Forgiving My Father

I went to a friend’s Barbecue last year and had a life-changing moment. Let me tell you about it.

The sun was shining, the temporary grills had chicken laid on them, drinks were flowing and we were all smiling in a garden with 10 or so people.

We began talking about the recent The Grapevine episode that was filmed in London. The Grapevine is a show that covers topics that are important to the Black community. We talked about the intersections of culture and music off the back of their Knife Crime video. While we sat and talked, an argument was made for the link between knife crime and music. The conversation quickly moved on to community, parenting and asked where the ultimate responsibility lies for protecting young people. We talked about the usual tropes, ‘it takes a village’ and whatnot which brought us on to the topic of Absent Fathers.

The whole conversation reminded me about a Plan B lyric from his track ‘Where ya from?’.

“It’s like they’re praising these youts for acting so dumb
and it’s no excuse, most of us are fatherless sons”

I talked about my Father, his absence in my life and began to slander him. After my rant, Iggy, a friend of a friend chimed in on the conversation. After I had said my piece on fatherhood, and not wanting to be like my Dad, he looked deeply into my eyes and told me, “You know that you have to forgive your Father, right?”

At first, I shrugged his comment off.

“Why would I do that? He ain’t sh*t”

“Because you can’t carry that hate in your heart when you become a Father yourself”

His words stunned me into silence. I didn’t know what to say. At that moment it was so hard to imagine myself doing such a thing. Forgiving him? For what? Why would I forgive someone that had caused me so much pain?

I didn’t have the answer then, but I do now.

The relationship that I had with my Father, like most peoples, was unique. I now understand that he is from a generation where men were pressured and taught to fulfil certain roles in the household and he took on those roles as he thought he should.

He worked while my Mother did non-renumerated housework and raised me and my brother during the week (we went to my Grandmother’s home on the weekends).

I always had the material things that I thought I wanted when I was growing up. Whether that was a Dreamcast, Nintendo 64, PlayStation or WWF figures, they were there. I was largely happy with that as a child, although I really wanted us to all go on a family holiday. Ultimately, I accepted that I had a Father in my life and a Mother that I lived with. Most of the other children in the area were in similar situations too, so it was normal to me.

It wasn’t until I got older that I realised a couple of things. One was that my parents were very young and the other was that an absent-but-present Father wasn’t exactly what everyone else had. I had grown accustom to the bubble of my area until I left for secondary school. It’s weird how small your world is when you’re growing up.

When I spoke to my friends in Secondary School, I was shocked when I found out that their parents were in their 40s and 50s. That seemed so ‘old’ to me, which is funny because I’m 28 now and don’t have two children like my Mother did at my age, so I guess I’ll be one of the ‘old’ parents one day if I’m lucky.

Being around and meeting my friends’ Fathers made me realise what I didn’t have, and that was (what I believed to be) a core family unit.

I never really knew my Father. I didn’t know what his interests were outside of work and a certain sport. If he was a book that could be read, I feel like I have only saw one page of it.

The thing is, it makes sense when married with the way that masculinity in society is imposed on us. It makes sense for a man to not be expressive and share memories or open up to those around them. Because society teaches men to be that way, it teaches men to show few emotions outside of anger and to respond with violence.

It’s a part of the rules that we are trying to dismantle every day in the liberation of our people.

Hilton Als’ wrote a book titled, ‘White Girls’. It’s a collection of essays that I and many people in my circle couldn’t get our head around. There is, however, one passage that has stayed with me since my eyes glossed over his words.

It talks about the pressures that women in long term heterosexual relationships face and how they are often told to stay in relationships ‘for the kids’. It continued to mention these pressures and finished by saying that the advice often comes from the older generation, older women that didn’t want to accept that the fathers of their children weren’t actually good matches for the children.

Those lines, like Iggy’s words at that barbecue, have stayed with me.

I read them over and over again until it slowly started to make sense.

I and my Father aren’t a good match, and that’s ok.

I’m sure there are plenty of people out there that would have been ecstatic with the relationship that we had but it wasn’t for me. As I grew and understood myself better, I knew that I wanted more from our relationship and my Father couldn’t provide me with that.

We both tried to make it work in different ways but towards the end, it just felt like trying to make a ball fit into a square shape.

“You’ll be a good Father one day”

I have heard that phrase from friends and girlfriends of my past, but for some reason, it doesn’t instil me with confidence. I have a lot of love to give and can’t wait to have a family one day. I’ve written about my dreams of Fatherhood in the past and what I imagine it will be like. However, I’m aware that reality is always different from our dreams and therefore, unpredictable. My Aunt gave me great advice once, she said that when you have your own children, “everything you know goes out of the window”.

I have been lucky enough to be around babies and children since my teens. I pride myself on the small role that I have played in my younger cousins lives. They gave me the time to learn how to bathe, change nappies, hold and soothe babies properly.

I think I’ll struggle with the amount of time that babies require. Not because I won’t do everything in my physical and mental being to give them my time, but because for all my experience with babies and children, I don’t know what it’s like to raise them.

I want to believe that I’ll be able to give a child the affection, attention, care, education and love that’s needed to build solid foundations of a person that can grow into a what they want to be.

I feel like I have no guide to follow. No memories of learning from my own Father to learn from.

Maybe I’ve been looking for answers in the wrong place?

I spoke to my Father for the last time in December 2017. Tensions had been building throughout the years and I was the last person in my immediate family to cut ties with him. Many of them were surprised by my decision but it was something that I thought long and hard about.

I decided to do it because I was tired of trying to make something work that wasn’t meant to be.

I have a calculated nature and made sure to feel the weight (and loss) on my shoulders of cutting him off before I went through with it.

We met and spoke about the tensions that were there, the lack of communication, my sisters and my Mother. There was a back and forth between us for a short while until I said to myself, ‘enough’ and uttered words along the lines of “we’re done”.

He accepted that and made sure that I knew that he would never beg for his children.

I left his home and with that, a relationship with my Father, his wife and my younger sisters.

I was quite upset at first, but my heart healed in the days after. I remember speaking to my brother afterwards, telling him what I had done. I won’t repeat what we said to each other, but it was definitely a bonding moment for us.

Life ultimately goes on.

So, with all this being said and analysed, I think it’s finally time to carry out what Iggy suggested that I do. It’s time to offer my forgiveness to my Father. I do this so we can both grow and continue on with our lives independent of each other.

To my Father, I forgive you for not being there how I wanted.

I let go of the hate that I held for you.

I let go of the memories that I wish we had.

I forgive you, but most importantly, I accept you for who you are.

I am no longer the shy, small boy in this picture, I’m a man now.