She was eventually re-united with her father as an adult with whom she formed a bond before his death a few years ago

Esperanza said her grief and mourning for her father affected her temperament and health and her mother put her in foster care

She said her mother fled with her two children after she became increasingly religious while her husband followed a more hedonistic path

The young woman, writing under the name 'Esperanza Hopewell', did not see her father between the ages of three and 18

A woman has told how she did not see her father between the ages of three and 18 after she was 'kidnapped' by her Jehovah's Witness mother who later gave her up to foster care.

Writing under the name 'Esperanza Hopewell', believed to be a pseudonym, the woman said her parents grew apart after her mother became increasingly religious and her father pursued a more hedonistic path with 'hippies' and drugs.

Then, when Esperanza was three, while her father was out, her mother called her 'brothers' who collected them from their home in Marin County, California, and took them to live with another family in San Francisco, she wrote on XOJane.

Severed: A woman writing under the name 'Esperanza Hopewell', not pictured [STOCK IMAGE] did not see her father for 15 years after her mother 'kidnapped' her

She said they 'eventually' got a government-issue apartment but it did not make her life happier and she mourned her father for years.

'I remember a few tearful tantrums, wailing that I wanted my daddy during the first few years...My grief and fear found no sympathetic ear, so they manifested physically,' she wrote.

Esperanza said she suffered from numerous health problems - including urinary tract infections and fever and was referred to mental health services.

She said she struggled making friends, adding: 'My social skills were coarse enough to make people wonder if Jack Nicholson had founded a charm school.'

Instead, she said she hid in her mother's room listening to records and fantasizing that her father was Elvis because she could no longer picture his real face.

But nothing could rid her of the 'constant undercurrent of fear' that she felt, she said.

Eperanza said she had a bad relationship with her mother and 'a near-complete contempt for authority'.

In the end, her mother tricked her into foster care, saying it was 'only for three days'.

She spent the next five years in foster care which she said 'for all its flaws, did set me on a better path than I could otherwise have hoped' and was later hired by her former home.

When she was working there, a notice of support collection with her father's name on it came to her desk and she was able to write to her him through them.

He got hold of her number and a few weeks later he called her.

His well-attended funeral overflowed with tales of Herculean strength, shirt-off-his-back generosity, redneck ingenuity, and enormous-hearted kindness

She wrote: 'His mumbly voice, with a volume he couldn't quite control, made him difficult to understand over the phone, but I did understand when he said he would already be on the way if he could, but as a garbage man, he had to work at 4 am.

'Could he come Friday? Friday! All week, I walked on sunshine, telling anyone and everyone that I'd found my long-lost father.'

When she finally saw him, she said he looked like 'if Santa were a disheveled, middle-aged 5'7" bachelor with a bald pate, a dirty-blond six-inch Bozo-the-Clown 'do, and a David Crosby mustache'.

She added: 'He gathered me into his Popeye-strong arms and held me tight for an uncomfortably long time, slowly rocking, savoring the moment.'

He gave her a gift of $50 and they went for tacos together and started to forge a relationship.

Esperanza wrote: 'We started visiting each other regularly, and one time we even smoked a joint together while meandering down the road in one of his beat-up pickup trucks.

'He was nothing like the mean, domineering "goat" my mother had described.

'She had never mentioned how strong or resourceful he was. She also hadn't once remarked on his helpful nature.'

She said they tried to build a father-daughter relationship but it resulted in more of a 'uncle-niece' bond.

She said he later re-married, joined Narcotics Anonymous and the Baptist church and 'stopped blaming mom for his hardships'.

Until one night a few years ago he died of congestive heart failure.

She wrote: 'His well-attended funeral overflowed with tales of Herculean strength, shirt-off-his-back generosity, redneck ingenuity, and enormous-hearted kindness.

'It was amazing how much we had in common, especially since he hadn't raised me.