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Write a letter

Muriel Larson

“All my life, I longed for my dad’s approval,” Cheryl told me, “and I never felt I had it. He never hugged or kissed me or told me he loved me. Often I hoped for a word of commendation when I did something good, but I never received one.”

Cheryl was in her 30s when she wrote a letter to her father telling him how she felt. “What do I have to do to get your approval?” was the most important question she asked in the lengthy letter. After praying, she dropped it off at her parents’ home.

An hour later, she heard the doorbell chime. When she went to answer, she found her father standing there. For the first time in his life, he hugged his daughter tightly and kissed her. “I do love you, honey,” he said shakily. “I really do love you!”

For ten minutes, father and daughter could only weep. “That was the first time I ever saw my dad cry,” Cheryl says, “the first time he ever hugged or kissed me or told me he loved me. You can’t imagine the joy that day!”

According to Cheryl, that was the beginning of a new life, not only for her and her father, but also for her mother, brother and sister. “The following week, Dad bought my mother flowers and started going to church with her,” Cheryl recalls. “He kissed my sister and told her that he loved her too. Now that he seemed able to express his emotions, he told us that he had received Christ as his Saviour as a teenager. Now he and my mother have both spiritual and emotional communication. And I finally understand that the reason he had opposed me concerning certain things in the past was that he really did love me and he wanted what was good for me.”

How many parents and children are estranged because they don’t understand one another? Unfortunately, many people seem unable to express their feelings and may be misunderstood by those closest to them. Although Cheryl lived in the same city as her parents, she couldn’t bring herself to talk directly to her dad about their differences. A letter did what she couldn’t seem to do in person.

Muriel Larson is a writer from Greenville, S.C.

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Last modified June 29, 2001.

© 2001 Mennonite Brethren Herald.
Published by the Canadian Conference of MB Churches.
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