'My absent father reached out after 18 years. I threatened them with $40k.'

"My absent father reached out after 18 years. I threatened them with $40k."

Well, not him DIRECTLY.

For context, I’m a 18f. I live with my grandparents, as they are my legal guardians. My mom and my stepdad, who has been in my life since I was about 2-3 years old, live in a different state.

I mostly grew up with my grandparents. My parents werent super active in my life, but I still love them to death. For the longest time, I thought my stepdad was my biological dad. I never even questioned why my last name was different and why I was Hispanic, whereas my stepdad and mom were both white.

It never clicked to me that he wasn’t my biological dad, because I’ve always loved and treasured him. He’s a good man. From the second I was born, my biological father, Michael, did NOT want me around. When my mom was pregnant with me, he was a douche. Drank, smoked, went out, cheated on my mom. She wanted a divorce, and he lost his ever loving crap.

He hurt the hell out of my poor mom, breaking her nose, black eye, everything. The whole 9 yards. He trashed the house, all while his family watched and knew what was happening. My grandma got her out of the house. When they agreed to call the cops to try to press charges, he ran away. My mom had given birth to me in a hospital.

Her side of the family was there, as I was passed around the room. My biological father’s side was not. He wasn’t even at the hospital. They all hated me. Called me names as an infant because I wasn’t fully Mexican, I was white too. I was very pale, they didn’t want anything to do with me. For the 2 days I existed in my father’s life, he didn’t properly care for me.

When my mom filed for divorce and they split up, he tried to legally sign me away. His family tried to frame my mom for mistreatment. It was all a mess. The point is, after a few months, he was all just a bad memory for my mom, nothing to me, and was radio silent for years.

Last year when I was 17, almost 18, his sister tried reaching out to me on Facebook. I blocked her and every single related last name on her friends list. I never responded to her text. It was radio silence again for a few more months. Well, I was at work today and I took out my phone as we weren’t busy and I was texting this guy I like. I see a notification request from Instagram, I thought it was spam.

I opened it and it was my cousin from his side.

The message read as follows (I am ONLY editing the names. everything is copied and pasted.)

J: “hi!

I know this is somewhat weird & random but i wanted to introduce myself, my name is j! And I am your eldest cousin on your dad's side. Your dad is 1 of my 2 uncles, and you were born when I was about 8.

I believe my mom (c) reached out to you sometime last year on Facebook and I just wanted to extend my own arms in saying i am completely here for whatever you want to know about our side of the family, anything you've wondered about your dad or even me and my mom's part in your life I am here.

I do understand this is completely your choice and you may even need time to process, no rush!! please take this as lightly as you need to but know this olive branch is here 🌱💗” I verbally screamed at my phone and had to walk into the back. I screenshot the text, and sent it to my mom.

She replied with this.

Mom:

“They literally will not stop. You're welcome to tell her what you want, even just that you do not want to know them at all and to stop contacting you...if you want.

They think I'm the villain in all of this and that I "stole" you from Mike when I assure you I did not."

"He has not voluntarily seen you since you were a month old. And I fully divorced him when you were almost 3 years old. He owes about 40k in back child support since he never paid a dime. I was not going to try to collect, as long as they left us alone. Alas, they did not so maybe I'll go after him now. For a little more backstory, now that you're 18."

"He cheated on me with strippers while I was pregnant with you. I asked him for a divorce and he b**t the absolute dog out of me while his family listened to me screaming and did nothing. He threatened to unalive me and grandma after I filed for divorce."

"His mom and sister (C) went after me and they filed CPS reports claiming I was a**sing you and had me investigated to try to take you away from me. They are bad people. Not to unleash more crap, but I also just remembered that that man literally signed papers to give up his legal rights to you."

"The judge did not approve them, for dumb Texas reasons, but he was very happy to walk away. I'm not saying this to make you feel bad, and I'm truly sorry if it does, I just wanted you to know bc they will try to manipulate the narrative. As far as I'm concerned, your dad is D and he's never wanted to walk away. Even if we ever split up, he still would want to be in yalls lives and be your dad.”

I responded with:

“D has ALWAYS been my dad, that’s what I’ve always known him as and I love him, I feel nothing towards Michael or any of his family. I don’t know what I’ll say to them, I’ll figure it out in the next day, but hopefully it’ll stop."

"The thoughts crossed my mind to get courts in on him to get him to pay child support so yall could be in a better situation or it would help with my college, since they broke the silence first, but then I opted not to.”

Mom:

“The child support is on me to file since the order is between us. At the very least, it'll ruin his life a little bit bc while he doesn't work to avoid having to pay (he's a deadbeat) they'll seize his wife's money 🤷‍♀️ FAFO ig."

"I legit hope that they will just leave you tf alone. It's been 18 years and they didn't say a word until you became an adult and they could get around me.“

It was at this point that I finally realized I should respond to J. Now, I have never EVER been a straightforward person. I’m kind of a pushover. I don’t have a spine.

I don’t like to speak up. I barely draw boundaries. However, something inside me switched and I typed up an absolute storm. She reached out on insta, as previously mentioned, which meant that I had a word limit on my text, and it took 3 long texts to respond to her.

I dug her an absolute new one.

I said, verbatim,

“Hi J, I’m sure you are reaching out because you guys are interested in getting to know me. Hence why this is the third time someone from your family has tried to find me. I’ll grant you some information. I’m 18 years old now. I am attending college for nursing in the fall. I was granted a nearly full scholarship."

"I am graduating highschool with a 4.5 GPA. I go to church. I have a lot of lovely lovely friends. One friend I have been with since we were both 8. I enjoy hiking, going to the gym, and reading. My favorite music is jazz. I love cats and sharks and dinosaurs. I always have. I’ve been obsessed with the walking d**d since I was a little girl. My favorite food is salmon."

"I’m really good at drawing. I like to travel. I grew up with my grandparents, my mom and my dad, who is not Michael. I do not know Spanish, my only claim to being apart of your family is my last name which I plan on legally changing to my mom and dad’s last name. I am not interested in getting to know you, C, Michael, or any part of your family."

"I have not once thought of you, about you, or wondered anything about you for the last 18 years because as far as I am concerned, I have my family. I know what has happened in the past. Michael has willingly not wanted to be apart of my life for 18 years, and where he failed to be a man, MY father stepped up in his place. Michael is a horrible man, may God bless his soul, and I have no respect towards any of you."

"He is despicable. You guys are disgusting in my eyes for trying to connect now after all this time. I love my mom. She has been there for me and is the strongest woman I know. I love my dad. He is a great man and is my only father. The woman I have become is nothing short of amazing and it’s purely because I was not around any of you, and instead with amazing role models who pushed me to be my best."

"Do not ever contact me again unless it is about the $40,000 in child support Michael owes my mother which I will be legally chasing now, apologizing for all that your family has done in the past, (which I would never forgive by the way) or to tell me you will leave me alone. You are not my family. None of you have ever been. Do not try to claim any sort of relationship with me. I am, once again, not interested.”

I blocked her immediately, she hasn’t had a chance to respond, and if she did, I haven’t seen it. I’m hoping that this will make them leave me along for good now, but I’m not confident. I’m sure in a few months they’ll be reaching out again. I’m not sure why they want to reach out now that I’m 18 when they’ve wanted nothing to do with me my entire life. I have so many questions that will never go answered.

I do feel awful for being so harsh with her, as she was a kid when everything happened and it was not her fault. But, nonetheless, I have no idea how she found my Instagram considering I don’t have a last name listed, no location, and only follow my mom. She must of been doing some intense digging.

PS. I sent my mom the text I sent them, she said “damn girl literally both barrels” so I think she was proud of me for standing up. Lol.

Here's what people had to say to OP:

Inner-Worldliness943 wrote:

Drops mic...and file those damn CS papers.

OP responded:

I’m trying to convince my mom to!!! She said maybe. She struggles a lot financially, so it would definitely help her and my dad out, but I don’t want her to relive her trauma or anything. I guess she probably has since they reached out though.

We also have no idea where he is, soooo might make it hard.

Infamous_Pay_6291 wrote:

Your mum may be out of luck if she didn’t file for child support before you were 18 there is a very good chance that it has timed out now. In most places to claim child support after 18 there has to of already been a child support debt incurred I.e your mum filed for child support when you were 1 and your dad never paid so the debt kept growing she can keep going after that money for a long time after you're 18.

Once you turn 18 she generally cant go back and file for child support any more as the courts are not interested in working out what his earnings were over the time you were eligible for child support so they can work out how much he owes.

OP responded:

I believe he’s been unemployed so his wages were never garnished. I’m not entirely sure how it works. He vanished, we had no clue where he went. He’s married now. I believe my mom said the payments would have to come from his current wife, he hasn’t ever made a single payment and my mom has never chased after it in order to avoid contact. Would that still be able to be filed?

ALL_PUNS_INTENDED wrote:

Your mom also speaks like a teenager?

OP responded:

My mom and I snapchat eachother instead of texting like normal parents, lol. She had me when she was young. She’s not super old.

Available_Link wrote:

I have a dirtbag uncle who did the same to a woman and her four kids. Three fourths of them hate me. I was a kid. I didn’t do anything. As adults, I tried to reach out to a cousin and she blocked me too. It sucks to be on this end but I understand it.

If I got blasted I wouldn’t try to reach out to you anymore. I mean I’m sure it felt good but your cousin isn’t the one who needs to hear it. Aunt yes. Sperm donor yes. Hopefully she shows the messages to them. And yeah girl, get that 40K.