them. Look at the statistics above. You can help stop this! You helped to create a human life - and you could help them become something amazing. You will make an impact in your child’s life whether you are with them or not. Even if the child doesn‘t want you to hold her at first, she will still be happy she got to sit next to you for that moment or two.

To the parents who have stuck by your kids no matter what - Thank you. Even if your children don’t always tell you they love you and appreciate you, remember that they do. If I didn’t have such an amazing mother, I wouldn’t have lived this long. My mother has helped me control my anxiety attacks, separation anxiety disorder, and depression that I have been battling since I was five years old.

To all of the parentless sons and daughters reading this article; don’t add to those statistics. I have found that not having a father is by no means easy, but it has made me stronger in ways I never understood until recently. Being angry at the world or at a father who doesn’t care about you is not hurting anyone but you. It won’t be easy to let it go, but it has to be done. The past is called “the past” because it has already passed us by. I try to take the anger and pain of being without a parent and use it to motivate myself. Everyone who knew my father told me I was just like him, and I was determined to prove them all wrong. I will not become a negative statistic, and I hope all of you parentless children reading this article will find peace in knowing you are not really alone.

I didn’t ask to be born without a father, no one does, but there is nothing I or anyone else can do to change their destiny. It breaks my heart to look at the one picture I have of my father, but I can’t let myself become bitter. I need to take a step back every time I have these thoughts and count the things, like my mother, that I have been blessed with.

As much as I want to put my dad behind me and forget all about him, I still wish that there was a way I could tell him that the Muppet Baby Drummer is “Animal.”