Single Dad Shares on Raising Daughter After Her Mum Left a Month After She Was Born

Richard Johnson, 21, a single dad, in an inspirational Facebook post, shared on raising his daughter after her mother left. Richard who says he didn’t want kids for the most of his life, told YahooParenting, “I came from a family where everyone is either divorced or a single parent. My father wasn’t in the picture, and I never wanted that for my kids, so I was dead set on not having any.” Then, he met his daughter’s mother and changed his mind.

He said: “We decided that we wanted kids, and I wanted to give them the life I didn’t have. The more I thought about it, the more panicked I got. I didn’t know what it meant to be an involved father except from what I saw on TV or movies.”

In a letter fast going viral posted to Life of Dad’s Facebook page on Tuesday night, Johnson explains how he ended up raising his daughter, Persephone, alone. Read below:

“[My daughter’s] mother left about a month after she was born. We still don’t know exactly why, but we suspect post-partum depression played a part. In the first few weeks of it being just [Persephone] and me, I stumbled upon your page by accident. I was so nervous and scared about being a father in general, but now I was a single father and had to fulfill two roles. I wasn’t sure I could do it. I had read every ‘new parent’ book I could find and clocked in over 1000 hours in YouTube videos from everything to braiding hair and painting nails to theories on how to deal with common parental issues. I then started to watch your page more closely and saw that there were other fathers out there who were in similar predicaments as me… We’re both very happy now and continue to grow together everyday. She’s now 10 months, and I now get asked by my friends for parenting advice constantly…”

Johnson told YahooParenting Persephone’s mother initially took their daughter with her when she left in February. “She took my little girl to California, but then called a week later and said if I didn’t come get Persephone, she was going to put her up for adoption,” he said. So, he went to get his daughter and his single dad life kicked off.

“I spent more than a few nights holding my little girl as she slept weeping because I wasn’t sure I was going to be a good enough father for her. One night in particular was the night she first crawled. She came to me and laid her tiny little hand on my cheek and stared into my eyes. I took it as ‘Come on Daddy, we have a lot to do.’ So I told her no more crying for either of us and we were going to fight to be happy. We’ve kept true to that promise,” he shared in a follow-up Facebook note posted Wednesday morning.

Now, Johnson can’t believe there was a time he didn’t want kids. He said: “It’s been crazy to go from that to waking up before she wakes up and getting her outfit ready for the day. I want to give her the best start I can. I want to teach her to trust me, to know I will be there when she goes to sleep and there when she wakes up. Now I look forward to every day because it’s so incredible to see her. She smiles when I look at her. She’s my best friend and my little shadow. I talk to her about everything – I know she doesn’t completely understand what I’m saying, but one day she will. I take a lot of pictures and write to her every day, so one day she can look back and form her own opinions about what happened and hopefully she won’t have any anger. People on Facebook say she’s lucky, but I’m the lucky one to have her.”

Johnson and Persephone have now moved in with a friend who is a single mother to a 6-month-old boy, though the two are not romantically involved. Johnson said: “We are each other’s rocks. I watch her son when she is at work, she helps me out.”

Overwhelmed by the massive response to his post, Johnson, said: “…I felt this is what a parent should do. I played football when I was a kid, and I didn’t have anyone there in the bleachers. I want to be sure my daughter doesn’t have that experience. It was terrible, it was one of the worst things in the world. As a parent, I guess you do have a choice, but to me there shouldn’t be any choice. You should stick with your kid. You bring a life into the world, you are supposed to love it and nurture it.”

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