I sat next to my grandpa on a stiff lobby room bench. It was eveining time, I'm not sure how I remember that. Honestly, the biggest memory that night was watching my dad walk out of the hospital, he didn't say goodbye or even look back. That memory has stuck with me for so long. The unexcused abandonment. Since then I knew what it meant to loose someone you love. I put my daddy on a pedalstal, I loved him more than anything. I think that pist my mother off. Everytime I would cry out for him, "I miss him" Her every response was "I cant do anything about that" "there's nothing I can do". That sounds familiar to most single mom stories, however, I would come to realize there was a lot she couldn't do. 

I knew I had seen him a few times after the divorce but most of my memory of my dad was prior to and then again when I was in Highschool. I had tried to find him so many times. Back then there was no google or internet resources, but I did it. I found him and left a note on his door.  We ended up meeting and going for a walk. It was just as I hoped it would be. After that though, dead silence.

Several years later, by happenstance, I ended up meeting his current wife. I had joined an MLM and in the process met a few ladies in the business, one of which was his wife.  She actually put it together, she was good at that, I would learn. She would orchestrate most of all of the gathering we would come to attend. I was so glad to have my dad back but I later learned he would ghost me again.

We celebrated holidays together, birthday parties, family dinners. After their employment ended with our company so did the relationship. Not all because of the termination, you see, I would learn Will, my dad, is in fact not my father...

We had shared a couple of years together before they joined our team. It was a life long dream having him back in my life. Of course, this upset my mother greatly. It made those years very difficult. It was a true divorced situation. Mom cant be around dad bullshit. 

At the time when I realized that Will was not my biological father, I was also 6 months pregnant. I had gone into the clinic for a standard blood draw; the lab had told me that I no longer needed a shot that I had needed with both prior pregnancies. I knew something was up; obviously, the lab had messed up my lab results. After a few phone calls, everything was straightened out, and I did, in fact, get the necessary medical care. That afternoon, the kids played in the backyard while I spoke to Will. After telling him the story about the lab results, he paused momentarily and told me his blood type. Type O. With my nursing background it very quickly came to the very front of my brain. Screaming, “This isn’t happening”.   Once we got back home, I started doing my research. I called my sister for her blood type. Spoke to my grandmother, my mom. I was putting the pieces together. This is what I like to call Rain Man. It’s really just a girl with a computer and detective skills. I dig and dig relentlessly, sifting through memories, old stories, anything to prove that the nightmare is real. I cried so much filling out the punnett square. There was no way with his blood type O and mine B- that he could be my biological father. I was gutted, I lost so much that day, it felt like my world was ending. I called him with my suspicions, and we had a nice, long talk. He had his own suspicions as well. Little things here and there that made him question it. I always wondered as well. I’m the only one in our family with green eyes; meanwhile, everyone else has blue. So many little things growing up where I was a little different than anyone else. Turns out, I was right, although I never honestly suspected anything like this. The conversations with my mother were not pleasant. She has yet to speak to me about anything, and this happened in 2019. I grew further apart from her. I couldn’t even look at her for the longest time. She didn’t comfort me then or say anything remotely adult. Let me be clear. She didn’t cheat. She conned him into believing I was his, knowing full well I was not. As much as she tries to deny knowing. There is no way that is true. Other people at the time I was in eutero knew who my father really was. 

I knew there were a couple of men she had mentioned before from her past. It didn’t take long to identify who my father was. I compared pictures online, gathered stories, and eventually called two suspects. One of which turns out to be the father. He was shocked when I called. We had never spoken before, never met, and here I am calling out of the blue on a weekday asking, “Hey, are you my dad”? A few days later, after talking to his current wife, he called me back and told me he did believe he was my dad. A few short weeks later, we took a paternity test, and when the results came back positive, I told my mom, and her response “Well, now you know.”