I don’t have a dad. I used to have one, but I don’t anymore. He’s not dead. And I’m not adopted, but he’s not a part of my life. The world is now vastly replete with Father-to-Daughter epistles imparting wisdom on their young, naive daughters about this cruel world. I wondered, in a world where I never get to hear those words passed to me, what words I would say to my own father if the tables were turned.
My dad was a pretty great dad when I was growing up. He stepped in as assistant coach for my soccer team. I attribute my sense of humor to him because he was the most colossal and epic troll of a dad ever. And he did a really good job of raising me to be independent and strong.
So, for many years, I was ashamed to share with the world why he’s not in my life. I feared how people would judge me. I feared that people would think I was crazy. I felt embarrassed. Mostly, I just felt like a victim, afraid to have control of my own life again, afraid to claim my own name.
A few years ago, I was the victim of identity theft. It wasn’t as cut and dry for me as it is for most people though. Most people just get a credit card bill claiming they purchased something they didn’t and discover that a complete stranger has violated them from some remote location. They fill out a dispute, it gets resolved, and they walk away from it feeling disoriented and shaky about their faith in humanity for a short while.
I was in college at the time, living with a boyfriend, and we had been looking at moving into a condo that was for rent. I had just landed a fairly okay-paying job at a private company doing contract work for the State of South Carolina and was proud of myself. When the owner of the condo requested a credit check on me, I was happy to oblige until he returned to me suddenly informing me that he couldn’t continue.
And then it all just unfolded in one very painful-to-swallow moment—tens of thousands of dollars of debt—in my name, Aimee Ault. Age 23. I filed disputes. The various copies of forged credit card applications then poured into my hands from various major credit card companies. I recognized the signatures, but they weren’t mine. They were my dad’s. It was heartbreaking.
There is almost no sense in trying to describe the feeling attached to this particular moment—it’s ineffable to all but those who have lived it, and fortunately, few have.
I called my dad, wanting to truly believe it was just a misunderstanding, but was responded to with lies, anger, and an unwarranted vitriol that I had never heard in my dad’s voice before. He openly admitted that he did it. I always remember the words he used to defend himself: “I wanted to give you the gift of good credit.” It didn’t make sense. When he found out I had returned one of the dispute requests, he became enraged.
And I cried, a lot. I wasn’t sure what to do. It was surreal how in one brief moment all the years preceding of loving fatherhood vanished into the horizon.
- The man who spent hours making sure I had the best model of the earth and moon for my third grade science class.
- The man who sat me in front of my first computer and encouraged me as I wrote my first madlibs game in QBasic.
- The man who took me to the beach and Dairy Queen while my mom was at work.
- The man to whom I used to recap the previous night’s Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode on our Sunday morning grocery trips.
- The man who I regularly called home from college, who always made a point of reminding me that it’s my responsibility in life to never be dependent on a man. To, ironically, be financially responsible for myself.
That man died in a blaze. I tried so hard to understand his rationale, but I never could. Was it drug addiction? Was it a mental illness? Would I too succumb to this horrifying mental disease that made me hurt people? I was horrified by all the possibilities.
For an entire summer, I spent every day on the phone with police officers, lawyers, creditors, collection agencies. I was depressed and at such a low point in my existence that I started to doubt myself. Guilt washed over me. I felt like maybe I deserved it somehow. Anyone who did find out what was going on made me feel like an asshole for “turning against” my own father, choosing to focus on the broken family aspect over the dramatic crime that had been committed. The longer it took to fight, the longer the story became and the more crazy I felt sharing it. I was internally at war with myself.
Father’s Day came and went. I wasn’t just jealous of people with dads. I was jealous of adopted people too because I thought at least they were mentally free from the burden of the parent that let them down. What was once painful quickly just became exhausting.
But when I didn’t see it coming, so many people suddenly had my back. People I never expected to be there for me. People who owed nothing to me. People who only did so much as offer encouragement and remind me that I’m okay. And being reminded that I’m okay was often all I needed. I needed someone to remind me that I was still alive, because I often felt dead inside.
One day that October, after nearly 6 months of fighting to clear my name, I jumped over the last hurdle and my credit report was finally back to something more reasonable. It was a victory, but it was still a loss, because none of that fighting could mend the broken relationship with my father. It had been 10 months since I spoke to him last. He was unapologetic. And I made a conscious decision to remove him permanently from my life, for my own safety. That was 6 years ago today. And even with 6 years passed, I am still looking over my shoulder constantly waiting for the next bomb to drop.
It took me at least 2 years to make peace with myself over this decision. And even still, every Father’s Day is trying for me. Thanksgiving and Christmas are also difficult. Usually I feel a weird twinge on my birthday, when I realize I will probably cross his mind and he will remember the day I was born, hopefully with some fondness. People close to me sometimes don’t understand my decision, particularly my mom, but even though I wish things were in some other state, I know that decision is making the very best of what little I had to salvage.
It’s tough not having a dad. And it’s such a hard detail to forget and run from, because other people are always sharing their own family stories. But I don’t think I would be okay if I hadn’t made that decision to walk away. The story would have swallowed me whole.
I went to see a therapist shortly after it all happened, who suggested I get some form of closure. I wrote letters every now and then, but couldn’t bring myself to send them. I was afraid he would write back, angry, retaliating, and a wound would be reopened that I had struggled so hard to heal.
The tone of my letters changed over time from angry to condescending to just hopeful for my own wellbeing in the future. I matured some and was able to stand outside of the situation and look back more reflectively, seeing the big picture. My dad may never read these words, but these are the things I always wanted to say… to not just my own father, but to any father:
Being a dad is a privileged job. Our culture loves to celebrate moms because they seemingly work a more physically straining and laborious job. But there’s a lot to be said for fatherhood too. Dads are often the “favorite parent” or the “fun one,” but they are also protective and in so many ways represent our first impressions of trust.
It’s not enough to protect your child. When I was a kid, dad, I told you I wanted to rollerblade and you took me to get the skates. You knew I was going to fall. I’m a klutz and it was something I had never done before. It was inevitable. But you made sure I got the knee pads and the wrist guards and told me that I needed to always wear them so I wouldn’t get hurt. And I listened because you explained what would happen if I were to get hurt. And it didn’t sound like fun.
You stood in the driveway as I lapped around the mailboxes nearby and past the neighbor’s house. You stood and watched and waved goodbye as I saw my friend Lindsey far down the street and sped off. I tripped a couple of times getting to her, but I was wearing the padding you told me to wear so I didn’t get hurt.
I wish every interaction we had past those days followed the same format. I wish you had been open and honest with me. I wish you would have let me make mistakes for myself, get mildly hurt when I did, and still feel like I had a dad to run home to who could make me feel better and remind me that it’s all part of the learning experience that is life.
I wish you would have been open with me and shared with me that you are a fractured man who makes mistakes too. I wish you would have conceded defeat so I could have seen earlier on that sometimes it’s okay to be wrong as long as you try really, really hard to make up for it when you are.
I wish you would have apologized more so I could have remembered right away for myself every time I was cruel or heartless to another person that I needed to apologize for that cruelty, even if I felt my judgments and assessments were totally on point.
I wish you had just been purely honest about who you are and what you stand for. Because I don’t feel like I know where I come from. And it feels like a little bit of my identity that I may never have.
But as much as I wish all of these things, in some sadistic sense, I am okay with how all of these things have turned out. As you taught me, I must never be dependent on another person, including you, and so for that, I have forged my own being and trudged on. I don’t blame you for any of my shortcomings… they’re purely my own, but every time I look back , you get smaller and smaller… and I wonder who’s getting further away from it all, me or you.
