Lessons Learned from an Emotionally Absent Dad
My decision to leave started with a lie. I told the father of my children (and husband at the time) I needed to go to Walmart to get some groceries, but that never happened. Instead, I sat in the Walmart parking lot and called my Dad.
So much was happening in my marriage and I needed some insight from the man I believed to be the best person for advice. My Dad received his master’s in social work when I was an adolescent. After spending the beginning of my childhood as a military brat, our home became the testing grounds for everything he was learning in school. I was fortunate enough to have a Dad who taught us emotional intelligence from early on and I am extremely grateful for that. It is one of the aspects of parenting I carried through with my children.
I always turned to my Dad for advice when it came to marriage and family. As I opened up for the first time to him about the struggles in my marriage, it was then he told me about the cycle of abuse. He pointed out that abuse isn’t just physical, that it can be emotional and psychological. He explained things in a way that once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it. I was in an abusive marriage.
My marriage was already crumbling at this point, my mental health was suffering, and the abuse started happening to the kids as well now. I knew I needed out and my Dad felt the same. The support he offered in those moments was incredible. Without hesitation, he offered to fly our kids and me to stay with him and his Wife immediately. He offered to help us get on our feet and to provide for us until that happened. He insisted that I stay with them until I could finish my degree or a certificate program to allow me to have a better paying career to provide for our kids. I agreed to everything and that very same day, I told my then-husband, I was leaving with the kids.
There is a lot to say regarding that decision and, in time, I will share more. However, this post is going to stay focused on my Dad and me.
Within two days, I was on a flight with our kids to move in with my Dad and his Wife. To this day, I firmly believe leaving my abusive marriage may have never happened if it weren’t for this support from my Dad and I recognize that not everyone has that. This quick turnaround of living situations was difficult for all of us, but we all did our best to make it work.
Upon arriving, I did not know what my future looked like. My then-husband was promising to change and fight to keep our family together, so I was not sure if divorce was what I wanted. My Dad and I had many conversations, but the overarching feeling being that my Dad wanted me to proceed with divorce. He was willing to help me pay for it, so I didn’t have any obstacles. I just didn’t know if I wanted to end my marriage without giving my then-husband a chance to prove he would fight for us.
Unfortunately, though a quick series of events, it became obvious to me that my then-husband was lying about getting counseling and other things. I did eventually decide that divorce was what I needed to do and most definitely do not regret that decision. However, I do want to address the fact that I did feel very pressured by my Dad to follow through with the divorce because he had done so much to get me safely out of that situation.
The divorce process started off amicable and I did honestly believe it could remain that way. I realized over time that this belief stemmed from the fact that as an individual, I am capable of maintaining a very amicable relationship. However, it takes two to tango and, no matter how capable I am, my ex-husband has since made it clear that he has no intention of being cooperative. Again, those are stories for later, what I want to focus on was that for the most part, the divorce process was easy. Everything after is where it all got hard.
Shortly after settling in, my Dad realized my laptop was old and partially broken, so he bought me a new one stating I would need it for school and job hunting. I immediately began looking for both those things. Before the divorce had even been filed, I was applying for jobs and researching careers for single Moms. I took being the sole provider very seriously and I was extremely active in trying to “get on my feet” as my Dad had discussed with me during that initial phone call.
Once I had decided on a school/career option, I started discussing it with my Dad. I planned to work at least part-time during school as well. Before we had been there for one month, I had already put a plan together for starting school as soon as possible and then beginning a career in less than a year. I was proud of what I had done. However, the conversation that followed was not what I expected at all.
My Dad told me to slow down. To not think about that right now because he is able to take care of us. He told me to focus on processing what has happened and that all the school and career stuff can come later.
Perhaps this would have been reassuring for some people, but I was confused. He told me this is exactly what he wanted me to do and was part of the “conditions” agreed upon when we came to stay with him. We were living in a two-bedroom apartment with three adults and two kids under the age of five. I thought I was doing exactly what I should have been. In fact, I thought he would be proud of me as well for everything I had planned in such a short amount of time with everything else going on. But he wasn’t. He was telling me I was doing things wrong.
Now, I do understand what he meant and why allowing myself to process things was important in healing and moving forward. However, to this day, I still do not understand why he made the choices he made after this conversation. Because having this conversation with me made no sense based on his following actions and I spent years trying to figure out why a parent would do these things.
Just as I sighed a breath the relief that I could just be present with my kids right now, everything changed. Within the next two weeks after that conversation to slow down, my Dad told me that he would be helping me get an apartment. At this time, I was receiving $800 a month in unemployment that was set to run out in a few months if I didn’t get another job. I was also receiving $1000 a month in child support from my ex. This was helpful in paying for bills, but not nearly enough to support my little family. My Dad offered to help with the bills and any expenses.
Nothing major happened with us staying there. I was helpful with the cooking and cleaning, we were respectful, and there were never really any issues. From what I understand, my Dad and his Wife were overwhelmed in the small space and I do get that. Although he was willing to help out with money as long as I needed it, I didn’t want to have to rely on him. To me, this decision meant I was going out on my own and I was in a tailspin with the sudden change.
This wasn’t what we discussed in the phone call before I left my ex-husband. This wasn’t part of the plan when we got here. This wasn’t part of the plan when my short-term plans were for this and he told me not to plan for that. My Dad, the one that I had always counted on for solid advice, was now giving me conflicting information and I was just very confused.
When we looked at apartments, I was very conservative. I wanted the cheapest I could find that was acceptable even though my Dad wanted me in something more expensive (mostly because there was more space). I knew I needed to afford everything on my own, so I made sure we found something I was positive I could make work without his help.
I settled on a one-bedroom apartment and he helped me furnish everything with the basics. I got a bunk bed for the kids and I slept on a queen bed all in that one bedroom. It wasn’t extravagant, but we had all the necessities. I had spent six weeks living with my Dad and his Wife before we settled into our tiny apartment. Just two weeks prior, I was told to slow down and not worry about providing for us, but now, I was on my own.
I want to state again, that my Dad was always willing to help me if I needed it. However, that was not really an option for me as I wanted to be able to prove I could take care of my kids. Perhaps having that false security blanket made the initial movement forward possible. But regardless of how I felt, I didn’t skip a beat.
Once everything was moved over, I remember a distinct moment that happened, once again, in a Walmart parking lot. After a last-minute trip to get the few remaining necessities, I sat in the parking lot with the kids in the back getting ready to make the drive back to our apartment “all on my own” for the first time. I sat in the driver’s seat with the engine idling just frozen with anxiety. I did not feel prepared to do what was ahead of me, but I also did not feel like I had a choice.
Over the next several months, I survived off my minimal income, government assistance, and donating plasma whenever I could until I found employment. My Dad helped pay for my car, insurance, and my basic (not smart) phone, but I took over everything during that time. There was only one time I asked my Dad for money after I moved into that apartment and it was when an electrical fire took out the power in our apartment building and the kids and I had to evacuate suddenly. Other than that, I never reached out for help with money.
What I did repeatedly ask for and needed from him was emotional support. Although all the financial help was pivotal, the hardest part came after that and I really needed him. However, my Dad disconnected very quickly because my ex-husband made things difficult almost immediately. I was left feeling as though my Dad did not want to deal with what was always framed as “drama.” My real-world trauma was treated like teenage nonsense to him. The one person I found as a consistent source of advice and knowledge my whole life suddenly did not want to be involved. After my Dad left me at the new apartment that day, I felt abandoned.
I couldn’t understand why he made the plans he did beforehand, then after the move with him, he didn’t want me to follow that plan immediately, and then suddenly, everything changed once again and I was just along for the ride of the whole thing. And although he did tell me to consider my mental health as the reason to slow down, this did not feel like my experience in all of this mattered at all. I felt pressured from him to get the divorce and then when that divorce got severely complicated, he was nowhere to be seen. I don’t blame him for my choices, but I do struggle to understand his.
Things got worse and worse over the years and my Dad only grew more distant. I tried for eight years, with every fiber of my being, to maintain a relationship with him, but his contribution was almost always below bare minimum. As a child, all I ever wanted was the approval of my Dad. Now, as an adult child, I was basically begging for a relationship and making all the efforts because it meant so much to me. But it never seemed to matter to him.
I have struggled my whole life with my relationship with my Dad. Once my parents divorced, my Dad checked out of our lives basically only coming around for holidays or special events. I don’t pretend to know all of what he was going through (and that’s his story to tell) but I do know what I went through as the child of that divorce. This wasn’t the first time I felt abandoned by my Dad and it wasn’t until years after my own divorce that I finally came to terms with that.
There is a lot of pain that has happened in the relationship between my Dad and me. And honestly, I felt that pain every day as I desperately tried to have a relationship with him. That was until a few years ago.
There were many things that led up to this defining moment, but ultimately, I was in a place of fighting tooth and nail for the well-being of our kids against my ex. As my ex worked furiously to alienate our son from me, I was making every effort to show my son I loved and care deeply about him.
Regardless of my ex saying our son hated me and didn’t want to talk to me, I would text our son every day whether he ignored them or not. I was practically losing my mind to make sure every moment with my son was meaningful because I was so afraid of losing him to the alienation.
My children are my whole world and I would go to the ends of it to show them my love. This hard time eventually led to an evidentiary trial over the custody of our son after my ex abandoned our daughter. My ex had completely stopped caring about our daughter and hadn’t heard anything about her (at his request) for about eight months by the time of the trial. When asked on the stand about his attempts to communicate with our daughter, he disgustingly stated something along the lines of the phone working both ways and if she wanted to talk to him, she could always call.
The idea that a child should be responsible for maintaining the relationship with their parents seriously blows my mind. Because what do you mean, that as the parent, you don’t desire so much to be involved in your child’s life that you make every effort to do so? My ex specifically stated he didn’t want to be involved with her and then placed all responsibility of the relationship on our twelve-year-old after he abandoned her.
This hit so close to my own parental abandonment experiences. I realized in that moment that the fact I am practically killing myself emotionally to feel accepted and wanted by my Dad was completely backwards. I realized then that if my Dad wanted a relationship with me, he would make the effort.
It was in this moment of realization that I thought about a previous moment I had with my Dad that suddenly felt very different now. Several years earlier, I had been trying to get together with my Dad just to catch up for a while and our schedules happened to align. As we sat together with his Wife chatting, he made a comment that caught me off guard at the time, but really hit me now. Looking me right in the eyes, my Dad told me that next time we get together to make sure to bring the grandkids because if they aren’t there, he doesn’t want to spend time with me. Now, he said this in a “lighthearted, joking” kind of manner, but it didn’t feel like a joke to me.
I was really hurt by this comment, but played it off in the moment like I got his joke. Now in that moment of realizing my Dad’s effort reflected his desires to have a relationship with me, that comment repeated itself in my head with more clarity. He had said it back then and I just didn’t catch it. He was fulfilling an obligation every time we hung out or he wished me happy birthday. And I don’t know if I happened with any of my other siblings, but he did forget my birthday before, so it obviously wasn’t an obligation he took too seriously. Seeing all of that now in a very different light, I knew I needed to release the expectation of ever having the relationship I desire with my Dad.
When I look back at my parents, I honestly believe they did the best they could. I do know that my Dad has been through a lot in his life. Truthfully though, he is very fortunate to have a daughter who desires to have a relationship with him because my ex cannot say the same about our daughter.
What I take away from my experiences with my Dad is that I don’t want to show up for my kids that way. He did his best, but I see I can do better and so I will. That isn’t a judgement on his best efforts, but rather recognition that growth can happen despite other’s shortcomings. From my experiences with him, I now know how I want to show up for my kids. The things I felt I did not receive from him, I make sure I give to my kids.
I am grateful for many things from my Dad, but I dismissed this pain for almost a decade feeling indebted to him for helping me leave my abusive marriage. I know now that it is important to recognize that more than one thing can exist at once. I can feel grateful for what my Dad did/does at the same time I feel pain for what he did/does not.
Realizing how ridiculous it was for my ex to expect our child to carry the burden of the relationship reflected right back at me the expectations I had placed on myself. Looking at our relationship history, I can see that I spent decades of my life trying to be accepted by my Dad. But now as a parent, I have always accepted my children for who they are and am intentional about helping them to see that. I just don’t believe it is my children’s job to do anything to feel accepted or loved. Rather, it is my job as their Mom to make sure I express that in a way they understand.
After spending my entire life feeling like I was never good enough to be loved by my Dad, I finally saw that it was never about me. I never needed to be anything more than someone’s child to deserve love and acceptance. It was always my Dad’s responsibility to make sure I felt that. Now understanding that his responsibility is beyond my control, I looked for what was within my power to change.
I cannot control how my Dad raised me, the experiences I had, or how he handles being a parent of adult children now. However, I am in control of learning from where I feel my Dad hasn’t shown up for me and making sure I provide for those needs in my kids. I will never be able to control whether or not my Dad wants a relationship with me. Truth be told, I have accomplished incredible feats in my lifetime and if my own daughter goes through what I did and comes out on the other side of it half as healed, I would be so proud of her. I am so proud of me.
Having this shift in perspective didn’t take away the pain I feel for what I wish my relationship with my Dad was. However, it did allow me to feel like I have control over what that pain does to me. Every time I meet my kids’ emotional needs or go above and beyond to show up, that pain has purpose. My unmet needs as a child become the driving force for empathy and love towards my own children.
People are going to do things that hurt others. We cannot avoid the consequences of other’s actions. However, we still have choices. We can either spend our lives passing that pain on to others or we can feel our pain and make sure others don’t. I will always wish my Dad wanted a relationship with me. The pain of that will never go away. But that pain ends with me as I make sure my own kids will never feel this pain from me. Where I lacked, they have abundance. And from my pain, they have love.
(A follow-up to this story explaining how I got myself out of the parking lot that evening can be found HERE)