Lily Collins is pulling back the curtains on her strained relationship with her father in her new book of essays. In them, she shared Phil Collins was “not being the dad I expected,” and her “deepest insecurities stem from these issues” with her dad.
In her new book, “Unfiltered: No Shame, No Regrets, Just Me,” Collins penned an open letter to her dad, forgiving him for “not always being there,” according to BBC.
The musician left Collins’ mother Jill Tavelman when the “Rules Don’t Apply” actress was five. He then moved to Switzerland for more than two decades.
“He may have still been alive, but most of the time it felt as if he were completely gone,” wrote Lily. “I knew he loved me, yet he wasn’t physically around to tell me.”
She added that she felt a “terrible disconnect” develop as she got older.
“He assumed everything was always fine because I never said otherwise. It established a detrimental pattern,” she wrote. “And I’ve realized that many of my deepest insecurities stem from these issues with my dad. It’s taken me more than a decade to resolve some of them (others I’m still resolving) and to finally build up the courage to speak my mind to him.”
In the open letter, she directly addressed her father, assuring him she will “always be your little girl.”
“We all make choices and, although I don’t excuse some of yours, at the end of the day we can’t rewrite the past. I’m learning how to accept your actions and vocalise how they made me feel,” she continued. “I accept and honour the sadness and anger I felt toward the things you did or didn’t do, did or didn’t give me. I forgive you for not always being there when I needed and for not being the dad I expected. I forgive the mistakes you made. And although it may seem like it’s too late, it’s not. There’s still so much time to move forward.”
Collins’ book was published by Ebury Press on Tuesday.