Then I started thinking about what he looked like, what was he thinking when he left me? Does he actually think about his long lost child? Lots of unanswered questions. I was a happy child, did not even know who my father was until I was in Cape Town in 1998 when my mother decided to tell me about my father who left me. There I was, living with Gogo, my late great-grand father and my late cousin- sister, my uncles and my other little cousins. I remember growing up with my mother gone to the cities of South Africa trying to make a living and send money and clothes home. That’s what I saw as I grew up in the rural areas of the Eastern Cape.
Whether there is a father in the household or not that child will grow up healthy and happy. Maybe yes, maybe no.įrom where I come from, it takes a community to raise a child.
A father, he is the one who is present for you, who welcomes you, who takes care of you and guides you safely by building every day a path permeated by important moments in the life of a child.Some say a child needs both his parents. If you have not known your father, probably your most healthy and important affection has been elsewhere: your mother, your grandparents, even your friends, or your companion as you grew up, people who were the pillars of your everyday life.Ī father is not only the one who gives life. There always comes a time when it is better to forget this suffering of the past in order to heal the wounds of the present. But, sometimes, understanding helps us to relativize, and to avoid accumulating too many negative emotions. Probably he did not have the paternal fiber, or even a good self-esteem, or an internal balance that would have allowed him to see his mistakes and to realize his fears and his own shortcomings.īut can this justify his absence and that emotional void that he has left in us? No. Understand that the absent father is a man who has not been able to exercise his role as a father, and he never fully understood what this role could imply. The first thing we should do is "understand".
How to overcome the injuries caused by the absence of the father? "You know your father, you know how he is," "Do not do that, you know your father will not appreciate it." We recognize the effort our mother made to fill the father's lack, but we also recognize how many times she has been able to excuse him by saying things like. They do not know what to expect, there is no response to their expectations, and they tend to compare the parents of their peers to theirs because they know that the parents of others do not act like theirs.
An empty, fierce paternal relationship generates anxiety in children. The child expects affection, communication and a daily interaction that allows him to open himself to the world through his father. The absence of the father generates incongruities and voids. The brain of a child is in great need of stimulation, and on a daily basis it needs positive reinforcements in order to grow in a mature and safe way. However, growing up with a paternal figure who, although physically present, is incapable of bringing fullness, tenderness or gratitude, creates voids in the heart of a child who then learns to build his world. Growing up without a father, a mother, or an important figure in our childhood because of a traumatic event, is something that is always dragged along with us, leaving internal scars that we try to bear. However, when the absence of a parent gives rise to an education that has resulted in injuries that have left traces, it is more common for the absence of the father. it was my father, that's it."īut this type of emotional thing is not just about the paternal figure, because it can also happen with the mother. When we talk about the father, silence settles and the answers are: "I do not know, my father was. Sometimes when someone is asked to tell us about his family, he tells us all about the life of his mother, his grandparents, his uncles, etc. You have probably experienced this situation yourself, or you know someone close to who it happened. It is a psychological absence that can cause various emotional wounds in a child. Sometimes it can also be someone who is physically present but has not known or wanted to exercise his role as a father.
The absent father is not only the physical void of a figure that is unknown. We can even say that one of the absences most difficult to manage but which is however the most frequent is the one of a father. Talking about family can sometimes wake up some wounds, disappointments and little grudges. We know how difficult it can be to define the word "family".Ĭan we consider that the members of our family are only the people who have the same blood as us? Or, can we extend the definition to those people who are freely chosen?