Advice please - child's father is back
Hello all. I hope this is the right place to post.
I'm a single mum to a little girl. She's five and a half, and has never met her dad. He was someone I knew at university. We were only together for a very short time, but I got pregnant. I graduated and moved back home with my mum, but he said he'd keep in touch. Anyway, he didn't, and apart from a brief phone call when my daughter was 6 weeks old, I heard nothing from him. I told my daughter, who asked me why she didn't have a daddy, that she had one, but he lived a long way and had decided he wouldn't be very good at being a daddy. She seemed happy enough with that. Anyway, last week I was contacted by a mediation company who told me he wanted to "build a relationship" with his daughter. So I arranged to meet him for mediation. But then tonight, he phoned me out of the blue. Apparently he's always wanted to be involved in her life, but lost my address. (Hmm, not convinced that he couldn't have found me if he'd tried hard enough...) Anyway, we managed to talk sensibly and although I'm having trouble forgiving him, I've decided to let him meet her...
What I'd like advice with is, how do I deal with the first meeting? I don't know how to handle it. Do I tell her who he is before they meet? Ask her if she wants to meet him? Or let them meet and see how they get on first? She's very intelligent and quite mature for her age so I don't want to put on an act that she'll see through. But equally, I don't want to put unnecessary pressure on her; if she knows she's meeting her dad, she might be horribly nervous... (And then there's the rest of his family; my daughter has a grandmother and now even a stepmum she knows nothing about. I guess I need to take it one step at a time and not tell her about them all at once...)
I know it's hard to advise when you don't know my daughter, but if anyone has been through a similar thing and has any words of wisdom, I'd be grateful...
Thanks
Amy
Answers:
It sounds like you have some sort of animosity towards this man. Is it because he said he would stay in touch and he didn't? I can understand that, but in all fairness, you didn't stay in touch with him either. You could have picked up the phone and called just as easily as he could have.
You said that when you got pregnant you moved in with your mom but you didn't say why. I'm sure you might have had a good reason for that, but maybe, possibly, if you had stayed where you were, he would have been there all along.
I guess what i'm trying to say is that you shouldn't prevent your daughter from meeting her father. She is still young, there is still time to undo the damage his abscence has called. She's only five right? That means he will get to be there for a vast majority if her life. I think you would be doing a horrible disservice to your daughter by not cooperating with her father, just because you feel a little resentful about how things happened five years ago. Every little girl deserves a father. If he wants to be there for her now, and he isn't some weirdo with a criminal record, i see absolutely no reason to deny your daughter that. But thats just my humble opnion.
Answers:
Thanks for your humble opinion but you seem to have missed the point of my post. I said that I was going to let him see her; I never suggested that I'd "deny" my daughter her father. What I wanted was advice on how to introduce them.
And by the way, in all fairness, I did keep in touch with him. I wrote to him, phoned him, and sent him photos of her when she was born. Then I went to America for a month, during which time he got married, moved house and never sent me his new address. His phone number is ex-directory (whereas mine is easy to find) and he's not a member of any websites like FriendsReunited (whereas I am). So I'd like to know how you suggest I could have contacted him. And why should I have to? I was the one literally left holding the baby... And as for moving in with my mum; I already lived with her during university, I graduated with no job to go to and nowhere to live so I had no choice. And besides, I only live a couple of hours from him, it's not like it's hard for him to reach me.
I really think you should read peoples' posts properly before you go expressing your opinions and making judgements...
Answers:
I would be up front with your daughter. Tell her that her dad called and he thinks that maybe he could be a good father after all. I would meet him somewhere fun, where he and your daughter can bond. Like an amusement park or a children's play place. If she feels overwhelmed she can go off on her own for a bit. It would not seem weird that she did, because it's a children's place. I am sure once the initial weirdness goes away, she and he will hit it off right away.
As with you and he I would just call a truce. He did not call for whatever reason (time can get away from us sometimes). And you did what you needed to do. You guys can start from scratch and start building something that will work for all of you.
Good luck!! I hope everything turns out ok. I am sure that it will.
Answers:
I agree, I think you should be upfront with her, but also prepare her for the fact that sometimes people don't always follow through with relationships. Although a little different from my personal situation my mom never really explained why I couldn't see my dad it was because he was an alcoholic and I had very sporadic contact with him which in my opinion did more harm than good. Talk to her, watch her reaction and let her have a choice in the matter and let him be around if he's a good decent person who can contribute to her life. Please include some sort of couseling for her, if it doesn't work out it'll be hard on her. I don't wish that kind of anger and disappointment on anyone it can take a lifetime to get over.
I'm a single mum to a little girl. She's five and a half, and has never met her dad. He was someone I knew at university. We were only together for a very short time, but I got pregnant. I graduated and moved back home with my mum, but he said he'd keep in touch. Anyway, he didn't, and apart from a brief phone call when my daughter was 6 weeks old, I heard nothing from him. I told my daughter, who asked me why she didn't have a daddy, that she had one, but he lived a long way and had decided he wouldn't be very good at being a daddy. She seemed happy enough with that. Anyway, last week I was contacted by a mediation company who told me he wanted to "build a relationship" with his daughter. So I arranged to meet him for mediation. But then tonight, he phoned me out of the blue. Apparently he's always wanted to be involved in her life, but lost my address. (Hmm, not convinced that he couldn't have found me if he'd tried hard enough...) Anyway, we managed to talk sensibly and although I'm having trouble forgiving him, I've decided to let him meet her...
What I'd like advice with is, how do I deal with the first meeting? I don't know how to handle it. Do I tell her who he is before they meet? Ask her if she wants to meet him? Or let them meet and see how they get on first? She's very intelligent and quite mature for her age so I don't want to put on an act that she'll see through. But equally, I don't want to put unnecessary pressure on her; if she knows she's meeting her dad, she might be horribly nervous... (And then there's the rest of his family; my daughter has a grandmother and now even a stepmum she knows nothing about. I guess I need to take it one step at a time and not tell her about them all at once...)
I know it's hard to advise when you don't know my daughter, but if anyone has been through a similar thing and has any words of wisdom, I'd be grateful...
Thanks
Amy
Answers:
It sounds like you have some sort of animosity towards this man. Is it because he said he would stay in touch and he didn't? I can understand that, but in all fairness, you didn't stay in touch with him either. You could have picked up the phone and called just as easily as he could have.
You said that when you got pregnant you moved in with your mom but you didn't say why. I'm sure you might have had a good reason for that, but maybe, possibly, if you had stayed where you were, he would have been there all along.
I guess what i'm trying to say is that you shouldn't prevent your daughter from meeting her father. She is still young, there is still time to undo the damage his abscence has called. She's only five right? That means he will get to be there for a vast majority if her life. I think you would be doing a horrible disservice to your daughter by not cooperating with her father, just because you feel a little resentful about how things happened five years ago. Every little girl deserves a father. If he wants to be there for her now, and he isn't some weirdo with a criminal record, i see absolutely no reason to deny your daughter that. But thats just my humble opnion.
Answers:
Thanks for your humble opinion but you seem to have missed the point of my post. I said that I was going to let him see her; I never suggested that I'd "deny" my daughter her father. What I wanted was advice on how to introduce them.
And by the way, in all fairness, I did keep in touch with him. I wrote to him, phoned him, and sent him photos of her when she was born. Then I went to America for a month, during which time he got married, moved house and never sent me his new address. His phone number is ex-directory (whereas mine is easy to find) and he's not a member of any websites like FriendsReunited (whereas I am). So I'd like to know how you suggest I could have contacted him. And why should I have to? I was the one literally left holding the baby... And as for moving in with my mum; I already lived with her during university, I graduated with no job to go to and nowhere to live so I had no choice. And besides, I only live a couple of hours from him, it's not like it's hard for him to reach me.
I really think you should read peoples' posts properly before you go expressing your opinions and making judgements...
Answers:
I would be up front with your daughter. Tell her that her dad called and he thinks that maybe he could be a good father after all. I would meet him somewhere fun, where he and your daughter can bond. Like an amusement park or a children's play place. If she feels overwhelmed she can go off on her own for a bit. It would not seem weird that she did, because it's a children's place. I am sure once the initial weirdness goes away, she and he will hit it off right away.
As with you and he I would just call a truce. He did not call for whatever reason (time can get away from us sometimes). And you did what you needed to do. You guys can start from scratch and start building something that will work for all of you.
Good luck!! I hope everything turns out ok. I am sure that it will.
Answers:
I agree, I think you should be upfront with her, but also prepare her for the fact that sometimes people don't always follow through with relationships. Although a little different from my personal situation my mom never really explained why I couldn't see my dad it was because he was an alcoholic and I had very sporadic contact with him which in my opinion did more harm than good. Talk to her, watch her reaction and let her have a choice in the matter and let him be around if he's a good decent person who can contribute to her life. Please include some sort of couseling for her, if it doesn't work out it'll be hard on her. I don't wish that kind of anger and disappointment on anyone it can take a lifetime to get over.