Dear Reader,
Throughout her life my daughter has struggled with her discovering and fitting the identity her mother and I had given her. Her mother and I have witnessed her struggle and yet we could not find it in ourselves to address, not only her questions, but the lie and the brokenness that our marriage was suffering from. My conscious decision to ignore my ex-wife’s affair and consequently the needs of Lacey only led to her digging deeper until she came to see me today, inquiring about my relationship with her mother.
I have known for years now that she is the product of my broken marriage and my ex-wife’s betrayal. The moment my ex-wife called the police on Rodney’s wife, I knew I was living a lie. My relationship to Lacey was a lie, my relationship to my wife was a lie, and my own identity as a father was lie. Despite knowing the pain of being lied to about the person I was, I could not stop myself from selfishly trying to preserve the identity we had created for Lacey.
Lacey simply came to me today for answers, but I’m afraid that while we were speaking I disregarded her identity as a black woman. I know that she has found herself within the black community, which relieves me to know that she’s finally comfortable with herself, but somehow that seemed like she was only shifting farther and farther away from me. No longer did my daughter even attempt to connect with the parts of my identity I could have given her.
I want to love Lacey as my daughter, as I once had. I want to return to the relationship we had once shared. But now I can’t love her as I once had, now knowing that my blood does not run in her veins but another man’s. Even still, I mourn for my ignorance and my lost identity as her father.
Robert
Robert