Complicated

My response the Daily Prompt Complicated

Complicated, an adjective with the definition of something involving many different and confusing aspects. Everything about the modern world is complicated, relationships, family life, work, and holidays. There is nothing straightforward about going anywhere anymore; where would the fun be in a straightforward world? Complicated is what we English people do best.

My family dynamic couldn’t be more complicated. My relationship with my brother is complicated and civil at best. My relationship with my biological father is straightforwardly complicated. My relationship with my Granddad is confusing to the outside world. My relationship with my Mum’s sister is complicated. My life is complicated and most of the time I wish it could be so much simpler.

My relationship with my biological father is complicated because I’ve never spent more than an hour in the same room as him. The first fourteen years of my life were spent with hearing a small number of stories about how he was a drug addict and didn’t treat my Mum the way she deserved to be treated. He remained being rarely mentioned and that was the way my Granddad liked it.

I didn’t consider meeting him or think about him until after my Mum passed away and he sent my brother and I a card which didn’t do anything to keep our already disrupted household stable in the slightest. My Granddad wanted to burn it before either of us had a chance to read it, whereas my Nan, who had a much less judgemental attitude towards my biological father, wanted us to meet him.

I wanted the first time I met my father to be something that every other girl in my school year had with their Dad’s. I wanted to be a Daddy’s girl. I wanted a fairytale reunion. I wanted to believe that he wasn’t the person my Grandparents portrayed him as. I was wrong; it was never ever going to be like that.

A few days later we met my biological father and his mother, who has lived in the same village as my primary school for as long as I’ve been alive, at Pizza Hut. I won’t lie or beat around the bush about how the meeting went because it was a complete waste of time. Neither my father or his mother acknowledged anything I told them about myself, their attention was focused on my brother and explaining everything from their perspective. Afterwards my biological father gave me a hug and we went our separate ways and I haven’t seen or heard from him since.

I recently found out from my Mum’s sister, who wants me to see him again and build a relationship with a former drug addict, that my father’s family don’t think that I am biologically related to him. The other side of my family know that my brother is his son, but apparently I might not be his daughter. But the only person who can tell me the truth isn’t here anymore. I wouldn’t blame my Mum in the slightest little bit if I wasn’t his; honestly, it would be a blessing.

My Mum’s sister and I don’t get a long at all; she’s very domineering and thinks that her opinion is the only one that matters in every single conceivable situation. I don’t like her at all. When we do talk over the phone she always brings the conversation round to the topic of my biological father, normally the conversation is about how I’m missing out on knowing my biological father’s sisters, and how difficult it would’ve been for him to come back into our lives after my Granddad told the drug addict that he needed to leave.

She keeps telling me that I’m dishonouring my Mum’s memory by not having a relationship with the man who hurt her, didn’t make her happy and made her feel afraid being in her parent’s home. Why would I want to have a relationship with my father or his family if I know how much I would be hurting my Mum in doing so? Surely, she’s the one dishonouring my Mum and her sister’s memory by talking to me about it?

I don’t need my biological father in my life when I know that I have an amazing man like my Granddad in my life. He’s the man who has raised me. He’s the man who has comforted me when I’ve cried. He’s the man who has loved me unconditionally as his daughter from the day I was born. He’s the man who I will always buy father’s day cards for.

 

Love,

Gennie