I remember the day that my dad left; the day he didn’t come back and the day that not only me, but the whole family would not have a conversation or see him for years. It was the year 2000 and it was his birthday. We all went to Olive Garden for dinner. My family had a good time, but I guess he didn’t. I was only 3½. Who could have guessed at that age, their dad would leave them. The next evening was a rude awakening. My mom began to worry because he hadn’t come home from his “late shift”. I began to remember all the memories that he and our family created, like when my brother Myles and I were jumping on his bed. Myles’ Pokémon comforter was thrown across the room. Then I fell a tragic fall and cracked my head on my brothers’ drum set. My dad insisted that I would be okay until my mom had gotten home and I bled through three or four washcloths. My mom rushed me to the emergency room. The time when I smelled the candle and my hair caught on fire, I don’t think that my dad did anything. Or even the time when I was at daycare and I was playing and I had put a rock in my ear. I said that I was saving it for later and my pockets were to full. I was rushed to the emergency room again! After all the memories that our family had created, what made him make the life changing decision of leaving our family? What did I do? What made him abandon us?
We waited for him for 3 more heartbreaking years. The pain was unbearable, but somehow we took care of each other, with friends and family to help us get through. I had started school and we moved on with our lives. We had to move out of an amazing home into a small duplex. My mom hated it; Myles and I loved it! In 2001, my mom found him in Arizona. Also in 2001 the divorce was final. He said that he would write to my brother and me, he did but only once. The entire time he was gone he didn’t say anything I really don’t think that he cared. He sent my brother one thing the whole time. He bought Myles Pokémon Monopoly and me stupid, plastic, dress up shoes. All those days made me wonder where we all went wrong. I remember how all the other kids had dads and how they always bragged about how much better their dads were than mine was. It was difficult telling them that I didn’t have one. I would always ask my mom to see a picture of him. I wanted to know who he was and Myles wanted to kill him.
The day that he tried to waltz back into my life is a day I can almost remember crystal clear. Myles and I had just got home from school around five ish. She brought Myles and me into the living room. I didn’t know what to think. Was I in trouble? Was I getting something? I really didn’t know what to think. She finally told us what was going on. The fact that my dad wanted to enter our lives again was crazy. I remember for a very long time I would cry all the time and I would breakdown often. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do with my life. Should I love I him because he was back or hate him because he left. A couple weeks later my “dad” and my mom had set up a date for Myles and me to basically meet our father. I was almost fine and I had moved on until he came back. The first time I saw him it was just my mom, Myles and I. He was not a man I could ever see as being my dad. He thought that I could love him after he just left us.
A couple times after I had met him for the first time I re-met him and not just him. When I saw him again I got the feeling you have when you get off a roller coaster. You are so excited, but you are so scared at the same time, sometimes so scared that you heartbeat is going roughly 1 thousand miles per hour. He was with “them” and this was real! I found out that in his course of being gone he got remarried to a woman named Brenda and (unfortunately) had a child named Charlotte. I will never forget because I cried myself to sleep. I started seeing him more often trying to get to know him and his family. When it finally hit me!! What am I doing? I HATE HIM!! I remember telling him and his family that they were just a rebound family and that I hope he leaves them too. When deep in my heart, I knew that he might actually love them more than me. Every time I would try to talk to him he said that I was just blowing s*** out of proportion and that he never did that. I knew that he wasn’t right because it was still happening. I still hate him. He didn’t and still doesn’t want to admit that he was wrong. He ignored the fact that he abandoned my family. He kept on making promises he could not live up to. He was getting Myles’s and my hopes lifted up just to be let down. About a year later my mom got a boyfriend named Rick, I was very mature for a ten year old. I saw my dad occasionally, but the visits weren’t to swell though. My dad developed anger and I developed depression. One year after my mom had met Rick, I began to rebel.

I would do everything I could to be bad, I would do things that I am not proud of. And because of my pain, confusion and abandonment, I started doing things to intentionally hurt myself. That continued for 2 ½ years. I had gone to about 5 different counselors in about two year time. I found myself looking for love in all of the wrong places. I was falling into a deeper hole every time I blamed myself or even began to look back on what had gone down in my life. I now know that nothing was my fault, but then I was blaming myself for it all.

In the year 2008 my mom remarried. That was a time in my life when her, Rick and I and I fought all day everyday. I felt like she chose him over me. She found someone to love and I hated it. I was so used to the three of us Mom, Myles and me. When he came around that all changed. I won’t ever forget that night my mom was having a party and I was with Amanda and Myles came outside and said “Morgan I hope you know that mom and Rick are getting married!!” I went to my room and cried. I was happy to have Amanda there to help me through the night. I didn’t talk to my mom for a week I still haven’t looked at her wedding ring. I can not go through the same s*** that my dad made me go through, that is one of my biggest fears in life.

I took all the pain, anger, frustration, confusion and so much more, I had towards my dad out on my mom and Rick. I came to the point of doing things my way and doing what I wanted, when I wanted. In one year time I got kicked out quite a bit and every single time my mom made me go to my dads or my grandma’s house. We all got so separated that when I would walk into the room I would clench my fists. I couldn’t even look at Rick. I don’t want to know him still. I can not us seeing us resolving our differences, all though he makes my mom happy I can not be happy about their relationship.

To this day I still haven’t had an honest conversation about what my dad has done to my life with the abandonment, emotional abuse and emotions. But I still remember the last conversation I had with him; I told him that I don’t need his help in life. I can make it on my own with out him in my life. I am willing to go through my life with out him but when I die I want to know that he loved me, at this rate I can’t see that happening. So no matter whom you have lost or what you are going through, what doesn’t kill, you can only make you stronger. After everything, I believe that everything happens for a reason. I know that I am me and my happiness is up to me and only me. I am realizing that no matter whom you are what you do or where you come from, you can get through everything. I don’t want people going through the same thing that I have gone through because divorce is the main thing that is tearing families apart and the kids have to realize it is never their fault.

Today I am well on my way to becoming a better person, I try to recognize that I don’t know what people’s backgrounds are and I have to respect them because I know I hated rejection then more then I do now when I was going through the tough times in my life. My goal for everyday is to be the best person I can be. I will never forget the times that my dad had brought me the good and the bad made me who I am today. I wouldn’t change that for anything. For him it might just be a memory, but for me, it will always live on. I know that everything God puts in front of me he does it because he knows that I can handle it the best to my ability. I know that had my parents never got divorced, my life would be completely different, but with every door shut another is open.


Life is too short. Grudges are a waste of perfect happiness. Laugh when you can. Apologize when you should. And let go of what you can't change. Love deeply and forgive quickly. Take chances, give everything and have no regrets. Life is too short to be unhappy. You have to take the good with the bad. Smile when you are sad. Love what you have, always. Remember what you had, always forgive and learn from stupid mistakes. People change and things go wrong. But always remember; life goes on!!!!!