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How do you help a fatherless child?
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<blockquote data-quote="donna723" data-source="post: 210068" data-attributes="member: 1883"><p>I've been thinking and thinking of how I was going to answer this. Our situation was a little different in that my kids' father was actually (physically, anyway) there until our son was 15 and our daughter was 20 - then he left us. He was there all those years and could have had a wonderful relationship with his son but <em>chose</em> not to. For his own reasons he always treated him differently - lavishing attention on our daughter but really using her and manipulating her, while treating our son terribly and trying to make him into the little servant boy! He's done some horrible hurtful things to him that he never would have done to our daughter. He even told me once that he always considered our daughter to be "his' child and our son to be "mine"! After the divorce, he made a show of visiting for a few months, then it got less and less, and finally he barely saw him at all. Christmas would come and his new stepkids got tons of gifts, his own son got nothing but promises. When he moved out of state his 'relationship' with his son became two phone calls a year - on his birthday and Christmas. Now there's not even that.</p><p> </p><p>Their father made things very difficult for me with our daughter when she was younger but I always had a special close bond with my son and I still do. I always felt like a single parent with him and he always knew that I was his only <em>real</em> parent, the one he could rely on, and it's still that way. I tried so hard to be everything he needed in a parent and I think I did pretty well. He grew up to be a wonderful young man that anyone would be proud to have as a son, a kind, loving, decent man who is nothing like his father. But I can't even imagine how much it must have hurt him to have a father around but to know that he didn't really want to have a relationship with him! It really tore at his self-esteem. Intellectually, he knew that he was a good, worthwhile person and that his father was a total loser. But he had to have wondered all those years how his own father could <em>choose</em> not to care about him, if there was some fault in him that made him unworthy or not good enough. And I didn't really know how to help him with that, how to make it up to him, or if I even could.</p><p> </p><p>It really wasn't until he was in his early twenties and age and maturity caught up with him, and he was finally able to see the situation from the viewpoint of an adult. It took all that time but now he finally sees his father for what he is and he now knows that it was no fault of his own. He's OK - his father is an <img src="/community/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/2012/censored2.gif" class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":censored2:" title="censored2 :censored2:" data-shortname=":censored2:" />! His father is just incapable of really caring about anyone but himself and the lack of a relationship is his fathers loss, not his. He sees it now, but as a kid, it really, really hurt! Our daughter sees it clearly now too and she no longer has a relationship with him either. I don't know if he is even aware that there's a grandchild on the way - she hasn't told him.</p><p> </p><p>I guess what I'm trying to say is that while you don't want to 'bad mouth' his father, you don't want to lie about it to the child either! Knowing that you have a father around and that he <em>chooses</em> not to be a part of your life HURTS a lot! You want to make sure that the child knows for sure that it's not his fault, that there's not something wrong with him that keeps his father at arms-length. You can't ever really make up for that hurt or make it go away entirely, but you can let them know how much <em>you</em> love them and do your best to reassure them that <em>they're</em> not at fault. Does any of that make sense? I hope so!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="donna723, post: 210068, member: 1883"] I've been thinking and thinking of how I was going to answer this. Our situation was a little different in that my kids' father was actually (physically, anyway) there until our son was 15 and our daughter was 20 - then he left us. He was there all those years and could have had a wonderful relationship with his son but [I]chose[/I] not to. For his own reasons he always treated him differently - lavishing attention on our daughter but really using her and manipulating her, while treating our son terribly and trying to make him into the little servant boy! He's done some horrible hurtful things to him that he never would have done to our daughter. He even told me once that he always considered our daughter to be "his' child and our son to be "mine"! After the divorce, he made a show of visiting for a few months, then it got less and less, and finally he barely saw him at all. Christmas would come and his new stepkids got tons of gifts, his own son got nothing but promises. When he moved out of state his 'relationship' with his son became two phone calls a year - on his birthday and Christmas. Now there's not even that. Their father made things very difficult for me with our daughter when she was younger but I always had a special close bond with my son and I still do. I always felt like a single parent with him and he always knew that I was his only [I]real[/I] parent, the one he could rely on, and it's still that way. I tried so hard to be everything he needed in a parent and I think I did pretty well. He grew up to be a wonderful young man that anyone would be proud to have as a son, a kind, loving, decent man who is nothing like his father. But I can't even imagine how much it must have hurt him to have a father around but to know that he didn't really want to have a relationship with him! It really tore at his self-esteem. Intellectually, he knew that he was a good, worthwhile person and that his father was a total loser. But he had to have wondered all those years how his own father could [I]choose[/I] not to care about him, if there was some fault in him that made him unworthy or not good enough. And I didn't really know how to help him with that, how to make it up to him, or if I even could. It really wasn't until he was in his early twenties and age and maturity caught up with him, and he was finally able to see the situation from the viewpoint of an adult. It took all that time but now he finally sees his father for what he is and he now knows that it was no fault of his own. He's OK - his father is an :censored2:! His father is just incapable of really caring about anyone but himself and the lack of a relationship is his fathers loss, not his. He sees it now, but as a kid, it really, really hurt! Our daughter sees it clearly now too and she no longer has a relationship with him either. I don't know if he is even aware that there's a grandchild on the way - she hasn't told him. I guess what I'm trying to say is that while you don't want to 'bad mouth' his father, you don't want to lie about it to the child either! Knowing that you have a father around and that he [I]chooses[/I] not to be a part of your life HURTS a lot! You want to make sure that the child knows for sure that it's not his fault, that there's not something wrong with him that keeps his father at arms-length. You can't ever really make up for that hurt or make it go away entirely, but you can let them know how much [I]you[/I] love them and do your best to reassure them that [I]they're[/I] not at fault. Does any of that make sense? I hope so! [/QUOTE]
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