I've been looking for it since I was fourteen years old. I wasn't seeking for a fantasy; I was looking for something I didn't think I had at home: unconditional affection.
My father and I had a tremendous falling out. He informed me that if I married outside of my ethnicity and faith, I would no longer be his daughter. He made a condition for his affection.
I kept falling short until the last year and a half. For the first time in my life, I felt genuinely loved. I felt safe. I was engulfed in this man's affection. Despite our shared anxieties and troubles from the past, he continued to show up every day.
His gestures and love indicated that we were in this for the long haul, but his words filled me with doubt and worry, to the point where I began to retract and felt compelled to start defending myself.
After a summer full of chats that seemed to be the end (though he kept assuring it wasn't), I found myself in fight-or-flight mode after an emotionally charged weekend.
Without thinking, I drove to the shop to get boxes, packed his possessions, and wrote him a letter to say goodbye. In truth, I wasn't prepared to say goodbye, but I couldn't stand not being picked every day.
We spoke, cried, and talked some more. We communicated in circles. Never addressing the fundamental problem. While we both wanted the same thing and wanted it with each other, he felt he couldn't give me what I wanted right now since he still had work to do on his own.
I pleaded with him to make this work. "We can figure this out together, you don't have to do it on your own," I'm going to say. He continued telling me how much he loved me and wanted to be