Not a Daddy's Girl

While watching television a few nights ago, I saw a commercial that provoked some emotions in me. It's the one where Kenny Chesney's "There Goes My Life" song is playing in the background as a dad replays some memories of his little girl through the years. My eyes immediately filled with tears and I struggled to hold them back so that my husband wouldn't see them. My first thought: Why wasn't I good enough to have that?

I am 35 years old, and I still long for and cry over the loss of something I've never really had--a great relationship with my Dad. I don't let many people know it. I hate for my hurts to be exposed but this one keeps coming to the forefront so it's time for me to be honest about this part of my life. It's time that I stop holding it in in fear of who I "might" offend -although I pray I don't offend a soul.

Please tell me that there are other women who struggle like I do with issues caused by certain relationships, or lack thereof. Please tell me that other women want badly to feel loved and adored beginning with their earliest memories. Don't we all want to feel like the first man who loves us will do anything to protect our honor so that the man we marry is only left to pick up that torch without having to start from scratch. Don't we all want to feel worthy of a bond that seems only natural to most?

Most of my "issues" go back to one of these questions. I find myself asking myself and the Lord, "Why wasn't I worthy of more?" Is it wrong of me to want more than I have, even if that "more" is merely a basic to most of the females I know. I find myself jealous that some can crawl up in their daddy's lap, no matter how old they get, and have the most comfortable relationships with the first man they ever loved. I've never known that. I have no idea what that must feel like but even at my age, I long for it.

You would think I would be accustomed to this and well adjusted. Some think that I am, but inside it hurts no less today than it did when I was a child. At what point do I get to work past this? What has to happen for me to heal? Because no matter how much I forgive and try to move on, it comes up over and over again like fizz that appears when a soda gets shaken. It affects all of my relationships in some way, shape or form. Granted I've come quite a way over the years, I keep seeing these insecurities in me that stem back from this very topic. I want to be healed already.

Let me just clarify some things. I want to be a Daddy's girl but it's a little late for that. I don't know how, and I know he doesn't know how to change the past anymore than I do. I'm not really angry or bitter towards him. I've forgiven him and tried to rationalize in my own mind why things happened as they did. He does love me, and I won't deny that. He's not a bad man neither. But neither of us know how to make our relationship "normal" and I wish I knew how to accept that. But I don't.

The good news for me is that I have another father. I have the Father in Heaven who formed me in my mother's wound. He celebrated me before anyone even knew about me, as my unwed mother carried me. He is there for me when humans fail me and He grieves with me when I hurt. Even better, I am developing a relationship with Him where I could crawl up in His lap (emotionally), and tell him everything that's going on.

Sometimes doing without things that we consider quite basic increases our need for Jesus Christ. Only He can fill in the gaps. Therefore, even though I hurt, I am thankful that He turned my hurt toward Him and that He gives me far more than any human relationship could. It doesn't mean that I am healed, but that He is working on doing just that. After all He came for people like me.