So it's a long story, and I'm struggling to cope because I don't have many people close to me nor can I talk about this to my family due to the circumstances.

I met my real dad for the first time last week, I'm 22 and my mother left my father when I was a baby due to his violence and have never had any contact with him until his sister contacted me recently, he has leukaemia for 2 years and he's contracted pneumonia from being in hospital for so long.

Because of his illness and it has dawned on me that this will be my very slim chance at getting to know him if the worst comes to it. I don't know too much about leukaemia but he has CMML and he can deteriorate at any moment, though his current health is worsening and he's been in hospital for 3 nearly 4 weeks.

It's a strange circumstance because I obviously don't have the same attachment to him like I would my mother, but I've wondered about him, thought about who he is and have always had him at the back of my mind all the way through growing up, and now I've finally met him I want to get to know him, we live in different cities, so I will try to travel to visit as much as my budget allows but I can't talk to anyone about my feelings of this sort of impending doom, like his leukaemia is a ticking time bomb but I feel like I can't be upset or be in grief because I've only just met him. I can't talk to the closest person to me, my mum, because she despises him and I wouldn't expect her to want to be involved. 

I just feel extremely isolated and more alone than I ever have, and I feel like I'm experiencing this slow painful grief alongside my aunt ( his sister who reached out to me about this) who I barely know. Half of me just wants to quit my job and move to london to spend what little time we might have together, but that might also sabotage my career because I've recently been promoted too. I'm sorry if this is a confusing story but I needed to just write this, I'm still in a state of shock from meeting him and now dealing with this illness.