An early Father's Day
06/19/2011 08:36 a.m.

I am fatherless. It's not a sentiment, it's just a fact. Frank Betts, my biological father, died in 1994 at the age of 53. But I didn't grow up with him. The man who raised me (whose name will not be spoken upon these pages) ended up being a sick and twisted person who damaged many girls along the way. And my mother's third husband didn't happen along until I was 15 and I was spending a lot of my time at my grandparent's by then.

I know that this (being fatherless) is a huge factor in the dysfunction of my relationships. But knowing doesn't fix things. Even learning how to fix things doesn't always fix things.

At this age, I'm less concerned about "how" the dysfunction occured as I am in just being healthy.

Father's day almost always makes me wonder, though, what it's like to have (or have had) a healthy relationship with one's father. I just...can't relate.

I am currently: not sleeping
Listening to: a sudden but never unexpected rain storm.