Normally I would start a letter with "Dear ..." and continue on with the letter. This time, I don't really know how to start this. So I guess this will just have to do.

The truth is I don't know you. I know nothing about you. The only thing that I do know is that you were supposed to be my dad. You were supposed to be there for me. You were supposed to protect me and grant me a sense of security. That's not what you did. You left because you couldn't handle the responsibility. So you left, giving that opportunity to someone else. What were the exact words you told my mother the day she told you she was pregnant? Oh yeah. That's right. You told her I'd be a problem and you wanted me aborted. When she wouldn't do it, you left. You didn't even take the time to get to know me before you assumed I'd be a problem. You left knowing you were leaving me behind unable to protect or speak for myself. An innocent, unborn child left to a single mother who had to figure it out her damn self. You left us both in distress. The only question I ask is, why?

Why did you leave? After all, I was your responsibility. You did help make me. I have half of your DNA. I have your blood flowing through my veins! Blood I hate and can't remove. Do you even understand what you did to me? Do you understand how it made me feel when I was eight years old hearing that my own biological father thought I'd be a problem and didn't want me?! Or did you only think about yourself? Well let me tell you exactly how it made me feel:

After I found this out sometime in February 2006, I couldn't hear the word 'problem' without automatically thinking someone was talking about me. I couldn't hear the word 'problem' without thinking about what you said and thinking that maybe you had been right. I was a problem and I was always going to be. I spent many years crying and hating myself because of you. It is because of you that the word 'problem' is a trigger word for me. It is because of you that I couldn't look in the mirror without wondering if some part of me just so happened to look like you. It is because of you that I have a hard time trusting people who say they are going to stay. It is because of you that I have so much anger and hate built up. I didn't know such a little person could have so much anger in them, but I do. I have so many years of anger built up just waiting to explode because I don't know how to channel it or let it out. I'm angry with everyone but mainly you and myself.

I have every right to be angry at you. I have every right to hate you, yet there is some part of me that just can't because technically you are my biological father. So unfortunately, some part of me loves you, if only for creating me and giving me to my mother and my dad ( you know, the father who decided to take on your responsibilities and who cleaned up your mess). I didn't know it when he came into my family's life, but he healed my mother's broken heart, and later he healed mine.

I remember fighting back tears when trying to ask my mother if I looked more like you because I couldn't stand looking in the mirror. The worst part of it all is I wanted to meet you at some point. I wanted to see if I looked anything like you, or if I did anything weird or quirky that you did. I wanted to see if we had anything in common besides half the same DNA and blood. I wanted to meet you so bad. Not just for all of those things. I wanted to meet you mainly to see if I could change your mind and show you that I was worth something more than the word problem stapled to my chest.

You caused me so many emotional problems — long lasting affects that I have had to live with from time to time. It took me 10 long years to realize that I wasn't a problem, and I never was. I am something more and I didn't fully realize that until I was accepted into college. It took me 10 long, emotionally abused years to realize I was worth something. I wasn't just a girl with daddy issues. No, I was more than what you ever made me out to be and you'll never know, but that is finally okay with me.