Diana Wilczewska had been trying to reach out to her father for four years before she finally got the chance to meet with him in December. Getting to this point was a long and difficult process, but she had some questions that she wanted answered.

Wilczewska has had a tough time dealing the absence of her father in her life. She hadn’t seen her father since she was in seventh grade. “My father and my mom got a divorce when I was just a baby, maybe a year or two old,” Wilczewska said. Wilczewska admitted that the absence of her father has made her a different person. She added, “I think that I would maybe believe a little bit more into ‘family’ and maybe I’d actually enjoy holidays.”

Wanting to reconnect, Wilczewska began the process close to home. “I began to talk to some of my family members. I was asking them if they knew any way that I can contact him. Then, I asked my friend that I’ve known since I was three, and her mom is friends with my dad. While she was over at his place, I asked her to ask him [for] his number, so I can contact him,” Wilczewska shared.

When she finally got the number, she stared at it for almost two hours. She was scared to call. “If it wasn’t for my boyfriend being there for me, I definitely wouldn’t have gotten the courage to call him.”

The first phone call was mostly silence for the first half hour. “The first time week we talked, it was mostly crying on the phone,” she added. Wilczewska realized that she finally could ask the questions that she has been wanting to.

“Why were you never there for me or tried finding me?” she asked. He explained that he, too, was scared.

After talking, Wilczewska eventually made plans to reunite with her dad. She had so many mixed feelings about this whole thing. “I didn’t want to meet up with him at a private place because I was scared,” she said. It was outside in the cold when she saw him waiting for her to arrive. They decided to meet up at a Dunkin Donuts. Wilczewska said that during the reunion, there wasn’t much to talk about. “It was like we were on the phone again, besides that fact that we actually saw each other, when I saw him, I didn’t know if I was supposed to give him my hand or if I should hug him or how I should react,” she added.  Wilczewska said they just sat there for about half an hour,not talking, just staring at each other. “It was just awkward,” she said.

Now that they have been seeing each other more and more Wilczewska admits that their relationship is a lot better, and not as awkward, because they have more to talk about. “I don’t exactly know how my dad feels about the whole thing, but I believe that he feels the same way I do”.

Wilczewska added “We are waiting for the weather to get a little warmer so that it’s not just Dunkin Donuts every time. We want to go out some place, like the zoo, because when you’re walking around seeing stuff you actually have more to talk about.”