I am the only child of my mother and father. My mother left my father when I was about a year old because of domestic violence in which she almost lost her life and mine too. My mother never returned to her marriage despite pleas from my father and his relatives because she had returned in the past and my father went back to abusing her physically, verbally and psychologically.

Fortunately, my mother found a good man two years later and she had other children for my stepfather. My stepfather treated me like his biological daughter and I never knew he was not my dad until when I turned eighteen years old when one of my uncles, while celebrating my birthday during his speech, eulogized my supposed biological father and praised him for never treating me like a stepdaughter. I was surprised at the revelation and after the ceremony, I confronted my mother while insisting on meeting my biological father.

My mother apologized while narrating the humiliation my biological father subjected her to when she was pregnant with me, and how by a stroke of luck after he dragged me from her back and she managed to grab me miraculously or else she would have lost me in that incident. I still insisted on meeting my biological father so she contacted him on the phone and asked him to come over for a meeting on an agreed date. My biological father came to my mom’s office where we were waiting for him. He apologized for his behavior towards me and my mother and promised to take up his responsibilities as my father going forward.

My father told us he had remarried but their marriage was yet to produce any other children and I was his only child. He pleaded with my mother to allow him to take me to see his wife, my stepmother, which my mother refused but I convinced my mother and she accepted. He spent one week in town and together, we went to my father’s house. Upon arrival, I saw that he had done well for himself for. He owned the house he was living in and he had a thriving business. My stepmother was a civil servant.