My mother left when I was 2 years old, and my brother was 4 years old. We lived with my father who did what he could to raise us. When I was 9 or 10 years old my dad married my step-mom Loretta, who I fell in love with and who loved me as well. This woman has been my everything, the only mother figure I had and needed, and paid attention to me since my father wouldn’t. I grew up with a father not around and a step mom who worked long hours and spent every second home with us. I had two step brothers who were both younger than my brother and I, and we fought just like any other brother-sister relationship would.
My biological mother started to come around when I was 17 years old. I wasn’t sure what to think, but was happy at the same time. I had always been so curious about her, and wondered why she was never around. When her and my dad were married, she got pregnant with someone else’s baby. She left my brother and I with my dad, and went with the new guy (who was an old boyfriend) and raise their baby together. She had her perfect little family and wanted nothing to do with her past (us).
I am 22 years old and Loretta and my father are divorced as of about 9 months ago. Loretta is still my mother and loves me like I am her child despite the fact that legally we are not. She loves and accepts my children as her own grandchildren, and would do anything for us. My dad left her for someone 15 years older than he is. Mind he is 45 and his new girlfriend is 60. My father believes I would be a “threat” to him and his new relationship because I still talk to Loretta, who has been more of a parent to me than he ever was. I have not talked with my father for the past 8-9 months now.
My son is turning 1 on February 5th. I’m confused as to if I should invite my father and my biological mother. He doesn't know anything about my son. Wasn't there when he started crawling, or standing up, or took his first steps, or even when he got his first teeth. Does he deserve to be there? Loretta will be there for sure and I think it will ruin the party if my dad showed up with his new girlfriend and started a fight. As for my biological mother, she has been trying so hard to be grandma, and I have pushed her away. She didn’t want anything to do with me and my brother as we were growing up because it was the hard thing to do at the time. But now she wants to be grandma because it’s the easy part. She can come and go as she pleases and not have any full responsibility. Being grandma would be so much easier than being parent. I have a lot of anger built up over the past 20 years from her, and I feel like she doesn’t deserve to be a grandmother to my son. I don’t want her to back out of his life like she did mine when it gets hard. So I think I will probably not invite either of them.
It’s sad that I have no biological parent on either side (mother/father) that is worth a shi*t. My dad is the most selfish person I know and will ever meet, and my mom thinks everything is everything else’s fault. She even tried to blame my husband for keeping her away from our son, even though I was the one who told her not to call anymore. Officially the only family I have is my “real” mother, Loretta. I talk to my Aunt and Grandma occasionally, and my brother barely wants anything to do with me due to my fighting with my father. It sucks that my kids won’t get to meet my whole family, and how I don’t have a father to introduce to them as grandpa. I feel so alone sometimes and I am very fortunate that my husband has such a close, big, excepting family who loves me. Just not sure what to tell my kids when they get old enough, “sorry kids, you don’t have a grandpa on my side because your grandpa is a d*ck.” That’s exactly what I don’t want to tell them. I guess it’s a good they are young and haven’t caught on yet.
Just needed to vent, and typed twice as much as I thought.
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Amanda, I am sorry you are experienceing this angst. In 2000 I "divorced" myself from my parents. I did not see them or talk to them for five years because neither of them respected my boundaries. (That is the simplified version of the load of crap that was our relationship) When my husband died in 2005 I didn't even tell them for the first month. Then finally I realized that they had loved John too so I called them and told them the bad news. I had three wonderful phone conversations with my dad before he died. I never did get to see him again. If I had it to do over, I would have done the same thing because at that time in my life I was not emotionally equipped to deal with them. I do wish that I had been able to be with them and be able to do that in a healthy way.
ReplyDeleteI hope that you can come to a point (with help perhaps?) where you can have a healthy relationship with your bio mom and dad, even if you are the only one healthy in those relationships. And BTW, a mother (or father) is not a matter of genetics. It is about love and caring. I wish you the best.
God bless you and yours
Deb Seely
Amanda, I can empathize with you. I had a very similar upbringing, it was dad who was absent until my teen years. It didn’t take long during my teens for me to figure out that it was best to not have a relationship with my dad, and I haven‘t spoken to him for about 12 years. My mom, who “raised” me has led, and continues to lead, a life that includes drugs and alcohol. As I prepare to give birth to my first child, these same questions are circling my mind. Adding to the mix, my husbands parents are both dead. Do I deny my daughter the right to have any grandparents at all? Or do I subject her to bad examples and undoubted heartache? The solution I am clinging to for now is to just pray that maybe having a grandchild will give my parents the incentive to “straighten up”. Until I see signs of this happening though, I have to put my daughters well being first and I’m not planning to allow them to be a part of her life and inflict their crap upon her innocent spirit. Hopefully knowing that you are not alone in your situation will bring you some comfort in the decisions you’ve made, by the way, happy birthday to your son.
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