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Dear Lili,

These past two days, September 11 and 12, mark the very last weekend we ever spent together, 20 years ago in 2004. I only saw you once after that in January 2005, for 20 mimutes in a coffee shop with your mother and grandmother wathcing closely (I suppose, for fear that I might try to abduct you) to inform you that my mother and your grandmother Nonnie had passed away.

That weekend in September we went to Kasai Rinkai Koen, at your suggestion. When I met you at Makuhari Station, you jumped up and down excitedly, happy to see me as I was to see you. We hadn’t seen each other in a couple of months becuase, I was told for the umpteenth time, that “Lili doesn’t want to see you.” I hope you never fully understand the heartbreak those words caused me every time I heard them.

We went to Kasai Rinkai Koen and enjoyed the ferris wheel and attractions together and watched the fish and penguins in the aquarium there. You seemed a little distant to me, and you refused to speak English for the most part all weekend. Nevertheless, I cherish the memory of that weekend.

When we came home, we played the “Train World” that we enjopyed together for the last time, setting up the train tracks and little structures we built together using the Brio train set.

You wanted me to buy some treats at Kasai Rinkai, which I did, that we were going to enjoy together the next time you came over. We never did, and as I said, I was never to spend another weekend with you after that.

I was so happy to have seen you that weekend. Shorttly thereafter, I took a trip to Thailand and bought you some omiyage — some handmade colored pencils and a cute wooden cat mask with pretty flowers painted on it. I sent it to you, but after you had gotten it, I received a message that said “How could you buy me such a scary thing?” It really broke my heart to pieces as I bought it out of love, of course. You never came over my place again, and every time I asked to see you I got the same answer — “Lili doesn’t want to see you.”

When I talk about losing you with people, everyone says “She’ll reach out to you someday.” I stil hold out hope that you will do so, but I have come to accept the worst possible outcome to this estrangement that any parent would have to accept — that indeed I may never see you again.

I’ve been writing this blog for 13 years now, and I have to assume you’ve seen it by now. And yet, the response I have prayed for has never come to pass. Regardless, I will continue this blog until the day I die, hoping upon hope that one day you and I will be reunited. Dum spiro spero (“As I breathe, I hope.)

You have always been and forver will remain in my heart.

Love forver,

Your one and only Dad

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Despite what you surely had been told, I did not abandon you, Lili. You were taken from me. I fought for you for two and a half years in court, just for the right to be a small part of your life. I knew going in that the incompetent and callous Japanese legal system would disregard my side of the story entirely (and there were some VERY compelling facts in my favor should you ever want to learn the truth), and that I was bound to lose, both as a man and as a foreigner. Nevertheless, I did what any loving father would do, rushing in to the burning building to save my daughter from the psychological damage so many on the other side seemed content to inflict on you. It saddens me that I was unable to save you from that. But my conscienece is clear, knowing how hard I tried.

I spent years after that in protest marches and petitioning both the Japanese and American government to do something about my left-behind parenthood. I did everything in my power to be a part of your life, but it was a fait accompli, sadly, that I — we — would lose that battle.

We were once close, Lili, and it was a crime what they did to us to just to cover up what THEY did to me and keep that knowledge from you. I had to be made to be the bad guy so that the truth of what happened in my marriage could remain buried under the avalanche of falsehoods you were fed on what I assume was a daily basis.

As Princess Diana remarked once in an interview, my marriage had gotten “a bit crowded.”

I cut my ex out of our daughter’s life: Now I’m glad he fought to see her | Daily Mail Online

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Dear Lili,

Hard to believe another year has come and gone. This year marks 20 years since last we spent any time together. Twenty years! Imagine that. 

I always imagine that you must have found this blog by now. I’ve been at it for 13 years now, having started on Father’s Day in 2011. And I think you must know the truth by now of who I am, and have come to realize that your understanding of me was built on falsehoods and slander by others with agendas of their own.

Then why haven’t you contaced me? Don’t you have any of your own memories of how close we once were together? Are your “memories” of me limted to those implanted by those who wish me ill?

My memroies of you are intact. They have always been so. Nothing anyone could have said or done would ever change a father’s love for his only child. I hope someday you can come to see this for your own.

Love always,

Your one and only Dad

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