DISCLAIMER: Before reading this, keep in mind that this was from my 14 year old self! There is a solid chance that typos and mispellings and punctuation errors do exist. Brownie points if you can find all of them. ;) I found this letter in a ICloud note from my eighth grade year and decided it wasn't awful enough to not share with the world.

11 Things Dads Should Know Before They Leave Their Daughter or Son:

1. I myself grew up without a father figure, and let me tell you, up hills and downhills are different when only one person is raising you. My uphills became her uphills and my downhills became her downhills too. She made me her entire world and for that, I could never be grateful enough. I saw my mom struggle, I watched her hair pop up with peaks of grey when she was only 26. I saw her break and fall apart because she was too tired to “hold up the fort" on her own. I saw her cry, a lot more than she thinks I did. I saw her not know how to control her anger and sadness. I saw a lot. From that, I grew up faster than most children. In a sense, I felt obligated to, like she needed me to, so I did. My mom couldn't give me her all and she couldn't fill the void my dad left without driving herself into an endless pit first. But from this, I also saw my mom grow. I watched and admired as she did her makeup, I watched her become stronger, I watched her cry tears of joy, and I've traveled the world with her with smiles on our faces. Just the two of us. My mom is my forever best friend.
2. I became a tragedy. People automatically assumed that not having my father in my life was horrible and basically life-threatening, in the same way that people freak out over chlamydia. Although chlamydia isn't exactly ideal and it's pretty rough, it isn't the end of the world and it is 100% curable. Sorry for the awful analogy. Either way, I'd like to think it wasn't all that bad. Until I realized, it played a huge part in my failing mental health. From guys I chose to be with, to depression/bipolar disorder/anxiety and self confidence issues, a lot of it had a origination against the idea that my father did leave me. He did hurt me. Accepting that as my conclusion took years. Therapy didn't work, parties with friends didn't work, church didn't work, literally nothing could fix the broken pieces of me that my dad left.
3. I have a lot of traits of his, from his one crooked tooth to his bright blue eyes to his overly emotional love for the world. I actually look and act a lot like him. Sometimes, when I look at myself in the mirror, I see his face and not mine. I learned not to love my bright blue eyes that came from him. I learned not to love my pudgy nose and small lips. I learned not to love my teeth that look just like his. I learned not to love myself. Looking in the mirror became something that didn't happen much because everywhere I looked, I saw him.
4. Not only did I take his physical features, but I took his talents. I learned to make art out of nothing, poetry out of literal and metaphorical scars and tears, and songs out of sadness. I learned how to paint pretty pictures from a man who never taught me how. I learned how to sing pretty songs from the man who never sang to me.
5. Notice that I am saying "I" a lot. I am typically not a selfish person, but for this entire situation, it is all about me. Therefore, to any fathers contemplating leaving their children, read this as if it were from your children's perspective.
6. People always ask me why I don't take medicine literally ever. Typically I brush it off like "oh, I just don't like having to swallow a pill and the liquid tastes bad" or something of that nature. Truly, it is because I know what caused my dad's fall, I've saw him high on god knows what, I have heard his voice slur and blur without a clue what he is saying, and I have saw what I didn't want to become. I can't end up like him, I won't end up like him, I pray that I won't.
7. Life becomes a daily battle of "do I want him in my life" and "does he deserve to be in my life."
8. Your daughter or son will look for love in people who have qualities like you, just like how I did. Not on purpose, it's very unintentional. Believe me. I assume that it is because we are searching for the love we didn't recieve? Either way, I ended up in emotionally abuse relationships at an extremely young age.
9. When you realize what you did wasn't the greatest thing to do, don't try to go back. You won't know them anymore. After five, ten, sixteen years, they are an entirely new person and there's a 90% chance that they have totally moved on from the fact that you did leave. It's unfair for any dad to think he can just up and go anytime he wants and then come back a few years later having a child with open arms. That is not the reality.
10. You will not only blame God, you'll blame your mom and your uncle, yourself, and your dog too. It will become everyone's fault because you won't want to take the blame. But why would you? Who would ever want to admit that they left their baby girl or baby boy instead of getting their life together and being around their child?
11. You will be forgiven eventually, but forgiveness comes from acceptance. That being said, your child will have to accept that you didn't want to to get your life together, your drugs were more important, you didn't have the money to raise them, you were too young to raise them, etc. Your child will have to wonder where the hell they went so wrong. Why did their on father not want them? Why did my own father not want me?