Why Fathers Should Spend Time With Their Daughters

From a daughter to any father that may be reading this, I hope you read this and are touched enough to at least ask your daughter to dinner, lunch, breakfast, even a trip to Disney.

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I am almost 40 and have longed to have a relationship with my father.

I grew up in a home where my mother stayed home and my grandmother as well. While it was always nice having my mom and Nana around, I wished my dad was, too. He was either working or taking a nap. 

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When I was 18, I ended up moving out on my own. With that, there was less and less time with my family as I was growing into adulthood, married twice with four children. While my dad was taking care of my mom, she wasn’t in the best of health even when I was little, she was what we now call obese. All of my life, she was this way and ended up passing on when she was a young age of 64. Ended up being able to meet all four of my children and caring for them. However, out of loss, I found my father. I was 30 at the time, and he appeared. 

I have had almost ten years with him. This past weekend, we went on a last minute trip due to someone saying to me, “this could be you last hoorah.” This scared me. You see, he is 78, he is healthy now. However, he has had his run in with his health from colon cancer, lung cancer and prostrate cancer and the word “last” that was mentioned to me change my thought process. We were having a conversation about how I don’t get a chance to spend much time with him, my husband and I both have thriving businesses and four very active children. 

I typically ask my dad to go with us on vacations, out to dinner, even to dinner at our house, his response is usually “I don’t think so” or “no.”

Well, not this time, I called him on a Thursday and asked him if he wanted to drive up to the Disney World area and stay at the Contemporary Hotel like when I was five, he called it “Holly’s Hotel” back then. I said, “it would be just the two of us.” To my surprise, he said, “sure, why not” Me? I was completely shocked; my response was “okay, great daddy. I have to finish working today, I’ll get in touch with you to sort everything out.” He said “okay.”

I ended up going up that Sunday, just a few days after the ball was rolling to spend time with each other. 

We went to church together, then headed out on our adventure, talked the whole drive, laughed quite a bit, I get my sense of humor from him. Typically, him and I are the only ones that understand the jokes we are saying. Which to me is close to perfection. 

We have gone to dinner and lunch before even breakfast; this trip couldn’t compare. 

The dinner, the lunches, the breakfasts that we have had are there. However, this trip will always be remembered. From the drive up with no reservation at the hotel we were going to stay at, to the upgrade they gave us to recapture a moment almost 35 years ago of being on the balcony with Disney World in the background. To them giving us complimentary tickets to Epcot, arranging late checkout and complimentary breakfast, and lunch the following day and then enjoying more time together on the ride home. 

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We took a leap of faith as our Pastor spoke about in church that morning. You see, the room that was available at the Contemporary Hotel was a bit over what we wanted to spend, even had my throat chakra kick in after the reservation was made, and I went to valet my car. I had to keep telling myself “everything was going to be okay” and you know what? It was and still is. 

The ball was already in motion if I stopped what I had put out into the universe I would be defying the law of attraction. 

From a daughter to any father that may be reading this, I hope you read this and are touched enough to at least ask your daughter to dinner, lunch, breakfast, even a trip to Disney. I promise you, she will never forget, neither will you.

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Photo is author’s own.