Should I contact my Father?

[sapphire904]

This is a hard thing for me to talk about, so I'll give you guys the basic details and hope someone can advise me with just that. And if there are any fathers out there, please feel nudged to read this and give your opinion. Here's the background:

My father had an affair with my mom and I was born as a result. My mom said he loved her, but he decided to stay with his wife and son at the time. So, I never knew my dad while I was growing up. He eventually had another son with his wife after I was born. When I was 9, I initiated a meeting with him out of curiousity than anything. I saw him each Saturday for the next 3 years. At first, it was great - I was so happy and excited knowing that I actually had a dad. We would go fishing or hiking and spend the whole day together. My mom always asked him for support money and I always told her that I just wanted to spend time with him. But I guess she needed it, being a single parent and all. As the years went by, our time was reduced to about an hour when he would pick me up, take me to lunch, then drop me off again. When he dropped me off at home, I'd go into my room and my mom and him would kiss in the living room for like an hour until he left. I felt used and angry, so I told him i didn't want to see him anymore. He didn't argue or anything...so I didn't see him until I went to college. My mom called him and made him meet us on campus. The 3 of us spent the day together, he gave me $500 for school and I never saw him or talked to him again.

Over the last few years, I've thought about him and about contacting him. Each time I do, I cry because of the pain. I think I've forgiven him, but I can't seem to get him or the hurt out of my heart. He's never made any effort to contact me, but I have moved several times since college and now that I'm married and have come to Christ, I would really love to bridge the gap between us. I just don't know if it would be the right thing to do. He is still with his wife and my 2 brothers are doing well for themselves (one owns a business that my dad helped him with). I do feel like I got the short end of the stick, being his "affair child" and the devil reminds me often that I was a mistake (even though I know God has a purpose for me) but I would love the oppurtunity to have a father and maybe even talk to my brothers, who are my age. I don't want revenge or money, I think I just need to tell him how I feel and leave it open for him to decide if he wants a relationship now. I'm scared, though, that he may not want one and that once again I'll feel the pain and rejection like before. Can someone please let me know if I should do this??? It's been 15 years since I last saw him that day at college and I don't want to stir up any trouble, but he is my dad and I feel like I deserve something from him, if not, just to tell him that I forgive him (if he cares). Thank you for reading this looooong post.

A couple other details to add: according to my mom, he denied that I was his daughter when I was born because my mom wanted child support. Maybe it was to spare himself the shame of telling his wife where the money was going. They had to run blood tests on me and him so she could prove it. Also, he lied about his income so that he only had to pay $25/month in support until I left college. I mention this because it made me think that he didn't care enough about me to make sure I was taken care of; like another form of rejection. On the good side, though, he named me after his mother and I know she wanted to meet me when she came over here from Italy. It never happened, though. I think that was around the time we stopped talking when I was 12.

[Vhayes]

Please be patient with me as I answer - this is straight from the heart and therefore may come out a bit confused.

I don't think he rejected you at all. He abided by whatever your wishes were at the time. He did exacly as he was asked in the instances you have mentioned.

Contact him and see what he wants to do. You may be surprised. Let go of the feelings of rejection and please let go of the feelings of being a "mistake". No child is a mistake - they are a wonderous gift.

I'll pray for you and the whole situation. God will use it for His glory and your ultimate good.

Hugs to you!
V

[Dani H]

Your dad ought to be commended for making any kind of effort to be involved in your life at all. Not that this excuses anything else, but at least it's something. In order to understand the scope of the situation, you're going to have to take a step back and include all of the people involved and the dynamics of all of it and look at it from an adult point of view.

I do understand your feelings because I come from a fairly volatile background myself and didn't have a relationship with my dad until I was an adult. We get along fine and talk here and there and I know he loves me and he knows I love him, but the closeness just isn't there, never really was, and it's just something I've had to deal with, and let go of. God has done a fine job by giving me an in-law family who have pretty much adopted me as their own and so those holes in my heart have been filled but not until I came to terms with the situation and the dynamics of it, and let go of the "woulda coulda shoulda" regarding my childhood. You can certainly make an effort to form an adult relationship with your dad and let the chips fall where they may. Let the past be what it is and see if you can have some sort of a future. And if there is bitterness or rejection or feelings of abandonment in your own heart, then you're going to have to face those and work through them, with God's help. Because you already have much more than a dad ... you have a Father Who loves you completely and unashamedly and Who will never leave you nor forsake you and Who will continue to catch you, no matter who else lets you down.

[hdt]

Placing the dynamics aside for a moment - what does your heart tell you?

Do you feel that God is nudging you?

I wouldn't place to much towards 'family dynamics' and the rest. You happened, and if his family doesn't know - and you are his daugther - maybe its high time they did!

Sounds like both of your folks made mistakes, but you are still here. If you feel the nudge towards a relationship with your father - you do have that right! You are his child afterall! LOL How you got here doesn't change a thing!

[MissTissa77]

Ok, I really want to post on this thread...I don't want to sound negative so I just want to give some background info on where I'm coming from and say that my father left my mother when she found out she was pregnant with me. He had been having an affair and they were divorced before I was born. He was in and out of my life until I was 7. Then he allowed my step-father to adopt me. 13 years later I made contact. Things did not go as I had hoped and we have spoken once in the 11 years since. I have been working on forgiving him and have a letter for him to tell him I forgive him. So, I kind of am in a similar situation. I have 2 views on this. First and foremost, follow God and His will for you would be my encouragement for you. Second, the child in me that got hurt wants to urge you to be cautious of having expectations.
I pray that you have peace with your decisions and good comes from them! I will certainly be praying for you!

[Bethany67]

First and foremost, follow God and His will for you would be my encouragement for you. Second, the child in me that got hurt wants to urge you to be cautious of having expectations.

I would echo this as wise counsel; I was rejected by my birth father who refused to have anything to do with me and that remains the case to this day. Although my relationship with my birth mother is actually fine at the moment, there was a year when things had 'dried up,' and I was very hurt over that. I wouldn't want anyone else to go through that, but there's always a risk in relationship. Only you can decide if it's right for you.

[matthew7and1]

I would say that you should contact him if you feel that it's what God is leading you to do, after much prayer and meditation on the issue. HOWEVER (capitalized for a reason) I think that it would be most beneficial for you to get your expectations in check. Once you are in a place that you expect nothing from the man but maybe his attention or consideration, then I think you will be more capable of handling whatever happens. The way that I think of it is that my father owes me nothing. He is who he is and I can't expect more or less then that.

[Prophet Daniel]

Hi, I wrote some of the verses for you in case you didn't know ...

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you ..." Jer1:5
".. those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers ..." Rom8:29
..before the world began..rejoicing always in his presence ... and delighting in mankind...Proverbs 8
"..the spirit returns to God who gave it ..." Eccl12:7
" ..He has made everything beautifull in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men... Ecc3:11
..through him and to him are all things.. Rom11:36
..he chose us in him before the creation of the world...Eph 1:4

Just to let you know that you actually came from God and will return to
Him. You existed with God before you had a body. I am almost sure you have heard this but most of the time this comes as a revelation as well.
You must contact your father bearing in mind that if he is not a Christian that you should replace all feelings that are not positive with ones of pity for someone who hasn't found his heavenly father yet. It is possible that you are spiritually much more mature than him and that the roles are reversed. You might have to help him getting identity.True reconciliation is when someone is reconciled with God. The enemy should not be part of your vocabulary. Look at your cv above.

Enjoy the journey.

[sapphire904]

Thank you, all. My heart is telling me to contact him, but I'm scared more than anything. In response to DaniHansen's reply, I don't feel like he made any effort since I was the one who initiated our relationship when I was young. He had our contact info through the courts. If I'm missing something that you see in my post, please let me know. I truly believe that the only reason he continued to see me was to get closer to my mom again. So, in a sense, while I was trying to have a relationship with him, he was using me to hook up with my mom. I'm scared that he'll try it again, I guess. Or that if he knows he can't get to my mom, he won't see any reason to have a relationship with me.

[DanceswithGod]

I did not know my dad until I was 11 or 12 when he suddenly appeared in our driveway. I was somewhat excited (though there had been many men in and out of our lives) to know that this was my real dad and he was here. My parents actually remarried within the year. He was a drunk, he was selfish, so on and so forth.

When I moved away to college, my parents divorced yet again. My dad would call once or twice a year, and he was always drunk when he did. Slurring about how much he loved me, blah, blah, blah. I remember being at my in-laws house one night when he called. I hung up the phone and sat down on the couch next to my father-in-law. I cried and said that if he really loved me, then he would have been there for me all these years, and he would give up alcohol, and he would not be who he is. If he loved me then he would call on important days,not just when he was so drunk he didn't even know he was calling. I said that I was done. I wouldn't answer anymore, I wouldn't send anymore cards, I would just pretend like he had never come back into our lives all those years ago.

My father-in-law told me that God gave me a second chance. What if God would have written me off, or would write me off every time I sinned still today. That maybe what he needed most was to know that I loved him even though he was a screw up. Maybe he only called when he was drunk because he was too ashamed the rest of the time. At first I was in shock to hear these things from my father-in-law, but I went to bed that night and couldn't get the words out of my head.

I didn't write him off. I stayed in touch with him over the years. Mailed him cards, pictures, called him on his b'day. Then something interesting happened several years later. He sobered up. He's been sober for 8 years. My children love their Pappaw, though we don't see each other often, we stay in touch on email and we call each other. It's strained at times, especially on the phone, because I don't always know what to talk about with him. We are practically strangers sometimes. But I know he is sorry for the past, and I have forgiven him.

So, to answer your question. Just write him a note telling him you're there and that you love him--not because of anything he's done for you, but just because he is your father.And then see what God can do from there. Don't expect great wonderful things right away. It took years for us. And many times I thought that I shouldn't have listend to my father-in-law. But then we wouldn't be where we are now.

[Dani H]

Thank you, all. My heart is telling me to contact him, but I'm scared more than anything. In response to DaniHansen's reply, I don't feel like he made any effort since I was the one who initiated our relationship when I was young. He had our contact info through the courts. If I'm missing something that you see in my post, please let me know. I truly believe that the only reason he continued to see me was to get closer to my mom again. So, in a sense, while I was trying to have a relationship with him, he was using me to hook up with my mom. I'm scared that he'll try it again, I guess. Or that if he knows he can't get to my mom, he won't see any reason to have a relationship with me.

I think as long as you approach the situation with both eyes open, you will be fine. I'm not saying you won't be hurt, but you will be fine. We have to approach people for who they actually are, not for who we want them to be, because that's when we set ourselves up for disappointment. As long as you have a firm grasp on reality, that's all that matters. As for any lingering open wounds within you, and I would encourage you to allow God to heal them. People may let us down and reject us and abandon us and manipulate us and use us, and God have mercy on their souls, but your heavenly Father will never treat you like that. And maybe God put this whole situation on your heart, because now is the time to work through it and close the doors to the past and embrace your future with the holes in your heart closed and healed? It can be very difficult and painful to address past hurts, which we're very good at burying and trying to ignore, but we have to understand that we're a) not children anymore and b) that God is with us now to help us and to comfort us and to take us through them. And once He delivers us from those pains, it is forever and we never have to bear them again. Please understand that in Jesus, you are already a whole and complete person, and you don't need any person or relationship on earth to make you complete, because God already did that for you. The missing piece is always Jesus Christ, never a flesh-and-blood person.

The important thing is to place your expectations in God, and your faith in Him alone, and not in your dad, because he's not going to be able to meet them, evidently. You are a believer, you have Jesus, and because of Jesus, you have more to give to your dad than he has to give to you. And perhaps that is why God is putting him on your heart, because he needs the Lord and you're going to be the person God uses to pray for him and minister to him? Who knows? As believers, we have to approach situations with an attitude of "I'm bringing Jesus with me into this situation and to this person because I am already rich and whole and complete in Him and so I can share Him with others" instead of "what am I going to get out of this?" and "how is this going to affect me?" It's all a matter of perspective, really.

Sorry for the rambling, I'm not completely awake yet. I hope you can see where I'm coming from.

[Cloudwalker]

Sapphire, I will admit that I haven't read all the answers posted here but those I have read have been good. If you wish more help working through your feelings toward your father I would suggest that a good place to start, at least here on our board, would be to start a thread on Chat to the Ministers board, found here. This is a private board where you and one of our board Ministers can talk in private where you can share knowing that it won't be seen by everyone. Both Amazin and Project Peter would be glad to help you. I would urge you to seek them out.

Cloudwalker
Facilitator for Familys in Christ

By the way, feel free to continue here as well as a number of our regular members have whisdom to share as well.

[sapphire904]

Thank you Cloudwalker and all for your guidance.

[cnw]

I think as a child your thoughts were misconceived. I don't think he was using you, but trapped in sin. I think you are intuitive now that you are saved and see that because of you he still had seen your mother which you know was a sin. You were not the sin! His sifestyle was the sin and wether or not you were born or even conceived he lived a lifestyle that was ungodly.
Do not be afraid. through your testimony may be the only way God can show him he needs repentance and a hearty change towards a savior. God will use you in your fathers life. Go and be truthful. He stopped seeing you because you told him you didn't want him anymore. I am thinking that hurt him greatly, but also helped him stop his affair with your mother...it was both a blessing and a curse to you both.
Siblings are a wonderful thing. My biological daughter would want a relationship with her siblings before me in a moment. they are becoming very close. May God bless a friendship long coming with your half siblings.
fear is not from God and I believe Satan would not want you to be a light in this other part of your family.
May god live through you that your father will see a need for repentance and a savior.