Angie* was too young to remember being abandoned by her mother, for she was only two years old.

Their father’s week and a half leave from the Air force was the impetus for Angie’s mother to get all five kids loaded into the car to meet him at the airport.

When Angie’s mother drove away after dropping them off, none of them knew she was leaving the family for good. Including their father. She’d made a clean break – no note, no forwarding address.

*Her real name, used with permission.

Having to make some fast decisions about childcare, Angie’s father took all five kids to live with his brother’s family. Resigning from the military several months later allowed him to focus on his family. New schools for the kids where no one knew the story of their mother abandoning them gave them a safe place to grow and thrive.

Boot Camp

A Brownies Mother/Daughter banquet when Angie was in Kindergarten brought to light the fact she didn’t have a mother. For you see, Angie’s father hadn’t spoken of her since that day at the airport. Instead of having Angie miss out on this important event, Angie’s dad took her.

Not surprisingly, Angie’s ex-military dad ran his house like a boot camp with her oldest sister, Terri, as the drill sergeant.

Having that structure gave their motherless family a rigid, but supportive environment.

Funny Like Grandma

Knowing she wasn’t like everyone else and not sure who she really was, Angie made a conscious decision to imitate her grandma (her dad’s mom), because her grandma was funny and everyone liked her.

“Being the funny girl or the life of the party was a perfect mask. What no one could see, what I didn’t want to see either, was I was an abandoned little girl in a big world. Feeling unloved, unworthy, and different. I didn’t want pity or sympathy; instead, I wanted to be understood,” Angie shares.

Feelings of Abandonment

When Angie’s sister Terri turned 18, she left home. Angie, then 10 years old, asked her dad about it. He replied, “Your sister left, because she doesn’t want to be a mother or take care of all of you. We won’t talk about her again.”

Two years later, her brother Joe graduated from high school and left in search of their mother. His decision to leave left Angie spinning again. Her dad suppressed his pain by declaring, “We’re not going to talk about him again.”

Joe found their mom and moved in with her.

 

Three important people – her mother, her sister Terri, and her brother Joe were not to be discussed.

How could Angie work through her feelings of abandonment when she wasn’t allowed to ask questions or talk about her feelings?

Visit Their Mother

The summer Angie was 14, her dad surprised her and her sister Pattie with tickets to visit their mother and brother Joe. Upon arrival, their mother embraced Pattie, but looked at Angie and said, “You look like your G__ D ___ father.”

Clearly not the welcome she was hoping for from the mother who had abandoned her twelve years earlier.

Going from a strict environment to a permissive environment (no rules, mom and step dad drinking excessively and partying all the time) was challenging for Angie, while Pattie loved her new found freedom. Angie wrote letters to her dad, explaining the laissez-faire environment and the lack of air-conditioning and food. No responses came from her dad.

Pattie met a guy at a fourth of July fish fry and decided to stay so she could continue dating him.

Once home and ready to start high school, Angie asked her dad about Pattie. He said, “She decided to stay with your mother. We will not talk about her anymore.”

Rebelliousness

Angie’s brother Matt (4 years older than Angie) struggled with their mother abandoning the family. His anger and rebelliousness eventually turned into acting out in high school. After an altercation at school, Matt ran away from home. Her dad’s response: “He’s gone. We aren’t going to discuss him again.”

Now it was just Angie and her dad.

At this point, Angie was past needing to talk about every family member abandoning her. Instead, she internalized her feelings, and those feelings turned to guilt. Maybe it was her fault Matt left. Her fault Pattie left. And on and on.

As with any teenager, Angie pushed against her dad’s limits. Two incidents of disobeying him were met with these words: “You know how this works. Three strikes and you’re out. You’re at two strikes, Angie.”

Fun and loving were words Angie used to describe her dad except when it came to discipline. He meant what he said, so when Angie tried to sneak out her bedroom window her freshman year of high school, her dad simply said, “Three strikes. You’re out.”

Father’s Punishment

A month later at Christmas, Angie was given a present: a suitcase containing a one way plane ticket to the town where her mother lived.

Her mom, of course, was not happy to see her. She said, “I know you don’t want to be here. This is part of your father’s punishment, and I’ll make sure it’s punishment.”

To avoid being at home, Angie joined the cheerleading squad, became class president, and took babysitting jobs. Rebelliousness and disrespect toward her mom and step-father grew and grew.

After an incident in which her mother forced her to lie about a situation to her step-father, Angie ran away and moved in with her best friend’s family. It was warm and safe and food was plentiful in this home. A stark contrast to her mother’s house.

Her Faith

I asked Angie to describe her faith at this point in her life. She said, “I knew God was with me. I always could feel him, even in my darkest hours, and I had many dark hours. I had a long and difficult process with my faith and at times I didn’t think God cared. I had placed him with all the others in my life, even he didn’t understand me.”

Health Struggles

Angie’s dad encouraged her to move home during her junior year of high school. Enrolling in cosmetology school was her dad’s idea, since she’d already earned all her academic credits.

That same year, Angie began experiencing severe abdominal pain and was diagnosed with endometriosis. Surgery to remove cysts and scar tissue helped ease her pain.

Even with the surgery, Angie continued to have the same health struggles throughout college.

During college, Angie met a man who worked at the postal service with her dad and fell in love. This man’s mother had abandoned her family, too. With these backgrounds in common, their priest urged them not to get married, but they did anyway.

Their marriage lasted a little over a year.

 

—– Angie’s story is heart-wrenching to say the least. But her story is not complete. Come back next Friday to read Angie’s ongoing quest to overcome her abandonment and trust struggles. You’ll definitely be inspired! —–

 

Leave a reply (below): Author/social worker Brene Brown says, “A deep sense of love and belonging is an irreducible need of all people. We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don’t function as we were meant to.”

Share your thoughts about this quote with regards to your own life/ your own experiences.