For those survivors that have done the workbook for “The Courage To Heal” will tell you that it is not for the faint of heart. That workbook is extremely hard. There are many assignments that will cause wounds that you did not know you had to fester, puss and bleed.
There are challenges to write letters to those that have harmed you. The letters I was challenged to write to my violators were not even close to being the hardest assignments. Because by the time I had started the workbook I had already begun writing letters to my violators.
For me, the hardest assignment was a letter to my dad. I never realized the hurt and betrayal I felt towards my dad until I started writing that letter. I wanted to feel some type of remorse from him. And to the point of that letter, I never got it.
After writing this letter I felt like for the first time in my life that my wounds began to heal. I may not have physically gave my dad this letter. But it felt so good to actually write it and read it to my therapist.
Here is the letter that I wrote to my dad about 8 years ago.
Daddy,
I am angry with you. You are my dad; you are supposed to protect me from harm. You had a party where there was alcohol, invited “strangers” into your home, and when one of them went to the bathroom and did not come back in a timely manner you did not wonder where he was and you did not even go looking for him. I feel you did not protect me then and you did not protect me when I told you about the molestation 6 years later. When I told you, you were on the defense “I don’t know who you are talking about” Instead you should have said “Who the hell hurt my baby, I don’t know who it is but I will hunt him down and kill him. How dare someone violates my baby, my innocent little girl? Dana, I am sorry this happened to you. I blame myself for this. Please forgive me” But no I did not hear those words then, and I have never heard those words. It hurts and angers me so much that you never protected me before or after the fact. How can you call yourself my protector if you could not even protect me in my own home? It will be hard for me to forgive you but I will do it because I need to so that I can move on.
So many years have been lost because you did not protect me. I have a hard time trusting people. I hate being around alcohol. I have a hard time sleeping. I blame you for these things because you did not protect me. I am so angered, so mad at you. So frustrated. So pissed off at you. How dare you not protect me from someone you invited in our house? Our house was supposed to be a safe environment. I can’t even lay my head comfortably in my own home because what happened to me so many years ago. I hope you can live with yourself knowing that you destroyed my security. My sense of safety vanished that night. I can never get it back. All I have ever wanted to hear from you is “I am sorry.” But I have come to the conclusion that I will never hear that. And that I will live with for the rest of my life. I have always and will always love you because you are my daddy. But I cannot trust you because you failed to love me appropriately by protecting me. I still love you.
My other 2 traumas you were not physically around when they happened. But I feel that you should have had some remorse for the fact that someone sexually assaulted your daughter. Instead, when I told you about Wilber you basically said “Wel you know your mom’s family is a bunch of hillbillies” and my gang rape you basically said that if I went into the Air Force this would not have happened. Sexual Assaults happen in all branches of the military so that is irrelevant.
I had hoped to hear the anger in your voice. Hatred and regret that this happened to your baby. But I never have heard anything close to that from you. You claim I am Daddies Little Girl. Yet you have not protected me like a Daddie should or would. I feel like I was thrown out of the nest to learn how to fly and when I went crashing to the ground you basically told me to get up, tell me this is a part of life and yelled at me to try to fly again. Tough love can work in some situations but not when your daughter has been through the unspeakable and unimaginable that I have gone through.
I do love you. I forgive you. Not to help you but it is to help me move on with my life and to live it to the full potential.
Love
Dink
