Growing up, I lived with my mum, stepdad, and brother. I never knew my stepfather wasn’t my biological dad because of how well he treated us. However, our neighbors began telling us that our real father was abroad.

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When I got to senior high school, my father’s brother found me on Facebook and started convincing me to reach out to my dad. But I ignored him until my first semester at university, when my parents were struggling financially. I reached out to my father overseas, asking him to pay my fees, but he refused. He wanted me to believe my mum was a bad person, but I asked him, “If she’s the bad one, why was she the one who stayed and took care of us while you left?”

Let me not forget, my dad had a first child in his teens, a boy named Kwaku, whom he also abandoned. Kwaku’s mother passed away, leaving him completely alone, so he was also trying to force his way into my dad’s life.

One day, I got a message from Kwaku saying our dad had given him my number. He thought our father was taking good care of my brother and me, but I explained everything to him.

In 2019, Kwaku got an opportunity to travel to the U.S. In 2021, with his help, me and my brother also traveled to the U.S.

Now, my father is sick and has been sent back to Ghana for his family members to take care of him. They constantly call us, asking for money, which, of course, we don’t send. Now they’re calling us wicked for refusing to support our father. Meanwhile, he has a wife abroad they could be asking instead. But as for me, all my money is going to my mum and stepdad, the ones who actually raised me.

Why does society gaslight children of deadbeat parents but not hold the deadbeat parents accountable? Papa nyɛ hwii aa, bone nso nyɛ hwii.

—Obaa

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