Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

How to reconcile parental estrangement/alienation?

  • 20-08-2019 11:19am
    #1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭


    First of all I need to say that I'm not Irish and so the issues I discuss cannot be viewed through the lens of what Ireland was like 30 years ago. I'm from a country that has been 100% secular since the 1960s. I now live in Ireland however.

    ---

    I’m 31 years old and I haven’t seen my father since I was 10. This past year I decided to open a can of worms and potentially get into contact with him and his side of the family.

    I found my grandparents (whom I’ve never met) along the way which is great and I’ve been talking to them over email and over the phone for a few of weeks. They seem really nice. I found out that they didn’t even know about me or that I existed.

    ----
    Here is what my aunt told me:
    ----
    My aunt said that my father would climb up the side of the house into my mother's bedroom to see her. He never took the front door.

    She also said that she thought it was stupid that my mother didn't know how to get pregnant.

    She said my father was dating my mom's friend Pat first and Pat was quite the little party animal and got pregnant but didn't know who the father was. My childhood friend could have been my half-sister but no one ever found out and just assumed not because she looks nothing like me. The family is not willing to discuss the matter with me.

    My aunt said that when my mother got pregnant my father told her to get an abortion and when she wasn’t interested in doing that he broke up with her. She said he did drugs and smoked and drank. She said that when he tried to come back it was always the same.

    ----
    Here is what my father's friend told me:
    ----
    My father’s friend went to the same secondary school as he did and lived with my father for a period of 5 years in a rented house. He was a welder and my father was a tiler.

    He said that my parents were dating and by the time I was born they had nothing to do with each other. He said my father said that my maternal grandparents (who babysat me while my mom was at work) wanted to raise me. He lived with my father for a period of 5 years before he moved to the other city. He said he lost touch with my father but last time he spoke to him 5 years ago my father was running a company and lost 3-4 houses to different women.

    He said my father had been with a lot of women and potentially got 50-50 custody of the children with his ex-wife.

    ---
    Here's what my mother told me:
    ---
    My mother can’t talk about what actually happened without getting really angry and swearing etc. She told me that he was an alcoholic, a drug addict, and that he would have been abusive.
    She said he lied to her and played mind games with her. She said she didn’t find out about the drugs until after she got pregnant. She told me that he didn’t want me and wanted me to have been aborted.

    She told my husband that she didn’t want anything to do with him and that she hates him and didn’t want me to know him.

    My mother said he would call her from time to time. His wife left him because of alcohol. The thing is I didn’t hear the conversations on the phone - only what my mother told me afterwards.

    -

    The problem is my mother has been awful to me as well. When I was 15 she screamed at me saying that I was a mistake. She also has a tendency to over exaggerate, black and white thinking and catastrophize.

    My mother said that she didn’t know how to get pregnant and she didn’t find out about the drugs until after she was pregnant. I find this hard to believe because my aunt grew up in the same house and knew how to get pregnant and this was in the 1980s there would have been sex ed in the high school. Also, if he was a drug addict how could he have held a job and apartment for 5 years?

    She can’t seem to tell me what kinds of drugs they were. She said he lied to her and cheated on her as well. But she can’t seem to name the woman she thinks he cheated with and what he lied about. She said he lied about his last name but clearly he didn’t as I spoke to his friend.

    --

    If I did get in contact with him I'd have mixed feelings about it. I mean I'm the skeleton in his closet, a secret for 30 years, and the child that he abandoned. I'd also be kind of excited about it as well. What do you think of this situation?



    Here is my side of the story with regards to my father:
    I only have 3 of my own actual eyewitness accounts of him. Everything else is what someone else told me and through someone else’s perception. My father has never even had a conversation with me, doesn’t have a picture of me, and has never hugged me.

    He babysat me once when I was 4. Not sure for how long. Objectively speaking it was fine. I mean he was sitting there in the room with me keeping an eye on me but he didn't talk to me or play with me but he didn’t leave me alone. He smoked some cigarettes and had a beer. I remember that there was a lot of smoke. I definitely remember the smoke. I was too young to know if he drank enough to get drunk or if it was just one beer to relax.

    Unfortunately, I had asthma and the smoke made me go to hospital. I have really bad asthma and even smelling the smoke off someone's clothes can aggravate my asthma. I don’t know if my mother told him if I had asthma or not. This was also back in the early 90s where people probably didn't know they had to open windows etc. less safety around smoking.

    When I was 5, he moved to a different town 8 hours away. My mother drove me to go see him. My father's apartment was nearly completely empty. Just a bed, one chair and one TV. There were no toys or anything for a 5 year old to do (my mother didn't bring any either) so I played on my father's Nintendo game the entire time. After what felt like a few hours my father took it off me. He said he was teaching me to share. He wasn't mean or anything he just put it away. Then my mother berated him for what felt like like 5 hours. I remember her saying ‘that’s not going to teach her to share’.

    No contact from him at all until I was 10. No letters, no phone calls, no birthday cards, nothing.

    He came to visit me when I was 10. At this point it was a complete shock to me and I was stunned. Like who is this strange man coming into my house saying he's my dad etc. My mother didn’t even tell me ahead of time that he was coming. I was a shy kid and I hid in the bedroom the whole time. My mother then berated him for expecting me to be excited to see him as he had never been around and was a stranger to me. He was married at this time and had 2 kids that I didn’t know about. I remember seeing his wife’s name on the ONE birthday card I ever got from him.

    If my father would have stayed persistent and kept going he probably could have pushed through my shock and I might have warmed up to him. He should have started with letters so I had time to process. He could have chosen to stick with it and decided to try but he didn’t.

    No contact from him at all until I was 18. No letters, no phone calls, no birthday cards, nothing.

    He asked my mother for my phone number when I was 18. I was just completely stunned. I needed help and time processing this news. Of course my mother wouldn’t do that because she hated him and my mother just sat there with a disgusted look on her face. I said no but maybe I shouldn’t have. It just sounded like such a deadbeat dad thing to do - wait until the kid is 18 and you’re off the hook for child support or raising the child. I was also afraid that what my mother told me. I was afraid that he really was an unstable drug addict and I would be inviting trouble into my life. I didn’t feel old enough or mature enough to cope with trouble if it came. I also didn’t know what to say or where to start. He said that he felt bad that he didn’t participate in raising me but the question is did he feel bad for 18 years or just for a few minutes?


Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 4,714 ✭✭✭Xterminator


    hey.

    im confused about a few things.

    your title was
    How to reconcile parental estrangement/alienation?

    this leads the question are you asking how to reconcile with your father? (thats what it implies)

    the answer to that question is you allow him to contact you, as he has tried.

    you are absolutely right to have very mixed feelings, and a sense that he let you down, because he did. and there is no guarantee that you will be able to overcome your negative feelings in order to have some relationship with this stranger.

    But by not trying you are cutting off your nose to spite your face. As much as you wondered for years about why this man missed every birthday etc, and never was there for you, you will again send the rest of your life wondering what he was like, would you have been able to have a friendship, etc.

    My advice would be to allow contact on your own terms only, ask him for the answers to the questions you have calmly, and to explore if this is good for you. If you are not happy with the relationship be ready to cut it off. you really dont owe him anything. So take it slow and go at your own pace.


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,119 ✭✭✭Idle Passerby


    It's unclear what your asking but I'll assume your trying to figure out what kind of person your dad is/was and whether you should contact him.

    The several viewpoints you've collected on who your dad was/is could all well be true, the stories don't necessarily contradict each other. I'm guessing your parents were both pretty young when your mum got pregnant. Teenagers I'm guessing, judging by the sneaking in windows of parents houses. It's fairly plausible your mum was clueless about contraception if she was quite young and naive.

    Maybe he cheated on your mum, maybe he took drugs, either way it doesn't sound like either of your parents were equipped to parent a child. The he said/she said narrative is just a distraction from whether or not you want to contact him now.

    Based on all you've said, my hopes wouldn't be very high that he would suddenly be a positive addition to your life if you were to make contact. It sounds like you'd like to see for yourself who he is and hear whatever his version of events is.

    No one can really say if hearing his side would give you a full picture of your childhood or just further muddle your perception of things.

    You've certainly had a hard upbringing by the sounds of it. I hope you find whatever closure your searching for.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    Thank you. They were 19/20 -ish. My father was out of secondary school and working as a tiler and my mum was just finishing up her final year of secondary school (she had previously taken time off).

    In my opinion 20 isn't THAT young (a lot of people have a degree by age 21) but maybe my parents were just eejits.
    It's unclear what your asking but I'll assume your trying to figure out what kind of person your dad is/was and whether you should contact him.

    The several viewpoints you've collected on who your dad was/is could all well be true, the stories don't necessarily contradict each other. I'm guessing your parents were both pretty young when your mum got pregnant. Teenagers I'm guessing, judging by the sneaking in windows of parents houses. It's fairly plausible your mum was clueless about contraception if she was quite young and naive.

    Maybe he cheated on your mum, maybe he took drugs, either way it doesn't sound like either of your parents were equipped to parent a child. The he said/she said narrative is just a distraction from whether or not you want to contact him now.

    Based on all you've said, my hopes wouldn't be very high that he would suddenly be a positive addition to your life if you were to make contact. It sounds like you'd like to see for yourself who he is and hear whatever his version of events is.

    No one can really say if hearing his side would give you a full picture of your childhood or just further muddle your perception of things.

    You've certainly had a hard upbringing by the sounds of it. I hope you find whatever closure your searching for.


  • Registered Users Posts: 4,714 ✭✭✭Xterminator


    Hi chris525

    I can only tell you i am not the same person i was at 20 and i do hope most of the changes are to the better/wiser. Your dad isn't the same person he was at 20 either. I don't really think how good your father was as a boyfriend to your mother in his teens has too much bearing on whether you should get to know him. i knew a couple of friends that were wild teens. Drinking & recreational drugs etc. i know some who were very quiet and reserved. Neither trait has a monopoly on how they turned out as adults.

    That doesn't mean he is a good person now and you should let your guard down, but he has a lifetime of expereince and possibly regrets. Get to know him now, as he is, and stop looking through the lens of other peoples experiences of him as a young person. Judge him by his actions more than words as its easy to say what people want to hear.

    I would say tread carefully with your mum, as she isn't likely to react well to any news you are getting to know your dad. and that's a pity because in an ideal world she would understand your wish to know your father and seperate it from her own personal feelings.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    Thank you. I guess it would be comforting to hear if he regretted his choice to abandon his own child and if not well I haven't exactly spent 30 years pining after him; most of the time I didn't care it's just now that I have my own family I can't imagine not wanting to see your kid for years on end. My mother also did something this year that was awful to me and she's always said that he was narcissistic and abusive but she's the pot calling the kettle black. I know my mother didn't value him as a parent and didn't help him to facilitate a relationship with me because she hated him but he could have done so much more - he didn't exhaust all avenues and he didn't see a lawyer etc.

    I also don't understand why he didn't tell his parents - even years later (I dropped a huge bomb on them by writing a letter - they were crying and upset that their son didn't tell them) but his friend and ex-wife knew about me. I have doubts that my half-siblings know either.

    I mean if he did get my phone number at 18 was he just going to continue to not tell them ? LOL


    Hi chris525

    I can only tell you i am not the same person i was at 20 and i do hope most of the changes are to the better/wiser. Your dad isn't the same person he was at 20 either. I don't really think how good your father was as a boyfriend to your mother in his teens has too much bearing on whether you should get to know him. i knew a couple of friends that were wild teens. Drinking & recreational drugs etc. i know some who were very quiet and reserved. Neither trait has a monopoly on how they turned out as adults.

    That doesn't mean he is a good person now and you should let your guard down, but he has a lifetime of expereince and possibly regrets. Get to know him now, as he is, and stop looking through the lens of other peoples experiences of him as a young person. Judge him by his actions more than words as its easy to say what people want to hear.

    I would say tread carefully with your mum, as she isn't likely to react well to any news you are getting to know your dad. and that's a pity because in an ideal world she would understand your wish to know your father and seperate it from her own personal feelings.


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 2,342 ✭✭✭tara73


    Hi,

    I think you definetely should try to contact your father. But you need to ask yourself about your expectations, i.e.about the possible diappointment. And from what you write I think a disappointment in which ever way is quite likely.

    It might be for example that he agrees to meet you but after one meeting can't be bothered again because it's too emotional for him. Just one scenario which would be hurtful for you.

    You also say you have a young family now, my guess is your deep wish is for your kids to meet their granddad and have a relationship with him. But also that is out in the open if it will happen and just your very understandable longing.

    So again, I think it is very important for you to try to contact him and also meet him if he's agreeing to get the clarity for yourself, but be prepared to not get what you wish for. Is your partner informed about your plans? I think he/she might be the best person to confide in and to console if things turn out badly.

    And don't involve your kids or even tell them anything about a potential meet up with their granddad before there's any stability visible in the contact with him.


  • Registered Users Posts: 15,176 ✭✭✭✭ILoveYourVibes


    My honest opinion is the pathology is too deep for familial reconciliation.

    I am not sure that emotional place would be a healthy situation for you.

    Well at least no more than perhaps meeting once or a letter or something.

    I don't think if i were someone who cared about you I would suggest you try to be in your father's or your mother's life at all.

    But there you go. It just seems like its not a positive relationship to have in your life. Not only him but your mother too.

    Its not because he is your father but just because both your parents seem like lost people who havent been or had a positive influence on you.

    But of course its your choice. And if you have this longing etc and its a deep emotional need for a father of any kind no matter the consequences etc i can be sympathetic to that feeling.

    I would just ask you what the emotional cost either way will be to you? Seeing him or not seeing him.

    I also hope you are not disappointed like Tara said.

    As to how. I don't know how. There are so many deep seated problems. Maybe a therapist could help you?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    I now live 8,000 km away from my mother and I speak to her mostly via email and occasionally Skype. Unfortunately, my newfound grandparents also live that far away as well in the same city as my mother.

    We do plan to go visit there in the future as my best friend is still there but we will be staying in a hotel. My father lives and 8 hour drive from where my mother and grandparents live so unless there is a connecting flight or he drives down there I won't be able to meet him.

    My husband has been treated poorly by mother in the past as well so he thinks that my mother definitely played a roll in my father's absence but I guess I won't know the truth until I hear it from the man himself. My husband has seen my mother's behaviour first hand.

    My partner is encouraging me to find my father. He keeps telling me not to make assumptions and that the courts didn't value fathers much back then especially in these types of situations etc. He keeps saying how my mother over-exaggerates everything.

    We won't involve our children in this at all unless things look OK. It would be nice to be able to tell my daughter the truth when she's older. She's starting to recognise family relationships like her paternal grandfather etc. and one day she's going to realise that she doesn't have a maternal grandfather and will ask questions. Right now I can only say what my mother said and it's highly biased.

    I think talking to a therapist will help.

    I mean look, I contacted my grandparents mostly to do genealogical research and I didn't expect them to be so receptive and excited. They have provided a lot of genealogical information.

    tara73 wrote: »
    Hi,

    So again, I think it is very important for you to try to contact him and also meet him if he's agreeing to get the clarity for yourself, but be prepared to not get what you wish for. Is your partner informed about your plans? I think he/she might be the best person to confide in and to console if things turn out badly.

    And don't involve your kids or even tell them anything about a potential meet up with their granddad before there's any stability visible in the contact with him.

    I don't think if i were someone who cared about you I would suggest you try to be in your father's or your mother's life at all.

    But there you go. It just seems like its not a positive relationship to have in your life. Not only him but your mother too.

    Its not because he is your father but just because both your parents seem like lost people who havent been or had a positive influence on you.

    As to how. I don't know how. There are so many deep seated problems. Maybe a therapist could help you?


  • Registered Users Posts: 390 ✭✭the14thwarrior


    I feel if you can you should contact and engage in counselling, while all this is going on, and especially if you do make contact with your father.

    You can get your father's views, and listen, but be prepared to wait to see if he wants to be involved in your life. true parental love would assume he would be interested and want to be involved. He's grown up, he can decide now if he wants to re-engage. You are grown up too, and must realise that when he contacts you, actions do speak louder than words.

    His side, your mothers side and the bit in the middle, the bit in the middle is the truth.

    and the truth is rarely simple...........


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    Kind of on a tangent but I've been talking to my grandparents over email and one phone call for about 6 weeks now. They seem really nice. It's funny they haven't brought up my father once. They've talked to me about my cousins and my uncle but not my father.

    Maybe I should give it more time but I want to ask them if they are in contact with him at all or with my half-siblings. If you were me, how would you go about this?


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 2,342 ✭✭✭tara73


    did you bring your father up in any conversation or asked them questons about him before? I think they are probably ashamed of the behaviour of their son and if they don't know you would like to get in contact with him I can understand they don't mention him.

    So I would advice to ask them directly any questions you have. you need to start the ball rolling here I think as they don't want to hurt your feelings or start telling you things you don't want to know. They sound very nice though, if it's not for your father you won some grandparents:) In every 'bad' story there's something good.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,776 ✭✭✭up for anything


    I'm not sure what to suggest as regards reconciling with your father. Sometimes it might be better not to open that can of worms.

    I just wanted to say that in the early 90s we all knew that you shouldn't smoke around children and most especially not ones with asthma.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    I asked them for a picture of themselves and of him and instead they just sent me a photo of the entire family. They didn't mention him at all.

    They said they were really upset and if they would have known about me then they would have done something about the situation. My grandfather said he had a 'hunch' but didn't specifically know (not sure what that means).

    My grandparents recently went to my cousin's wedding and I don't think my father was there.
    tara73 wrote: »
    did you bring your father up in any conversation or asked them questons about him before? I think they are probably ashamed of the behaviour of their son and if they don't know you would like to get in contact with him I can understand they don't mention him.

    So I would advice to ask them directly any questions you have. you need to start the ball rolling here I think as they don't want to hurt your feelings or start telling you things you don't want to know. They sound very nice though, if it's not for your father you won some grandparents:) In every 'bad' story there's something good.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    I have very mixed feelings about it. I mean my mother definitely played a role in this as well but maybe it could be good to find out for myself. I also have half-siblings that I might have to go through him to contact. Not sure how old they are maybe 20-ish. I don't know their names.
    I'm not sure what to suggest as regards reconciling with your father. Sometimes it might be better not to open that can of worms.

    I just wanted to say that in the early 90s we all knew that you shouldn't smoke around children and most especially not ones with asthma.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    Yeah, my mother told me that he didn't smoke cigarettes so if I ever saw him smoking it was a different substance.
    I'm not sure what to suggest as regards reconciling with your father. Sometimes it might be better not to open that can of worms.

    I just wanted to say that in the early 90s we all knew that you shouldn't smoke around children and most especially not ones with asthma.


  • Registered Users Posts: 32,634 ✭✭✭✭Graces7


    Would advise against this. Having been through the process of much of it. wish I hadn't. My father was still the same person as when ne originally vanished; maybe we hope and think they will have changed, He caused me more pain and did nto even make contact when he knew he was dying,

    Someone opined it is like trying to unscramble eggs and they are right

    Try to make peace with your past without doing this? for your sake.


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,624 ✭✭✭✭meeeeh


    OP, I don't know what you should do but I would be cautious. Your parents were young, unplanned pregnancy can happen despite knowing the mechanics. Your mother doesn't come across as a great mother however your father didn't even mention you to his parents. He either doesn't get on with his parents at all or he didn't want strong enough relationship to mention you to them. I can't see any other reason.

    He also didn't put in any effort when meeting you. One time the only entertainment he offered was a Gameboy and another time he made you sick because he didn't care enough. Quite likely he smoke drugs while you were in his care.

    I think you have to separate your feelings for your mother and listen what others tell you and what you remember. I'm not going to advise not to meet him or talk to him but I think it's likely that you have two bad parents so don't expect too much. It's possible your mother didn't make things easy for him but it's also very likely that's precisely what he wanted.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    Yeah, what throws me is the fact that he has 2 other children from a previous relationship. I'm not sure how involved he was/is with them though and he is divorced.

    My grandparents said he owns a new house as well and based on the area he lives in the house is probably at least 300K. Not sure if a drug addict would be able to maintain such a house.


  • Registered Users Posts: 11,624 ✭✭✭✭meeeeh


    chris525 wrote: »
    Yeah, what throws me is the fact that he has 2 other children from a previous relationship. I'm not sure how involved he was/is with them though and he is divorced.

    My grandparents said he owns a new house as well and based on the area he lives in the house is probably at least 300K. Not sure if a drug addict would be able to maintain such a house.
    Some can and some do in illegal way. Also if he sorted out his life he wasn't overly persistent to build up a relationship with you. Or he could be devastated by what happened and is afraid to contact you to cause you pain. I don't think you will know unless you contact him but there is also significant chance it will cause you a lot of pain. I don't think it's right for anyone here to tell you what to do but I would advise you to be careful and not allow yourself imagine the best. You could try to find more information from the grandparents. Btw if you were them wouldn't you contact your child straight away when your grand child you knew nothing about contacted you. So either they are not in much contact with him for whatever reason or he was told about you and is not reaching out to you at all.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    One thing I find strange is that my grandparents said they are going to visit my father in October. So you find out that your son fathered a child, didn't care for the child, and then kept the child a secret and you are going to visit him and help him paint his house? not sure


  • Advertisement
  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    They said they didn't want to tell anyone anything without my permission. They originally wanted to send him a picture of me but I said no. I said to just tell him that I came into contact with them. They said they'll do it in person when they go to visit him.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 214 ✭✭chris525


    One thing I don't know how to do is to talk to them about telling the other relatives such as my half-siblings and my uncle about this matter.

    meeeeh wrote: »
    Some can and some do in illegal way. Also if he sorted out his life he wasn't overly persistent to build up a relationship with you. Or he could be devastated by what happened and is afraid to contact you to cause you pain. I don't think you will know unless you contact him but there is also significant chance it will cause you a lot of pain. I don't think it's right for anyone here to tell you what to do but I would advise you to be careful and not allow yourself imagine the best. You could try to find more information from the grandparents. Btw if you were them wouldn't you contact your child straight away when your grand child you knew nothing about contacted you. So either they are not in much contact with him for whatever reason or he was told about you and is not reaching out to you at all.


Advertisement