Is the questioner considered divorced due to a fictitious divorce document issued by her husband years ago, with his knowledge that he was not spending on her or their daughter and that communication had ceased, or must she file a divorce suit before a judge?

If the husband did not utter the divorce, or write it with the intention of effecting it, or delegate someone else, then the document is of no use to the wife. The husband's statement, "If she does not love me, then I do not love her," is not an explicit divorce. If the wife wishes to separate from him and he does not divorce her, then she must refer the matter to the Sharia court to rule on a divorce or khul'.