What Daddy Did (24 page)

I visited my Dad in hospital on a couple of other occasions. The next time I went, I was approached by a doctor who asked me what my circumstances were, and whether or not I could look after my father at home. I was horrified! Me, look after him in my new clean home with no evidence of my horrible past? I blurted out to this young doctor, 'NO! I couldn't do that, it's completely unthinkable.' I tried to tell him that things had been terrible for me at home when I was a child and that I didn't have that kind of relationship with my Dad, but all of my words became jumbled up and I tripped over what I was trying to say. I'm sure that I must have sounded mad. The doctor could see that I was clearly distressed, so he dropped his suggestions and left me to go back and visit my father. I don't remember much more about that visit, but that conversation with the doctor had shaken me and brought many, many questions into my head about my Dad.

Over the next few days, my thoughts were in turmoil. Images of my past were tumbling over and over in my head, and I was getting increasingly angry about the role my father had played in my childhood. I just knew I had to say something to him. He was ill and worn down, maybe even ready to die, but I just had to ask him what he knew about what Helen had done to me and why, in my eyes, he had never done anything to stop it.

On my next visit to see him, I was armed with the knowledge that this was my opportunity to finally talk to him. My stomach churned and my heart raced as I sat on the number 41 bus on the trip to the hospital. My mind was full of all the questions I would ask – I even went a step further and anticipated his answers. I thought that maybe he would cry (surely he would cry?) and say he was sorry (surely he would say he was sorry?). Maybe he would say that he hated Helen for her actions towards me; maybe he would tell me something about my mother; maybe, just maybe, all the gaps would be filled. Then perhaps we could redeem something.

My optimism didn't last.

When I arrived, my Dad was sitting up in bed, leaning against a mountain of pillows. He told me that he had to sleep like this so that he could breathe. As I watched, he was breathing in and out as if blowing up a balloon. His pyjamas swam around his shrunken frame and he looked very vulnerable. Initially, we just went through some small talk. I gave him a book I had brought for him, a cowboy story. I didn't really know what he liked but I remembered that he loved the old Western movies that were often shown on Sunday afternoons. I arranged the grapes I'd brought him in the little bowl on the locker by his bed, throwing into the bin the uneaten ones from a previous visit. Then, during a lull in our awkward conversation, I just started talking. My head felt as if it was going to explode, my voice shook along with my whole body, but I just started pouring the words out.

'Dad,' I began, 'I need to ask you some things about when I was a child.' At this, he looked straight at me. His eyes seemed huge through his glasses and, as I looked at his worn, thin face, I thought that I wouldn't be able to go on with the questions – but I did. I asked him whether he knew about all the beatings Helen had given me. Did he know about me being starved and locked up? Did he know about the sexual abuse? As I spoke, he put his hand up as if to signal to me to stop and then turned his head away from me.

'Dad,' I pleaded. 'Please tell me – did you know?'

He lay there in that hospital bed with the curtain partially hiding us from the rest of the ward. I could hear the sounds of life around going on – the clip-clop of nurses walking up and down busying themselves with their patients; the sound of the tea trolley being wheeled from bed to bed and cups and saucers clinking as they went. I could hear other visitors chatting to their sick relatives as I stood there waiting for my father to answer me.

I waited and waited and waited.

I begged him over and over again: 'Dad, please tell me! Please tell me!' but he kept his face turned away from me, waving his hand to signal me to be quiet.

'Dad,' I said. 'Please! If you don't speak to me I'm going to go.'

I waited for a bit longer, watching him while the tears welled up in my eyes.

He didn't say anything; he didn't even look at me.

Finally, before I embarrassed myself by crying in front of him, I picked up my bag and left.

I walked up that ward, past all the other patients who were laughing and chatting and hugging with their visitors, and I walked through the long corridors out into the Edinburgh sunshine. I left behind my father and any hope I ever had of him saying sorry, of explaining his role, of explaining about Helen, of telling me anything about my mother.

I walked away from him and I walked away from my past.

I never saw him again.

AFTER THIS PARTICULAR STAY IN
hospital, my Dad went to live in sheltered housing in the Abbeyhill area of Edinburgh with Karen. It seemed like an odd situation and living environment for such a young girl, but Karen has said that she was glad about where they ended up because it was safer and cleaner than some of the other places they had been living. Up until then they had been in a flat in Rossie Place. That flat had no lock on the front door so it was permanently open to anyone who passed by. Karen was terrified in the evenings as she was usually left there on her own while my Dad was at the pub. One evening, when she was about 10 years old, she was so worried that she ran out into the street at 11pm, crying and screaming, until a neighbour went and got my Dad from Middleton's pub.

Dad was in and out of hospital for the rest of his life. I remember his funeral but, oddly, I don't recall the date of his death, but our relationship had never been traditional.

My father, my flesh and blood, had chosen to be the prime carer for me, taking me home from Barnardo's to nothing more than a life of abuse and neglect. As far as I'm concerned, he was as accountable as Helen or any of the men who violated me because he was my Dad – and fathers are supposed to be protectors, no matter what. They are supposed to love us and nurture us, listen to us and allow us a voice. They are supposed to praise us and instil us with confidence; and they are supposed to protect us. My father didn't do any of these things.

My views of what 'real' fathers did came from a number of places – not just story books and fairy tales, but life and my experiences of it too. While I was in the children's home I had visited a family from time to time on a Saturday or Sunday. I'm not sure where this was exactly but I think it may have been fairly close to the children's home as there wasn't much travelling involved. According to the files from Barnardo's, there had been so little contact from my father at one stage that I was being considered for 'boarding out', which I think may have meant fostering or adoption. I wonder now if these visits to this family had anything to do with this; maybe they were checking to see whether I would fit in or what I was like away from the environment of the children's home.

Anyway, I remember aspects of these visits. I know there was a little girl who lived in this family; she was around my age and called Andrina. What I remember most about going to that house was the way the family all got on with each other. Andrina's Dad would pick her up and throw her in the air while she laughed and screamed with joy. He'd push us both on the swings, laughing and joking with us all the time. Andrina's Mum would be in the background somewhere, either laughing along too, pottering in the garden or cooking the meal we would all sit down to.

This was my very, very first impression of how a Dad should be.

This is what I thought I was going home to when I clutched my own Daddy's hand the day he took me home.

Sadly, my Daddy was very different. He didn't seem to be able to interact with me the way Andrina's father did with her. I saw him play with the boys, tickle them, and even sit them on his knee. When I first returned to Edinburgh, he once or twice did the same with me but I clearly remember Helen telling him not to baby me, so any affection my Dad may have wanted to give me was soon thwarted by whatever was going on in Helen's mind.

I was a five-year-old girl who needed love, affection and reassurance. Instead, I was made to feel that I was not important. I was made to feel unloved. I used to dream about a different life and different parents, and I would cry and cry for my Mummy. I would look at my Daddy, watch him playing with the boys and wish he would see me.

I never felt that he saw me. I held on to the hope that one day he might, and that maybe he did love me as much as he loved them.

As I grew older, I discovered books that opened up to me another world of how fathers should be. One of my favourites was
Little Women
. When I read the chapter in which Mr March returns from the war just in time for Christmas, I wept and wept, thinking how different life must be for some families. What I would have given for a Daddy like Mr March! Why couldn't my Dad be like him? He was loving and warm to his daughters, in spite of his injuries, so why couldn't I get just a bit of love from my own Dad?

In my adult years, I've met many men whom I would class as being 'good fathers'. These men were the antithesis of my own Dad. They loved their children and showed them this by hugging and nurturing them, listening to them, providing for them, playing with and protecting them. My first important 'fatherly' relationship with a man other than my own Dad was with my first husband Robert's father. The first time Robert took me home to visit his parents, I was bowled over by that family. They were intelligent, kind, caring, smart . . . and they accepted me. I developed very good relationships with both of his parents, although initially I was scared because I didn't know what to expect, having known only my own dysfunctional family life. I was most nervous about meeting Robert's father, Bob Shipman, but I needn't have been as he made me feel comfortable in his presence from the outset.