Amidst the turmoil that surrounded Cheese at 8 years old, her mom packed her and her brother’s belongings and moved out.

“Even though I was young, I understood why,” she said. “Our home was not pleasant to be in. My parents were always arguing. I (felt) relieved when my parents split because the arguing stopped.”

After time passed, she realized it meant she wouldn’t get to see her father much anymore.

“It was really devastating,” she said.

Now Cheese, an interdisciplinary studies senior, was one of three MSU students sharing their stories about how the loss of their fathers has affected their lives and how God has helped them fill that void.

She was part of a Fatherless Daughters panel Thursday night, which was a workshop hosted by the Christian sorority Alpha Lambda Omega in the Engineering Building.

It’s unfortunate that there’s a need for this type of panel, said Patrice Johnson, the sorority’s outreach chair and a social relations and policy senior, but her sorority still wants to help.

“What we began to see is that there are a lot of young women who do not have their father, whether it be he died, he was absent, or there’s a relationship where he was married to their mother and then there was a divorce and separation,” Johnson said. “It stays with women until they are old — it doesn’t leave. It’s like a gap there. When you don’t have that male figure in the household, you’re really losing out.”

Although the panel recounted many of the scarring stories that made the early periods of their lives difficult, the members all spoke about how God was able to see them through their trials.

“At first I had to count on myself and I had to count on my mom even more,” Cheese said. “But then when I entered into a relationship with God — when I got saved — I began to count on him for that comfort, that love.”

Mathematics senior Oluseyi Akinpelu couldn’t fully relate to the stories told Thursday night, but said the event has helped her appreciate her life.

“We need to cherish what we have, because we never know what we have until it’s gone,” Akinpelu said.

Cheese communicates with her father on and off since she and her mother moved out, and despite some flaws, she said he’s trying to mend the relationship. Her father recently found God and she said having a common spirituality has brought the two of them closer together, especially knowing how far he has come.

“That made me rejoice even more, just knowing him,” she said.