Father’s lust for me makes me sick

By as told to Sanka Price | Sat, June 16, 2012 - 12:01 AM

IT STARTED when I was around the age of 12. That’s when my father – my own father – started to make passes at me.

They were always done when I was alone in any part of the house which I shared with our sisters and three brothers. It would happen when I was alone in the bedroom, when I went to the bathroom to shower, or even sometimes just passing him in the house, when no one was watching he would pull at my breasts and touch other parts of my body.

I could not tell anyone about what I was going through. Not my mother who was devoted to my father, not my father siblings – who feared dad because of his strictness – and not my best friend.

In fact, I used to wonder if every dad was like my father, two-faced and carried a lust for their daughters.

When my friends at school took turns to talk about their fathers, I wondered how come they had such good relationships with their fathers and I could not have the same relationship with mine.

The advances only stopped when I left home at the age of 20, or so I thought.

By that age I had a boyfriend but could not understand why my father was so interested in my personal relationships and not those of the other siblings. I was the one whom he would always try to insult when my boyfriend visited.

A blessing

He would ask him to leave the house by a certain time and forbid me to encourage him at the house at certain times. Leaving home when I did was a blessing but I maintained a fear for my father.

Yes, I respected him, but I feared him and never liked when he was at home. Once away from home, I would visit the family home often and despite my own situation we remained a close knitted and respectful family. Anyone looking on from the outside saw just that – not the nights when I would be too fearful to venture off alone to any part of the house we called home because of my father interferences.

Well as I got older and lived on my own I felt I had put the past all the past behind me. One day, however, it all came back when a situation arose in my life – that’s when I realized I had not received the healing I needed – but I did not know what to do.

I shared my situation with a former teacher who was also a family friend and the first thing he asked me was: “Did you tell your mother?”

I told him no and he said: “Good”. He then added you can never let her know.

Once again I was left to carry this hurt on my own. I could not tell my boyfriend because I did not know how he would look at me, or my father, or my family for that matter.

By the time I reached my 30s, I was convinced that as long as my father was alive I would have to constantly live with the knowledge that the distrust I felt, and that the resentment – not hatred – could not and would not go away unless it was faced head-on.

So one day when a situation arose, the matter of his sexual advances towards me came up. My father said he was sorry if he had hurt me, but he also confessed that his feeling had not changed. I was taken back. I felt sick; betrayed by a dad who was more two-faced than I ever imagined.

I felt dirty and started to blame myself. I believed that maybe I was doing something that was carrying these feelings he was carrying around to be so.

I pledged to stay out of his sight so he would not be tempted but that did not help. I would get calls on my home phone and personal phone. If he knew, or rather, learned that I was going to be at a particular location, he would turn up, or turn up at my house unannounced.

I soon put an end to that and asked him not to do this.

Regarding the phone – thank God for caller ID – I started to refuse to answer.

I turned 40 two years ago, and to my dismay my father had the gall to tell me nothing has changed over the years.

His request for forgiveness, I soon learned meant nothing to him.

All these years and even though he is over 20 years older means nothing to him. He is still lusting after me and I have now refused to blame myself. I have simply come to the conclusion that my father is a sick man and that unless he deals with his demons he will never be free.

He is now in his 60s and I hope that will allow God to do a deep work in his life. I pray for him almost every day.

I am a born-again believer. My husband to be and I have never discussed this.

In fact, he has not yet been told of this aspect of my life, but I do not intend to hide it from him. I believe I need to expose my father for who he is – but only to my husband to be – and before I walk down the aisle. I will not enter a marriage with the baggage from my teens.

Tomorrow will be Father’s Day and I hope that when all the fuss is being made, fathers like my father will hang their heads in shame and ask God to change them. I will not allow him to make me blame myself any longer.

I write this confession on behalf of all you children and women out there who have been or are being sexually harassed or abused by your fathers, uncles, brothers, stepfathers, and any other males – tell your stories and free yourself from enslavement of the mind. Expose them and stop carrying around the guilt.