Dear Emma, Show
When my daughter was six months old, her dad left and more or less never showed up again. There were a few visits for a few years, and a couple of visits to family court for child support, but since then we have not heard or seen from him. My daughter is now 8 years old. We don't talk about it much and I feel like it isn't such a huge deal. She is a great kid — does well in school, has lots of friends and is polite. We are close with my parents and siblings, who live nearby. I am glad that I get her all to myself and don't have to share custody like some of my divorced friends. Sometimes people say things to me like, “I feel so bad for her that she doesn't know her father.” She never mentions her dad, and I feel like she doesn't care. She doesn't know any different. What should I tell all these rude people who judge our situation? — Shannon Dear Shannon, I’m not worried about your rude neighbors. I am worried about you and your daughter. Absentee fatherhood is a huge, complicated problem in this country. Incarceration, a culture and family court system that presumes fathers are incompetent, and other lack of support for shared parenting are among the causes for the fact that just 22 percent of fathers who don’t live with their kids see them once per week or more, according to Pew Research, and nearly a third never see their kids. This, of course, is heart-breaking for your child, and stressful for you as a single mom. If your child’s dad is not, or marginally involved, there are a few guiding principles for addressing your child’s concerns and questions. Father not involved in child’s life? What do you do?Every family is different, but here are some things to consider:
What to say to your child when his dad is not involved:1. Be honest. Don’t say he died if he didn’t. Never say “He’s working far away.” Your child deserves the truth, even if it is painful for both of you to address. 2. Be kind, and keep your feelings out of it. “Being a parent is really hard for some people, and your dad wasn’t ready to be a parent yet.” 3. As you will do in your relationship with your child’s father, as well as in your own heart, you will keep the door open to future, improved relationships. At the same time, be very careful not to nurture false hope in your child. It’s a tough balance, but an important one. Note in the “yet” in the sample script above. 4. Answer all their questions. “I’ll tell you when you’re older,” or “We don’t talk about that in our family.” These create the notion of secrets, and secrets foster shame, self-hatred, and lack of trust. 5. Highlight the fact that there are all kinds of families, and every family is whole. Even if it feels silly, as you go through your day, or are watching movies or TV, point out gay families, interracial families, kids being raised by grandparents, multigenerational households, friends who live together, foster and adoptive families, how some groups of friends create families, and on and on. Then, name the people in your family — blood relatives, friends, your neighborhood network. Do this enough and nuclear, married, straight families start to seem like the weirdoes! 6. That said, do not dismiss or minimize pain that a child experiences by his father being absent from his life. It might be really, really hard to hear, but listen. It sucks to feel like you’re the only kid at school whose dad isn’t around. It hurts like hell when your birthday comes around and your father doesn’t call. You worry you did something wrong, or you’re unlovable, or deeply flawed — no matter how great your mom and life are. My father was mostly not part of my life after age 8, and there was no space for me to talk about it. Growing up with my mom, I heard no positive stories about my father, and no space for any of us to ask questions, or to share hurt feelings about the matter. The few times I remember asking about my dad, I was just reminded of how good our life was, which only made me feel stupid and selfish for feeling so horrible for not having an involved father. I think my mom felt really bad about the situation, and didn’t know how to deal with her own feelings, much less her kids’. Fast-forward to today, after plenty of therapy and other ways of processing my daddy issues, I now find myself answering my children’s questions about why they don’t know their paternal grandfather. While your son or daughter is not your bartender, talking with your child openly can be a wonderful way to heal your own heart, too. 7. Do not always wait for your child to ask. For many reasons, your child may not bring up the fact that her father isn’t part of her life. It is up to you to talk about it very early, even earlier than you may think reasonable. One day, when my daughter came home from school and said, “Today Sofia talked about how both our parents are divorced.” She was 3! Even as a toddler your child sees her friends with two parents. Movies and TV shows and books are powerful messages, consisting almost always of a mother and father. It is your responsibility to address this, even if she doesn’t initiate the discussion. 8. Remember: Life is long. The questions will continue throughout your life, and each conversation at each age will lend new perspective and healing for both you, your child, as well as your relationship with each other. What are the effects of fatherlessness?Often, articles and even academic studies cite that 1-in-4 kids grow up fatherless, even though that figure is based on U.S. Census data that a quarter of children in the United States are raised in a home led by a single mother. However, most of those kids have a relationship with their dads, including in 50-50 time-sharing families. However, a lack of meaningful involvement with either parent is often devastating to a child—especially if that parent is alive, and ostentibally able to be involved if he chooses. Based on an analysis of dozens of studies, the federally funded Fatherhood Initiative reports that a child who grows up without meaningful time with his or her father, that child is more likely to struggle with:
Being abandoned as a child often produces adults who struggle to trust friends, colleagues or romantic partners. They may struggle with self-esteem, having an early message that they are unworthy of unconditional love. Adults with abandonment issues may unconsciously push people away, and repeat distant behaviors with their loved ones. Alternatively, adults with a fear of abandonment may lack boundaries and be overly needy and dependent in an attempt to protect themselves. When a parent is absent from a child’s life — no matter by choice, imprisonment or death — it is a loss. It is a loss for that child and a loss for those who love her. Your child may ask you: “Who is my dad?” “How is my dad?” “How old is my dad?” “Where is my dad?” “Where can I find my dad?” [learn more about using background checks in this post]. “Why is my dad so mean?” “Is my dad dead?” We are all socially conditioned and predisposed with a deep need to know both our mother and our father. Socially, it is easy to understand that the majority of people grow up living with both a mother and a father — and nearly everyone else knows both parents. That is the norm. Your daughter is very aware that her family does not look like other families. She understands deeply that most of her friends have relationships with their dads and she does not. We are biologically half our mothers and half our fathers. Humans have an intrinsic need for family. We yearn to know our relatives so that we can better know ourselves. When we are raised apart from our families, homelands and extended cultures, there is a sense of loss that transcends our daily experience. This explains why people who are adopted are compelled to find their birth parents — no matter how wonderful their adoptive families. This also explains why humans are driven to visit their ancestral homelands, even when they are removed from the place by generations. This is why companies like DNA mapping companies 23andMe.com and Ancestry.com are so successful, and genealogy is among the most popular hobbies in the United States — and world. Not every person will know both their parents. This is a fact. This does not mean that your daughter does not have a fantastic life, or that she is a wonderful child who will grow up to be a happy, productive and lovely adult. But that does not mean that the process will be easy. Before you can support your child, you must address your own loss and grief. When your ex-husband left and abandoned your daughter, he also abandoned you — both as a husband but more to the point here, as a co-parent. You also suffered a loss in that you do not have someone to help raise your daughter — even if it means separately, as divorced parents. You do not have anyone to enjoy their sweet habits, or commiserate on the daily challenges of parenthood. You do not enjoy a happy co-parenting arrangement that gives you a break. Most of all, you suffer because deep down you know that your daughter is hurt. That, for any mother, is devastating. This situation can be changed. But you must take action. First, you must recognize the situation for what it is: A huge, giant, grave loss. It is not your fault. It is life. But it is your responsibility as a parent to address it. First, acknowledge how this has affected you personally. Lean into that pain. Right now you are avoiding that pain, which is why you are dismissing it in your daughter. Just sit with it. Cry, scream, punch the refrigerator or write him an angry letter you never send. Whatever is your way, go there. Then, recognize that he is human. When a parent abandons a child, that parent is deeply wounded. There is a reason they cannot fulfill their responsibility. They do not recognize they are worthy of being needed, or can bring value to another person’s life. Your ex misses out — in a very major way — of the joy of raising and loving his child. He also suffers knowing that he deeply hurts her. Every day. Recognizing this is part of the process of forgiveness. It involves empathy and grace. It will take time. But you must get there — for your sake, and that of your daughter. While you work through that, you must now face your daughter. Talk with her. Say: “I’ve been thinking a lot about your dad. I imagine you do, too. How do you feel about the fact you don’t know him?” Ask her how she feels when she visits friends who live with their dads — or have visitation schedules with both their divorced parents. Tell her about her father, how you met him, what you liked and loved about him. Tell her stories about your time with him, and stories he told you about his life. Tell her about his family and jokes he told. Ask her what she’d like to know about him. Answer honestly — including about the part where he left. And why he doesn’t call. If you don’t know how to answer some questions, say so. “I wish I knew, but I don’t.” That is just the first conversation. Have another the next week. And the next. You may not have weekly conversations about your daughter’s father for the rest of your lives. But get into a habit of talking about him. About her father. Give her permission to ask, and to feel. Do not sugar coat the information, or your own feelings. Especially as she gets older, tell her what really went down, and how absolutely infuriated you were — and maybe still are. By recognizing your feelings and sharing them honestly with her, you give her permission to recognize and honor her own, complex and human feelings. Only then can both of you move forward with a full, wonderful — and complex — life you were meant to have. Why fathers are absent in their children’s lives?There are many reasons that explain fatherlessness. These reasons include:
How co co-parent with a narcissistic or toxic ex If a father doesn’t want to be involved, is this child abandonment or fatherlessness?If a non-custodial parent — mother or father — is found to have willingly abandoned the child, they may lose parental rights depending on state law and a judge’s ruling. This can mean that the father is not allowed to have visitation or legal rights to his child. It can also mean that in the absence of other safe adults to care for the child, the child will be taken into the welfare system, including foster care. There are Safe Haven laws in all 50 states and Puerto Rico, which decriminalize the leaving of unharmed infants at a police station, fire station or hospital so that the child becomes a ward of the state. Outside of safe haven laws, parents technically cannot voluntarily forfeit their parenting responsibilities without facing criminal consequences. While all states have child support policies and laws that force (in theory) parents to contribute financially to their children, there is no mandate for non-custodial parents to participate in the physical caring of children. Child abandonment laws usually apply when a custodial parent or guardian fails to care for a child, leaves them with another adult for long periods without contact, and sometimes leaves a child alone at home, unattended. The laws on these issues vary from state-to-state, and sometimes apply to non-custodial parents, but not typically. Child abandonment may be an emotionally traumatic experience, though not a criminal one. Proving child abandonment may be required to win full legal and/or physical custody of a child. Parents who wish to relocate with a child may want to prove abandonment or have the child adopted by a step-parent or other adult. These are examples that a court may consider criminal child abandonment by a custodial parent or guardian, according to the U.S. Health and Human Services’s Children’s Bureau:
Fatherlessness, meanwhile, refers simply to kids who grow up without an involved dad, for whatever reason. Does an absent father have rights?Increasingly, courts favor keeping families connected if possible. This includes reuniting children with willing fathers who have been absent from their lives, as well as recognize legal joint custody when considering matters such as where a child goes to school, where the child lives, and religious and medical decisions — regardless of the father’s or mother’s actual participation in the child’s life. That means that even though a father is not involved with their kids today, there is an opportunity for them to be involved going forward. Does an absent father feel guilty?Many fathers who do not see their children regularly do feel guilty they are not more involved, or feel angry that they feel they were kept from being involved with their children. Parents who do not see their kids often miss them very much. Recommended shared parenting documentary: Divorce Corp Kickass Single Mom, Be Financially Independent, Discover Your Sexiest Self, and Raise Fabulous, Happy Children, By: Emma Johnson Blend, The Secret to Co-Parenting and Creating a Balanced Family, By: Mashonda Tifrere Co-parenting with a Toxic Ex: What to Do When Your Ex-Spouse Tries to Turn the Kids Against You, By: by Amy J. L. Baker, PhD and Paul R Fine, LCSW Divorce Poison: How to Protect Your Family from Bad-mouthing and Brainwashing, By: Dr. Richard A. Warshak Is your child’s father not as involved as he should be? How do you deal with it? What mistakes have you made? What advice can you share with other parents? Share in the comments…  What are the effects of fatherlessness? Being abandoned as a child often produces adults who struggle to trust friends, colleagues or romantic partners. They may struggle with self-esteem, having an early message that they are unworthy of unconditional love. Adults with abandonment issues may unconsciously push people away, and repeat distant behaviors with their loved ones. Why fathers are absent in their children’s lives? There are many reasons that explain fatherlessness: parental alienation, conflict with mother, can't afford child support, and more. Does an absent father have rights? Increasingly, courts favor keeping families connected if possible. This includes reuniting children with willing fathers who have been absent from their lives, as well as recognize legal joint custody when considering matters such as where a child goes to school, where the child lives, and religious and medical decisions — regardless of the father’s or mother’s actual participation in the child’s life. Does an absent father feel guilty? Many fathers who do not see their children regularly do feel guilty they are not more involved, or feel angry that they feel they were kept from being involved with their children. Parents who do not see their kids often miss them very much. |
Based on the text, what is the best advice to give a father who is considering leaving his spouse?
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