Some people use the term “Daddy issues” like a punchline that explains every complicated girl, guarded woman, silence, or flash of anger. It’s lazy, really—an oversimplified diagnosis for something they don’t understand.  

But is that what I have? I’ve asked myself that more times than I can count, always landing somewhere between “maybe” and “absolutely not.” 

I’ve never been the girl people imagine when they say those words. I don’t chase affection. I don’t ache for something I never felt. Because how can you miss what you never truly had? 

My father wasn’t there. That’s the fact of it. And not in the “we grew apart” kind of way. He just… wasn’t. He was absent in the most consistent, quiet way possible. Not abusive, not present, not even awkward. Just a void. A blank space where a father was supposed to be. And still, I never saw myself as incomplete. 

I was raised by a woman who did the job of two. My mother is everything he wasn’t. She’s fierce, resilient, and overflowing with love, the kind that shows up when you’re sick at 2 a.m., or when your heart breaks at 16, or when you don’t believe in yourself and need someone who still does. She gave me strength and softness. She gave me enough. And so, I thought that was the end of the story.  

But then you grow up. And the older you get, the more you notice how someone’s absence leaves a mark not with a scream, but with a silence that echoes, like a notification that never came. 

I have siblings from my father’s side. More than a few, maybe ten. At some point, I stopped counting. I’ve only ever been close to a handful. Not because of him. He had nothing to do with that. It was my mother, again, who reached out, who wanted me to know them. Who believed that the branches could still intertwine even if the roots were messy. 

Here’s the part that still sits heavy sometimes: my father has been in their lives. Some of them grew up with his birthday texts, his phone calls, his overall presence. Not perfect, but there. But not for me. I’ve never gotten a birthday wish from him. Not one. Not a text, not a call, not even a rogue “HBD” in the wrong group chat. The man who helped create me doesn’t remember what day I was born.  

He doesn’t know my favorite color. He doesn’t know I’m majoring in something I care deeply about. He doesn’t know what makes me laugh until I cry or that I chew peppermint gum like a nervous tic. He knows nothing about me, and I don’t think he’s ever tried to. 

I’ve seen him at family parties. I stood near him. Exchanged polite hellos, like you would with your dentist outside of work. But no hugs. No small talk. No real acknowledgment that I’m his daughter. It’s one of the most unnatural things I’ve ever felt to look at your own father and realize he’s nothing more than a stranger with your cheekbones.  

And yet, I don’t hate him. I know that would make this spicier. “Estranged daughter seeks vengeance” basically writes itself. But truthfully? I’m too tired. And probably too well adjusted. I’m not angry, I’m just… done. 

I’m aware. 

 Aware that I don’t like emotionally flaky people. Aware that I build walls faster than most. And it’s not because I’m dramatic, it’s because I’ve been conditioned by a lifetime of casual disappointment. I don’t chase.  I  refuse to disappoint myself by accepting the bare minimum. 

 Not having a father didn’t break me. But it shaped me. I recognize my flaws, the parts of me that get cagey with intimacy, and that second-guess sincerity. I don’t romanticize fixing that. I… live with it. 

 It’s not trauma in the loud, explosive way. It’s the quiet kind. It’s birthdays spent wondering if maybe this would be the year. It’s realizing your father isn’t in your contacts because he never gave you his number. It’s sitting across from him at a table and realizing you have more in common with the waiter than with this man. 

But despite all of this, I’m still whole. Because absence doesn’t have to mean emptiness. My mother made sure of that. My big brother made sure of that. And I? I made sure of that. 

I’ve had to raise parts of myself. I’ve had to learn how to be soft, be naïve, and be guarded without bitterness. I’ve had to teach myself how to grieve someone who wasn’t gone, just never present. And I’ve done it quietly.  

But now it’s up to me to forgive him. 

Not for him, necessarily. He might never know, for the little girl who wanted someone to show up, and the woman who now knows how to show up for herself. For the version of me that wants to move through life a little lighter. 

 Forgiveness isn’t about forgetting. It’s not about pretending the absence didn’t shape me. It’s about choosing peace over resentment, even when the apology never came. 

So maybe this story doesn’t end with a reunion or a breakthrough. Maybe it will end with acceptance, with saving his number, not to chase anything but just in case life hands me one final conversation. 

And if it doesn’t? 

I’ll be okay. I already am.