March 9, 3024

“Mom, Dad’s crying now!” 

I can’t blame Paul for being suspicious. Oh Emily was always such a Daddy’s girl for years and years, then everything changed. She pulled away from family and from healthy connections years ago. She dabbled in habits and thoughts and people who weren’t healthy or honest. She believed flattering lies, way too grown up lies meant to lure her into places she was too young to be. And she believed lies that damaged her mind and self-worth and made her doubt her rightful position as The Daughter Of The Most High God (yes, with capital letters). And Paul and I made mistakes by sometimes ignoring and minimizing the problems, sometimes by overreacting to them, and sometimes by just totally screwing everything up with threats and yelling and judgment and shame. But we did a few things right along the way. We loved. We showed mercy. We apologized for being too hard and for being too soft.  We showed Emily that there is enough grace in our hearts to cover her infractions, and that taught her to show grace to her very fallible Mom and Dad. 

When she ran away from home a little more than two years ago, and when she tried to kill herself last summer, she was so angry at the ways we chose to lead our family out of those crises. She was angry because our leadership affected her more than anyone else in the family. It was no secret the security system with cameras wasn’t installed to keep intruders out, but rather to keep Emily in. And we were all devastated when she was transferred to the hospital psych ward, but she was there by herself while we went home and slept in our own beds. 

She has been working on herself mindfully and purposefully. As mad as she used to be, she told me that psych allowed her to learn about who she is and what motivates her. She knows no one is more Team Emily than her family is. We proved that, and she felt it. But she has also felt unworthy of our support because she feels badly about what she put us through. And shame has made her pull away from healing connections. A friend reminded me recently that self-harm isn’t always as obvious as a razor slash; self-harm can be self-denial of self-care. There’s no need for all that. It’s all forgiven Emily.  Come connect with us again. 

Maybe it’s just easier for her to connect with me.  Riding in the car. Listening to the hot jam. Shopping. Practicing her driving. Whatever. She opens herself up to me probably more than to anyone else in the family. Grace and Harry drove Emily to school three mornings a week for many months, so they had lots of opportunities to connect. Her relationship with Lauren has been a study in healing lately. Their fellowship nearly died after the run-away and was slowly resurrected just before the suicide attempt. Lauren’s protective nature gives Emily comfort, and it’s refreshing to see their connection regrowing. Emily has wanted brothers, and now that she has Eli and Gavin, she doesn’t know what to do with them. They bring something to the family that has been missing, and Emily really likes that. Not that she makes it obvious, but if you know to look for it, you’ll see the corners of her mouth turn up, smirk, almost snicker. She’s not gonna cut loose with a full on hee-haw at one of the boys’ jokes, but she might crack a smile.

But she used to be a Daddy’s girl. She would climb onto Paul’s lap and he would rub her back and snuggle with her every morning. She rightfully outgrew that sweet routine a long time ago, but then life and lies stole away most of the old tattered remnants of her sweet connection to her Daddy. Then Friday night, she showed me a video of a girl crawling into her dad’s lap, and Emily said she wanted to do that her own dad. But yeah, Paul was suspicious because that kind of tenderness from Oh Emily was so out of character. He was expecting her to drop a bomb, deliver some devastating news, throw a curve ball. But instead, she just wanted to snuggle and get a back rub from her Daddy. He even took the tv remote and turned down the volume because Emily was more important than golf. But even after the snuggle session, he was still suspicious, and he texted me to ask why Emily had done that, and why did she have me video it. Was she trying to document the moment she gave him some shockingly awful news? I told him that it was her quiet way of loving him out loud the way she used to before all the lies and loss of connection. Then Emily showed her Daddy the edited video of the two of them snuggling, and Paul started crying. Of course he was crying. After all the years of loss, he had his baby girl back. “Mom, Dad’s crying now!”

We aren’t done getting Emily back.  She’s still gone in some ways, and that’s as it should be.  She’s a grownish girl who needs independence, space and a chance to discover who she is beyond Paul and Sandie’s daughter. But as she grows and uncovers her independence, we take comfort in knowing that Oh Emily is connecting once again and quietly loving us out loud. 

And now a word from my co-author: This is Emily typing now, I’d like to add that me being a Daddy’s girl never “left” nor is it “gone.” As life goes on, like with other things in life, certain things get covered up and lost as we grow. Lost in things, such as mental illnesses, friendships, regrets, worrying about self worth, etc. It’s completely normal and alright to grow out of things you once did, and grow into new habits and interests. Change is painful, and although I am not a parent, I can only imagine how hurtful it is to watch your children stop snuggling with you, running to you when they find something they think is cool, maybe even dirtying your freshly cleaned house as well. As a daughter, I personally feel the same way about my parents, sometimes, but in a very different way. I miss when it felt like my parents knew everything there was to know about the world and believing they were my heroes every time something went wrong for me and they’d drop whatever they were doing to fix that and protect me. I miss being carried to my bed after falling asleep in the car, and pretending to be asleep just to HAVE my dad do that for me. I miss when their parenting was sweeter and innocent. When my issues weren’t so bad that I had to be disciplined so much harsher. I miss my mother having to call my name so many times to come inside for dinner, rather than coming out of my room. These memories and feelings will never come back, but we share different experiences together now and do different things together now, that I enjoy just as much as I did with things of my childhood.