One of the most common and heartbreaking topics I’m asked about is dealing with fathers who don’t see their kids regularly. A mom shared a typically devastating situation:
“My ex-husband doesn’t see his child”
The woman’s 11-year-old daughter’s father would go months without seeing the girl, and instead spent all his time with his new girlfriend. When the mom asked him why he didn’t return the daughter’s phone calls, he replied: “I don’t have anything to say.”
I gave her some ideas about taking the issue to family court, and managing both the daughter’s and her own expectations (stop trying to control him — you can’t). But the advice the mom told me that was most surprising and helpful was this:
Be empathetic.
- Reasons a dad does not fight to be involved
- How long can a father not see his child?
- Absent father? How moms can support fathers
- Can you force a dad to see his child?
- How to get dads involved
“Biological father refuses to see his child.” 5 reasons a dad does not fight to be involved
I’m working on that brand of empathy as both a divorced parent and a child of divorce. My own dad was not involved in most of my life — and that devastated me in ways I don’t yet fully understand, but I have harbored a lot of anger about it and so, I have thought deeply about why do fathers abandon their child.
When you recognize that your child needs you — and you are valuable to them — you show up. You take parenting as a responsibility — not an extracurricular activity. Unfortunately, our culture dismisses fathers, and fatherhood. Think about the typical TV dad: Homer Simpson, or Al Bundy, Ray Romano. Nice guys, but bumbling idiots, and as parents, clearly inferior to mothers.
Divorce and family courts reinforce this stereotype, defaulting to visitation and custody schedules in which dads are relegated to every-other-weekend “visitors” with their own children, and told their greatest value to their children is as a breadwinner (the other side of this coin is that women are shoehorned into the primary caregiver role, and forced to be financially dependent on men. More on this in: Why is child support so unfair to fathers? A case for needed reform
Ex feels there is too much drama with kids’ mom
On the surface, “too much baby mama drama” is a petty reason not to have a relationship with your children.
But dig deeper, and you will find many men explain a history of police involvement, restraining orders, and mothers screaming at them in front of the kids. “I worried that all the conflict was hurting the kids more than if I didn’t see them, so I stepped away,” one man told me.
Of course, that is just one side of the story. You, the mom, certainly have your version of events. But consider his. Just consider it.
Here, a dad explains: “Why I don’t see my son.”
Ex did not choose to be a father in the first place
Until June 24, 2022, when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, women in the United States have a legal, constitutional right to abortions. That means that women in the United States have a legal, constitutional right to decide if she wants to be a mother or not. While conservatives slash away at that right by closing abortion clinics, state by state, women’s access to abortion is dramatically reduced, in practicality.
However, men have virtually no reproductive rights. If a woman gets pregnant, she can choose to carry the baby to full-term, put a man’s name on the birth certificate (or not — her choice), and take him to family court for child support and visitation. The father in these cases has no rights whatsoever about deciding whether or not he wants to be a father. He can be criminally charged if he does not pay court-mandated child support.
While there is no legal repercussions for a non-custodial parent abandoning their child, it is unjust to expect any person, of any gender, to take responsibility for a person they did not choose to bring to this world.
What to do when a parent cancels visits last-minute
Ex feels incapable as a father
The world tells men they are incompetent, bumbling parents. Think of Homer Simpson, Al Bundy, Ray Ramon — even good-hearted Dre on Blackish are all fumbling, lesser parents compared with their competent wives.
This is not surprising in a time when we still herald the stay-at-home mom as martyr-saint, and defer to women as the primary parent in every family — married, separated, divorced or otherwise.
If you were the primary parent during the relationship, and your ex now has just a few days per month with the kids, it is unreasonable to expect him to get into a groove as a father, understand his kids needs and wants, and understand and grow as a dad. In fact, men often report being much better parents after divorce for all these reasons.
Malicious mother syndrome
Malicious mother syndrome is a real medical condition in which one parent is revengeful towards the other, especially in cases of divorce. Parental alienation is a key example, though any display of revengefulness that makes a relationship with the children can be a symptom of this disorder.
Ex is a deadbeat dad
I have been reading the research on this topic, and interacting with single moms and single dads for nearly a decade. There are very few fathers who actively choose to bring a child into this world, and then choose to abandon that child without any good reason.
There are many men who want to be involved, loving fathers who cannot afford to pay the child support sum ordered by the courts. That does not make him a deadbeat, or a bad father who should not be allowed to see his children. Unfortunately, those two functions are often connected: Men who cannot afford to pay child support and are at risk of being arrested for arrears. That dad is not likely to go to family court to fight for more time with his children, out of fear of jailtime for child support arrears.
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How long can a father not see his child?
If there is a custody order in place, both parents must adhere to the visitation schedule outlined in the order.
Parents who do not follow these orders risk losing custody and facing jail time.
How long can a mother keep a child from seeing his or her father?
Child custody orders typically include rules for whether one parent can move away from the other parent without consent, or travel abroad or out of state without permission from the other parent.
Withholding visitation time can quickly put you in bad standing with the court, and put you at risk for losing custody as well as jail time.
Even if there is no custody order in place, a court will likely look unfavorably on a parent who keeps a child from his or her other biological or adoptive parent or guardian. “Friendly parent factor” is an increasingly common term written into state laws, as well as practiced by family court judges, which means that courts look favorably on parents who encourage a positive relationship with the other parent.
How much time must pass of a father not seeing his child before his parental rights are relinquished?
Biological parents have the legal and fundamental right to physical custody of their child, as well as the right to make important legal decisions on behalf of their child, regardless of involvement with the child.
If a parent is absent from a child's life, whether by choice or incarceration, they will generally still be recognized by courts as having parental rights.
However, if a custodial parent dies, goes to jail or otherwise is unable or unwilling to care for their children, then the non-custodial parent, or another relative or loved one may petition the court for primary custody. Otherwise, the state will appoint a guardian, which may include foster care.
On the other hand, if a non-custodial parent does not see his or her child for an extended period, which varies by state, nothing will legally happen. However, if the custodial parent chooses to seek to have that parent's parental rights terminated, he or she may initiate that process.
The other biological parent, a legal custodian or the state would need to take a court action to terminate the absent parent’s rights.
A state views an absent parent as someone who has abandoned their child by failing to make an effort to see or bond with their child for several months or years. Each state has its own laws in this regard.
What to do when the non-custodial parent doesn't show up or cancels last minute
Absent father? How moms can support fathers
First, let’s address the fact that the “deadbeat dad” stereotype is just that: A a trope, for which the history and explanation is complicated. Edward Kruk, PhD, a shared-parenting advocate, and divorce expert, writes in Psychology Today:
Despite President Obama’s 2011 Father’s Day lament on the irresponsibility of “deadbeat fathers” footloose and fancy-free from taking responsibility for their children, in fact the two major structural threats to fathers’ presence in children’s lives are divorce and non-marital childbearing. More often than not, fathers are involuntarily relegated by family courts to the role of “accessory parents,” instead of active caregivers.
This view persists among many, despite the fact that fathers in two-parent families, before divorce, typically share with mothers at least some of the responsibility for the care of their children. This is both because fathers have taken up some of the slack while mothers work longer hours outside the home, and because many fathers are no longer content to play a secondary role as parents. Most fathers today are keen to experience both the joys and challenges of parenthood, derive satisfaction from their parental role, and consider active and involved fatherhood to be a core component of their self-identity.
Whereas parents in general are not supported as parents by our social institutions, divorced fathers in particular are often devalued, disparaged, and forcefully disengaged from their children’s lives. Researchers have found that for children, the results are nothing short of disastrous.
Father Absence, Father Deficit, Father Hunger
The vital importance of paternal presence in children’s lives. Psychology Today
Kids who miss their fathers is just a surface symptom of deep psychological and societal issue that results when one parent is missing completely or partly from a child’s life. It is not just that the father (in the majority of cases) is not present to be involved, teach, care for and share in financial responsibility.
That child for their entire lives is plagued with the question: Why doesn’t my father love me?
Princeton University scholars’ meta-review of 47 studies, The Causal Effects of Father Absence, found that children raised without regular father involvement suffered:
- Increased behavioral problems
- Greater likelihood of smoking, drug use and underage drinking
- Lower chances of graduating high school, or attaining college educations
- Less likelihood of working as an adult, and adult who were raised without the involvement of their father had lower job statuses than those who had involved fathers
More research on fatherless daughters and sons finds:
- Daughters raised without an involved father are 71% more likely to have children as teenagers
- Researchers believe that a lack of father involvement affects a child’s brain social and cognitive development
- Troves of research link father absence to childhood obesity, increased risk of gang involvement, incarceration, mental illness, poverty and homelessness
What can moms do about fatherlessness?
The biggest change that must take place before fathers will be equally involved is to change our laws and culture to respect men as equal parents to mothers.
This will not happen overnight, but changes inside of individual families contribute to informing those around us, the courts, the judges and attorneys and mediators with whom we interact, and friends and family members who observe how we behave in our co-parenting relationships. This can include:
- Aim for a low-conflict / separation. Divorce and family courts are designed to make attorneys rich by incentivizing all parties to fight to win. If possible, opt for an amicable breakup, in which everyone walks away with a fair deal, and equal time and responsibility for the children. There are several quality online divorce services that we explain and review.
- Aim to be financially independent of your ex. Money exchanged between parents increases conflict between co-parents. Studies find the more conflict between parents, the more likely the father is to check out of the children’s lives.
- Stop trying to micro-manage your ex’s parenting. If you are in a relationship with him, let him take full responsibility for caring for the kids when it is his turn — he may not do it your way, fail, screw up and try again — just like any parent. If you are separated or divorced, don’t call the kids all the time when they are with him, or otherwise control his parenting.
- Focus on mutual respect and truly equal, shared co-parenting. Stick to the rules of healthy co-parenting, and if you need help with a shared calendar, splitting expenses and tracking communication, try a co-parenting app.
Consider this excerpt from The Kickass Single Mom, my bestselling book with Penguin:
There are many ways you can do this, but in Valerie’s case, she actively reached out to her ex and explicitly supported him in being a better father. It worked:
The best advice after my divorce was from a counselor. I was complaining about the burden of having my kids most of the time because my ex (going through a period of self-loathing, pity, and guilt) was not taking the time to be with them.
She told me that my kids needed me to be 100 percent of the mom I could be to them, but being 150 percent of the mom they needed would not compensate for their dad being anything less than 100 percent of the dad they needed. I would be better off investing that extra 50 percent helping him be a better dad.
Something clicked in me and really shifted my perspective. It began with a discussion I had with their dad: “Our kids need more time with you. Our kids need you more involved in the day-to-day of their lives. Our kids need you to be 100 percent of the dad you can be. How can I help you?”
And I kept asking. Finally, one day he asked me to help him move furniture into his apartment so he could make it more of a home for them. I packed up some toys and clothes (and even dishes and cups the kids liked using) and took them to his apartment. I encouraged him to coach our son’s baseball team and I helped with its administration. I encouraged him to take one of the kids to dinner to spend time one-on-one with them while I kept the other two. He became more confident as a parent. Once I started to give, he started to give.
That was more than five years ago. Our co-parenting relationship is balanced and in a very good place. It has been for a long time now—sometimes I forget it wasn’t always.
My ex is an awesome father, but there was a time when he was not as reliable as I would have hoped, related to what I wrote about a little bit here. Over the past several years I have let go of a lot of the rage I harbored for my ex over all kinds of things.
I see now that when he is not there for the kids, it is because forces bigger and darker than him are at play. And those things prevent him from being the parent he wants desperately to be — and enjoy his children as much as he otherwise might. Recognizing that allows me to be kinder to him, spend less toxic mental energy managing the situation. I’m a happier person and better mom because of all of the above.
There is also incredible work being done in the realm of shared parenting, in which courts presume that both parents are equally competent in the face of separation and divorce, and therefore presume that both parents should share in parenting time equally. There are now 60 peer-reviewed studies that prove that shared parenting is what is best for children — including in high-conflict cases (and I know of none that have found in favor of unequal time to either parent).
What to tell your kid when their dad is not involved
The literature finds very clearly that in cases where there is conflict between the separated parents, and when parenting time is heavily weighted in favor of one parent over the other (such as the every-other-weekend, Wednesday night arrangement, which constitutes 14 percent of hours in a month), the parent with the lesser time with the child has a very high chance of checking out of the kid’s life. Argue with whether or not that is fair or ethical. That has been happening for decades or more.
Shared parenting work in both the legal and mental health realms go hand-in-hand with work on parental alienation. A study found that 11 to 13 percent of divorce cases involve parental alienation, in which one parent systematically programs a child to reject the other parent, for no good reason. This is recognized as child abuse, and a symptom of mental illness on the part of alienating parent.
These facts are important to mention here in this post about fatherlessness. The research is there: When one parent is marginalized in their children’s lives, they tend to check out. As mothers — which are granted primary custody in 80 percent of cases that go to court — we can influence these things in powerful and positive ways. When you promote equally shared parenting with your kid’s other parent, that trickles into our culture, our expectations of one another, and that influences policy and court rulings.
When co-parenting fails: Can you force a dad to see his child?
In short: It is impossible to make a non-custodial parent take responsibility for his or her child. That said, when equal parenting time is promoted through courts and culture, men are more likely to use their parenting time, and even advocate for more equal parenting schedules.
29 ways to co-parent like a pro—even when your ex is a crazy narcissist
When your heart breaks because he stood your son up again, are enraged at his disregard for your time at yet another last-minute cancelation, or your daughter knows her dad is on vacation with the new girlfriend but says he can’t afford to see her, you are 100% entitled to be livid. Because that is bullshit.
It is also a sign of a broken person. And a sign of a broken culture and parenting expectations that go far beyond just your family.
Practice forgiveness. Practice empathy. Get therapy. And activism. Read 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
Bottom line: Get dads involved
Please listen to Terry Brennan, co-founder of Leading Women for Shared Parenting, explain why default every-other-weekend visitation leads to absentee fathers:
Note that in cases where ‘standard’ visitation is awarded — every-other-weekend — fathers become depressed and non-involved, and within 3 years, one study found, 40 percent of children in an unequal visitation arrangement had lost complete touch with their non-custodial parents, which are nearly always the father. Have a listen:
One of the most important things you can do to support your kids’ father’s parenting is just that: Allow him to parent. Presuming he has not been legally proven to be an unfit parent, you must operate from the premise that he is capable of keeping the kids alive and is allowed to make all decisions when they are in his care. If you eventually have a great co-parenting relationship, you may find ways to cooperate on special diets, bedtimes, and discipline. Otherwise, he is allowed to be whatever kind of father he likes during his visits. This includes feeding them fast food, letting them stay up late, and letting them spend the night at his sister’s house even though you hate her so much about that thing that happened at your wedding.
Do not call or text him or the kids frequently during their visits. Except for unusually long visits—which could be more than three or four days for very young children, or more than several weeks for older kids—do not call, FaceTime, text, or otherwise ask to engage with the kids. You must allow their dad to get into his own groove of parenting without your interference, and your kids should be allowed to get into the groove of life at their dad’s house.
Advice for mothers raising sons alone
I understand that you may miss them and worry they are having experiences that you will not share. I appreciate that this can be sad. But this is part of separated family life, and the sooner you embrace the wonderful benefit of having an actively involved, loving dad and fill your kid-free time in a meaningful way, the sooner these absences will stop being sad, and all parties involved can relax and flourish in the rhythms of your life. Plus, your children will sense if your calls stem from your own broken heart, and feel a need to care for you. That is not children’s job.
Ready to take action? Join MomsForSharedParenting.org — an activist org devoted to changing policy, law, culture and attitudes around parenthood. Time for 50/50 default parenting!
And report in the comments how it’s going.
Movies and books on single motherhood, divorce and co-parenting:
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
Divorce Poison: How to Protect Your Family from Bad-mouthing and Brainwashing, By: Dr. Richard A. Warshak
It is impossible to make a non-custodial parent take responsibility for his or her child.
If there is a custody order in place, both parents must adhere to the visitation schedule outlined in the order. Parents who do not follow these orders risk losing custody and facing jail time.
This article and comments really struck a cord with me. I do agree that there is something broken about a parent who is not consistent in their childs life and does not put them first. I personally was dealing with my sons father who showed his true colors when I told him I was pregnant. This is someone who i “knew” for 7 years before we even had sex. I did not plan to get pregnant and I even moved to another state to begin my new life but then found out I was pregnant a few weeks after I moved. He begged me to get an abortion. Then while I was pregnant, he decided to get back with into a relationship with his on again/off again ex. She broke up with him when he told her he had another child on the way. The funny part about all this is he blames me for her not being with him anymore but he cheated on her consistently when they were together and unfortunately I began talking to him when he was in the rebound stage. I honestly never saw myself having a serious relationship with him. He wasn’t present during my pregnancy, the birth, or really at all. My son is 4.5 and I can honestly say that I have put so much time, effort, and money into investing in my sons relationship with his father and his fathers family but I can not do it anymore. I am a very empathetic person but if I have learned anything from my sons father is that you have to put yourself and your kid first! I have moved clear accross the country Twice so my child can be in his fathers life and the the first time I moved back he made promises to take our son on a vacation and the day I was dropping him off he canceled at the last minute and then disappeared for two weeks. I eventually forgave him for that but then told him if it ever happened again I would pack my sh!t up and move back home with my parents. Eventually I did have to move back home with my parents but once I got back on my feet I moved back to the state where my sons father lived. He had many months to prep financially, emotionally-or whatever for our move back but didn’t. We had an agreement that he was going to pay for our sons ticket…that didnt happen, he told me at the last minute he wouldn’t be able to do it. We had an agreement for him to take him sun-wed….that didn’t happen, he always managed to call on sunday trying to change the plans. Then the child support payments started to get pushed back….he was originally deposting the money at the beginning of the month but then he changed it to the middle of the month and I was just supposed to accept that. Then he was supposed to take our son to school…the day after he was put on the pick up drop off list he didnt take our son to school because he over slept. I made the decision that he will not have our son during the week because my son needs consistency. For someone who hasn’t been in his sons life you would think he would jump at the chance to take his son to school…nope! He also lost his job…but didnt know that I knew and continued to say that he can only take him sunday-wed because he has to work thursday-sat. He is not working!!! He is partying with his new girl which he stupidly shows on social media. He can take her out on dates but the child support gets pushed back. My son and myself have to do without becaue he decides to put himself first. I have bills to pay too but now I know NOT to depend on him for money or consistency in his sons life. Also I saw the comments about Parent Alienation. I looked it up to make sure I wasnt being a parent alienator. Whew! I choose not to interact with my sons father at this point because the merry go round of his inconsistency is draining…emotionally and financially. I finally put him on court ordered child support and told him if he wants to see our son he can pick him up on weekends from a third parties house (a friend of the family) friday-sun but he has not made contact with them for pickups. The thing is he wants to keep jerking around my time but I have a life now too. When we make an agreement and he doesnt show up I have to pay for a sitter or cancel my plans. Majority of the time Im paying for a sitter which is taxing financially. But Im starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I built a better support system and I made the decision NOT to interact with his father because I have done enough. His father needs to develop his own relationship in his sons life. If he wants to see his son he can pick him up on weekends or get court ordered visitation. He can tell the courts he over slept and they can decide what to do with all his excuses. Sometimes you have to realize the blessings in the inconsistency. Yes he may be broken so maybe NOW is not the best time for him to be in his sons life. Im pissed because I had to find that out the hard way but he will be welcomed with open arms once he takes iniative on his own to file for visitation and actually stick to the plan. I definitely believe my son should see his father more than two days a week but he has school and I overslept is not going to cut it. He has never made our son a priority and never made a birthday or given our son even a $2 bday card but will spend money and time flying out to his friends weddings and birthdays. It doesn’t make any sense to me but its no longer worth wasting my energy on. The final straw was when he told me that “he lost the love of his life messing around with me and my decision to have our son”? Wait a second! I personally DO NOT talk to men who are in relationships I cannot comprehend why its my fault when I didnt get myself pregnant. He is still emotionally tied to his ex before me and she is too but he will forever see our son and me as the reason he and the ex is not together. He doesnt accept his role in the situation and he is missing out on having a great relationship with his son because he will not get over his ex. Sometimes I wish they would get back together because maybe he will be a better father if he gets her back but i digress. Only time will tell what happens but I will no longer be mommy and daddy because I dont have to be…it’s that simple.
It’s funny when I read this article…. two years ago I went through what anyone doesn’t want to go through. A partner that cheated because he was unhappy in the relationship. At that time I had my two kids, and I was the one that stood by them as everything fell apart while he was already in his blissful “new” relationship. Not caring at all that he wasn’t there even though they were still young he just dropped his role as being a Dad and that was that. But you know things are never greener on the other side, so he realized that he made a mistake and used the kids are a means to get on my good side and played me again, but I learned the hard way that if a man can’t own up to his mistakes and pretends that life is peachy then why should I let him back in? he left me, left the kids.. which was very traumatic and then returns as if he didn’t do anything wrong. Now two years later, he sees them at least 3x a month. It’s a joke… but my kids knows that I am the one that is there for them, always there to help them with anything, bring them to school, activities, and even though I have them full time, it’s something that I hold onto. My ex has a mind of a 18yrs old trapped in a 31yr mind. I had a lot of anger and hatred towards him… but seeing how all that energy was just for waste I see that now it’s pointless. I can only better myself and show my kids that I will never go anywhere even if I were to start dating, they will come first. It’s a sacrifice that single Moms go through, I know that I can’t be a Dad towards them but they will grow up to know how to a good and better person with my guidance. Thanks for this article :)
Realize that I made some spelling mistakes, it was past midnight when I wrote this.. excuse for the spelling mistakes :)
This ‘article’ paints a so simplistic and biased picture of absent fathers. The reasons for which a father may not want to be with their children anymore are very varied, deep and complex to try to lump them in a condescending “because he has feel low worth”. Give me a break for once. There are many things to begin with:
1. Stop calling it visitation. If a biased, anachronistic judicial system cannot change, at least you take the lead and do it. Visitation is an utterly derogatory term which only serves to self-perpetuate the idea of division and exclusion rather than inclusion. Suggestion? timidly but solidly more legal people and just parents are using the more neutral term “parenting time”. If you keep meaning that a father visits and not parents his children, don’t expect a friendly reaction from him.
2. If you want more free time then at the time of reaching a separation agreement, focus on shared custody and an access schedule that truly reflects it. Otherwise either you are shooting yourself in the foot, or simply you perpetuate the problem of myriads of mothers: they want free time but they don’t want to share the custody nor the parenting time. Really? keep being a selfish parent or grow up and behave like a mature-thinking adult.
3. Real life is not Hollywood romantic crap to which so many women are addicted to believe is possible beyond the screen. In real life, people acts and adjusts more according to the many problems and opportunities that life presents than the corny cheesy image of a superhero, martyr, parent who goes several extra-miles for their children and leaves unscathed. Come on, please. Parents do, and will keep going the extra mile for their children, no question, but do it when it makes sense. Bending backwards when is beyond a healthy option is foolish. Stop believing in that Hollywood superhero that makes it happen all at the end of the 2 hour movie. Life is beyond those 2 hours, and many factors you don’t control, which in the end may cripple you physically and psychologically if you do not keep a rational ground where to step on. It is way different to bend backwards and act when your child’s life is in immidiate danger and other when you have been alienated parentally by the other parent to a point that it does not matter what you do, the oly outcome is take a step back, regroup your forces and wait until the child grows and sees for him/herself the true (if he/she can).
3. When you have your child most of the time, the dynamic of the relationship and the energy spent on it, is of different intensity and nature than when you only are with your child one weekend every here and now, say every other weekend if you are lucky. It is exhausting in all terms because you need to catch up and take advantage of every precious moment with the child during that weekend. you know you will not be with him/her until another 2 weeks if so!
4. Again, when you have very limited time with your child, and the environment where this happens is sour, due to some form of PAS, sabotaging, blocking parenting time for example, sometimes it becomes unbearable to do everything in your power to be there to in the end be rejected over and over and over again.
5. At last, as there are more points to be made, mothers please understand once and for all: fathers are equally important, equally fundamental in the life of the children. Their contribution and love for them is as deep, as intense, and raw as the one you mother feel. There is not Orson Well’s animal farm here “some animals are more equal than others”. Once you understand that, everything becomes seen with another light. Yes, some fathers, as well as some mothers, do not care for their children and only for they BF/GF. But those are some, not all. Aim at the ‘all’.
Stay well.
I read this article and didn’t quite make through all the comments and thoughts, I lost it in the fact trolling and defensive posture that Tom took early on. Also, I may be dropping this thought on the wrong article but I want to flip to a situation opposite of the one described in the article. My ex and I were married for 15 years, she left me not too long ago but long enough for things to be final and her living across the street from her new relationship, and it was a sometimes imperfect relationship. I get our kids every other weekend, standard visitation. But she refuses or displays a lack of co-parenting. I’m not involved in any decisions regarding our kids. I wonder how I could encourage her to create a positive environment for us to co-parent? The reason I ask this is due to the lack of respect I get from our oldest daughter, last visit when I asked her to hang up her phone in a car full of siblings and one friend. She told me no and then moments later told me she didn’t have to fu**ing listen to me. Would a visible positive co-parenting environment have helped to prevent this? I wonder many times if I am to blame for this situation with her.
I will say that I had to start paying child support through the courts, which makes my life both easier and harder. Less stress worrying about if I can get together enough money for support and more stress worrying about how to get together enough money to buy groceries for their visits. No, I don’t go out five days a week, don’t have a girlfriend, and have only missed two weekends when my job absolutely needed me due to sickness of a crew member and when I couldn’t get back into town to get them myself at the start of weekend. I did communicate with our kids in advance and even tried to make arrangements to have them come down and stay with friends is I could see them for at least a short period but she refused.
I feel like I’m rambling and I’m losing a connection to our oldest daughter that I feel will hurt her in the long run and future relationships. I know I can’t force her to co-parent and this isn’t about my ex, it’s about my relationship with our daughter. How do I flip this, I don’t like the direction things are heading. We tend to repeat history if we don’t learn from it which I feel is true even for our kids and their parents past.
Please feel free to move this to a better article comment section if need be, thanks
Sorry. I just can’t do it. Not only did he put me through hell with the lies, emotional stress and putting me down, he also set up child support trials and deliberately failed to appear. Then he decided to lay low and harrass me via email because I preferred to handle the whole situation in court instead of outside of court (under the table). Most recently I guess the mother of his new child (I didn’t know that he had another until she facebooked me) contacted me disclosing that “she’s heard so much about me…and wanted to know what happened between us because he blames himself [and how she thinks] that I should contact her and be friends.” WTF!!! I have a strict no contact rule in place because of his psycho ways. I don’t care about his new woman, kid. He refused to be a man and father to my son, but because the new chick does it his way [keeps it out of court] he’s the best father ever?!? I haven’t talked to him in years and he hasn’t seen his son since he was 2 months old. I cannot be empathetic to that individual. I do not care about his new life. He continues to play deadbeat so I could care less how he feels. So he took care of the new kid, good for them because he didn’t do anything for my son. I have no idea why the latest babymamma contacted me. I have no idea why the deadbeat would bother discussing me or my child with her. Especially since he refused to be a real parent.
I agree… My daughter dad complains he his bby ma took his son away…n other the lil grl aint his… I end up getting pregnant and we split she was 4months… He cant handle being responsible…but he dates women with kids n his new gf is a kid n has 3kids…guess shes more important that his daughter i actually let him see. But i do all the effort..
I came across your blog and finally realize I’m not the only one going through this…
I have a beautiful baby boy – Wil be 2 in November. His father is an inconsistent mess. We split up a year ago and we have been to family court twice and we will be going back for various reasons.
I asked him to leave because of drugs. He smoked Marijuana morning noon and night and the last straw was when he left it out where our son could get it.
He agreed to take our son every other weekend and I did not push child support at that time. We had a verbal agreement for him to buy diapers and pay me $300 a month.
Needless to say he was inconsistent with visits – he was court ordered to parent at his mother’s and that didn’t work out. We went back to court in May and at that time I had child support court ordered as he stopped buying diapers and did not pay anything for Oliver.
He was consistent with visits at least for a month then it was back to the same old. Only this time didn’t see him for 2.5 months.
I just found out he’s moved in with his new girlfriend and her 2 kids – not informing me until the last minute.
He still hasn’t paid any child support and says our son will sleep on a futon if I was to allow our son to go to this women’s house.
I don’t know what to do.
Bc of the drugs I have restrictions that he cannot smoke drugs or drink alcohol 24 hours prior to having our son. But how do I control the new girlfriends actions.
I’m so frustrated as all I want is for him to be a father and want to have him more than 4 days a month. I’m at the point where I don’t want a cent from him and I’d just rather he walk away now so our son doesn’t get hurt.
How about the fact the the mother justmay be a P.O.S. who refuses to work to help support the kids. Leaving the father to work 2 sometime 3 jobs in order to provide for them, put a roof over their head and support the mother (ex) as well. Stop blaming fathers who actually do every thing they possibly can for the kids. Sometimes a father has to pr is forced to miss a trip or play date do to the fact he has to work. The mother gives no support what so ever.
Father of 3 here, facing a separation, and I can only hope beyond all odds that I’ll have a fair chance of seeing my kids on a regular basis. Feeling crushed and gutted beyond belief.
It’s easy to put the blame on the fathers who don’t visit, I’m also one of them.
I have the misfortune of living in a country where fathers only get full custody if the mother is a dangerous addict or mentally unstable, and even then it is extremely difficult to prove. My kids were 2 and 4 when my verbally abusive ex finally left my house and moved back to her parents’ house 8 hours away. She got full custody of course, I got a weekend every 2 weeks and half of the holidays. Do you think that did me any good? I earn 360$ a month, I have to pay 40% child support, and all I have left for my living is 216$, my food, bills, travel expenses to my job. Keep in mind that this is not a rich Western country where you earn 5-10x more, this is Eastern Europe. I simply can’t afford the 60 $ to visit my kids, and by the time I get there after 8 hours of bus/train ride, it’s already late afternoon and I have to get back with the last train. Don’t even think about going to a motel, it also costs money. If I want to take them out of town it is 120 $. Money and distance is the perfect way to keep the fathers from seeing their kids, even if they want to. The court rejected my appeal to share the travel expenses with the ex, as a non-custodial parent I have to pay for everything.
After a few months I realized that either I continue living in this hell and really go nuts over it, or make a hard decision and stop visiting altogether. Custodial parents will NEVER understand the pain of non-custodial parents, and they are hipocritically wondering why we are broken inside. A week before the ex moved out, my daughter hugged me and told me how much she loves me. I was the one who played with her, we laughed together, did all kinds of fun activities. It is over now, the ex won. Money won. I have a new girlfirend now, a new life, and I’m thinking less and less about them now. It gets easier with every single day. It is still better than seeing them for a few hours every few months and crying when it is over. Custodials would only understand if they had to give up their children for two months without the possibility of contact. Until then the fathers are always to blame.
Dont give that witch a single cent ever again. As you said you are in Europe, i dont which country you are in. If your country is part of the EU then simply disappear into western Europe. Nobody will ever know where you are and you only tell your mother or father e.t.c. Believe me, i know this from experience, the ex will go totaly mad, run to the courts and try to get you arrested. You will see how that witch will become very well behaved and very very very nice, humble and courtious towards you when you turn off the tap through which the money is flowing hahahaha.You see my friend, go to west Europe, Britain, Germany infact Scandinavian countries are the best. Try for Sweden or Norway you will earn 20 times what you earn in your country and you never give the witch a cent because you dont tell anybody where you are.
I just got off the phone with my ex-husband. I made the mistake of asking him to take our 3 children tomorrow so that I can work overtime. I need to work overtime so that I can make my ends meet, as he is not giving me any money. he knows I wont ever go stand in a court to ask for money for my children. No offense to anybody who does, its just not me. so he says why must he help me? its my fault for divorcing him. so I bit back my anger and just said. ok then see the children when ever it suits you. why do people, oth mothers and fathers try to spite each other with the children? that is your very own dna, what kind of farther or mother you are should not depend on the child’s other parent. But what can I do? go to court to ask a judge to make him spend time with his children? here’s what I think, people who are divorced for being inadequate spouses will make a lot of the same mistakes with their children. and its so sad. I don’t even have the ability to prey for that man right now. I don’t know how to tell my children they may not see their father this weekend. so if any of you are reading this please stop and check yourself, make sure your intentions are for the best of the children and not the worst for the ex.
I told my ex either we have a 50%-50% joint physical and legal custody arranged or I walk. OR I AM DONE I MEAN IT. I even agreed to pay the full child support just let me see my kids! Instead I got the typical EOW (every other weekend) screwjob. Seeing your children 4 days a month isn’t being a parent. I feel over whelming bitterness and resentment over this cruel and unfair arrangement. I drop the kids off at my ex’s house and I i’m not allowed to see them for 12 days in a row. I am moving back to Brazil where i’m originally from. My kids are 5 and 9 and I am through with them. Ex will have some explaining to do.
I sacrifice my whole life and happiness paying $1,200 a month child support for my kids and I am only allowed to see them 4 days a month. They call the her new husband “Daddy”. I guess he is the Dad biology doesn’t make a parent. Being a parent is tucking the kids into bed, reading stories, being there with them. Parent is a verb not a noun. Since I am no longer allowed to do those Dad things fulltime or 50% of the time and only everyother weekend I am no longer my childrens father. It hurts but it’s the truth. I am more like an uncle that my kids visit than I am a father. My wife’s new husband is their primary father figure now since he lives with them full time.
I see my co workers more than I see my kids since I have to work 60 hours a week to pay all that child support. I am only raising the children financially I am just a visitor. Seeing my kids 4 days a month and sacrificing my life paying for her and her new husbands lifestyle is making me severely mentally ill. I have to see a psychiatrist and get pills. This lifestyle is torture i’m moving back to Brazil and starting a new happy life.
You ladies would have to go to a shrink and get pills if you were only allowed to see your kids 4 days a month and had to pay your ex husband and his new wife $1,200 in child support. Then you could listen to your kids talk about their new “mommy” and yes the ex will talk shit about you to the kids. They must demonize you to justify the unfair custody arrangement or else they will look selfish. They will never say yes your father got screwed he has to pay me $$$$ and is now just a visitor. They must make themselves the rescuers and you the ex is incompetent.
I am damned if I do and damned if I don’t. I am talked about as a moron incompetent Disneyland every other weekend Dad. (Dismissively saying I am not raising the children, that i’m not doing any significant work, i’m just an incompetent fun parent) I can’t teach the kids much only have them 2 days on 12 days off-repeat cycle over and over. I can’t discipline the kids. I am mocked and ridiculed by my ex. I am the flakey fun parent. I am incompetent, useless, pitied, dysfunctional, a joke, It’s very embarrassing. I am not respected as a parent. I feel like such a loser. I am a loser. I got so screwed. Non custodial every other weekend parents are losers. Living this lifestyle makes me feel like a big LOOOOOOSSSSSSEEEEERRRR.
I feel dominated, humiliated, and controlled calling my ex asking for more time with my kids so I don’t even bother she never lets me anyway. I feel like a cuckhold paying my ex and her new husband $1,200 a month in child support and having my kids be raised by another man and call him Dad. I feel so defeated. I can honestly say that I am truly never happy.
If I say fuck this and leave then I am cold hearted and mean. I’m a “deadbeat”. Either i’m a miserable $$$$$$ paying incompetent part time visitor loser or a mean deadbeat. I’m not happy I must leave. This lifestyle is untenable. From what I have observed from watching other non custodial parents is that the vast majority have poor outcomes. I will move back to Brazil and start a new family. I would rather be a deadbeat and happily married to a new woman that loves me and raising children that respect and love me than a miserable $$$$$$$$ ATM to an ex and new husband that hate me,mock,ridicule and bully me and to kids that i’m not allowed to parent that are being raised to think i’m a loser. I would rather be “bad” and leave and have a future happy marriage and be a real dad to future children who love and respect me than be “good” and be alone paying $$$$$ and miserable and being tortured by not being allowed to see my kids who think i’m pathetic.
Non custodial parenting is a mentally ill dysfunctional lifestyle that will only lead to financial ruin and cause mental illness which in time will lead to physical illness. Also the non custodial parent is only human and might self medicate with drugs and alcohol. They will be dealing with feelings of over whelming anger, resentment and bitterness which may lead the non custodial parent to often verbally and psychologically abuse their children (the ex’s weapons) or god forbid get physically abusive and sometimes if you read the news tragic things occur. They might hurt their ex, the kids or themselves (divorced fathers suicide rates are astronomical.)
In general people act how they are treated. If the person is treated like an incompetent, deadbeat, criminal, loser by their ex and the family court system eventually they realize they have nothing to lose by acting how they are treated. Ex and family court system think I am only worthy enough to see my kids four days a month. Well i’ll just take my screwed loser incompetent ass and fuck off and not see them at all then. You’re a deadbeat they will say. Meh… to me it’s just the gnashing of teeth of people who can no longer dominate, humiliate and control. Never will they be pleased with me i’m damned if i do and damned if I don’t. Naturally like most non custodial parents I will eventually choose the “I don’t” option it’s much much easier.
please rethink. we are only gonna live once.
Excellent. Dont give your ex a single cent, thats madness. At this point in your life you should only be focusing on you and only you. Why give the ex money which she will use to pay for an expensive dinner with her boy friend and then get fcuked on the bed paid for with your money. Stop paying immediately and build your own life because life is short. In 20-40 years each and every person reading my words will be rotten flesh 6 feet under the ground. So throw all moral to the wind and focus only on yourself. The point is to have a certain quality of life whilst you are still here and breathing, even make new babies if thats what your heart desires. The point is that you must never ever give your ex a single cent ever again in your life. Let her go work or even better let her man go work for her.
But there are exceptions to every rule. If the ex plays her part and sees to it that your kids live near you and you can see them any time you want and as often as you want , then in my opion it is ok to pay child support. Let her take the money and go get fucked by different men, everything is fine and ok. But if the ex plays the dirty games that women love then pay nothing and start a new life far away from the money greedy parasite and only support the good women who give the access that you want to your children.
I think you are full of nonsense. Its not about moving on, or fighting, or getting fucked. Its about ensuring that your child grows up in a healthy environment. A real caring father would ensure that he comes to terms with the mother and get to an agreement. Supporting a child has nothing to do with you seeing your child stupid betch. Every thing that happened to you and you baby your baby mama i am sure it was caused by you, as i see that you have a rotten mentality.
Women don’t have the ability to look at that situation from a man’s point of view. They just see it as that is normal way of sharing the kids because the kids are suppose to be with mommy because she gave birth and its her right to have the more close bond and the courts agree 99% of the time. Women love to be in control when it comes to their kids …. notice I typed ‘their kids’ ….because that is what they feel and think anyway. Remember she gave birth to them and cared for them first for 9 months so her mind they are truly only her kids and she is the decision maker and the final say on her kids. Her mind, body and soul says ” I gave life and nurtured first so she gets the ” Pink Slip”…………. The reality is when they grow up they become adults with bonding, relationship and etc issues stemming all the way back to childhood and for some reason the cycle starts all over again and the parent of the adult child with these problems cannot understand why problems are going on psychologically with their adult child and the mental issues they are having.
I am a father of an 18 month old boy. I always cared for my son and took care of him. I was never married to the mother. Since she found a new man she has done everything to get me out of the picture. She moved over 80 miles away i havent seen my son in over 2 months. we have a court date in October.
Women justify the father not seeing his child because he did not marry the mother and she wants to get revenge. Women are also not innocent. Not all but alot of women must tell the truth as to why the father is not in the childs life.
If the mother of my son continues continues like this then i will have no choice but to move on and forget about him. Because in all honesty if i pitch up on her doorstep the police will remove me. If she does not want me to see him she will always find an excuse to cancel my visitations with silly excuses like ” oh he is sick and vomiting”.
Such women now start telling the world “oh he is an ars**hole”, “oh he doesnt bother with his kid”. But the truth is they move hundreds of miles away. Call police when you want to see the child. Cancel court cases because she is suddenly ill on that day. Then when the father moves on due to the simple fact that he aint getting any younger and starts a new family, now he is a loser and a jerk. But to run to the courts for money oh yes that is what they are good for. These woman must get nothing, not a single penny and i dont blame men to play this game because such women are best dealt in the financial department.
I am not saying all mothers are like this and that all fathers are saints, no thats not what i am saying. But truth be told some women are just plain old demons and then blame the fathers.
Chris, I was all with you re: women being revengeful, malicious and manipulative, which they absolutely can be. But I lump you in with jerks with “i will have no choice but to move on and forget about him.” Forget him? FORGET HIM? One day he will be old enough — like at age 7 or 8 — to understand what kind of person his mom is, and what kind of man his father is. And if he doesn’t see his father fighting to be part of his life, well … there you go.
Men arent getting any younger as well. We sometimes have no choice but to keep it moving. How much energy does a man have to continue fighting a never ending battle that simply cannot be won if the childs mother refuses to cooperate? Firstly it costs a small fortune to conduct a single court case. Secondly it takes great amounts of emotional energy to continue fighting, which can break a mans spirit. When a man is depressed and broken he then starts drinking and maybe doing a few drugs or two. Which man willingly agrees to be an alcoholic?
So at a certain point if mothers refuse to cooperate a man then has a choice to make: either he sacrifices his mental, financial and physical health to continue fighting or he chooses the path of self preservation and happiness. Just because one woman wants to totaly and utterly destroy a man does mean that another woman will not bring him happiness and give him many children which he will see grow up under his guidance and care. So you see a man always has options and there are many lonely women out there who would not refuse the oportunity to settle down with a stable man of means. But if the man is an alcoholic and maybe hooked on drugs then his options dwindle down to very few or even zero options because no sane woman will take him.
To finish up let me tell you a little secret. If a woman does want to cooperate then there is absolutely nothing that a man can do about it. The courts can do nothing if she says the child is sick or if she brainwashes the child to refuse to see the father. Secondly if the father even tries anything the police will be on him in less than a second and if he beats the police up then 5 police vans with back-up will arrive. Even if the man defeats the reenforcements then armoured special military units will arrive to finish him off.
So your child is not worth the fight….you can try to sugar coat it and explain it but it’s really THAT simple: to you, your child is not worth the fight.
Yes. Forget him. I’m not going to run my life into the ground to prove a point. I’m in the same boat as Chris. My efforts to be part of my son’s life are constantly thwarted. The courts just don’t care, and it costs me between $4-$5,000 a pop to have them remind me. My ex makes life as difficult and disruptive as she can and then taunts me with “I guess you don’t want to see him” in order to try to bait me to drive all the way to Pennsylvania to find an empty house. If it matters, I never return the emotional abuse that she hurls my way at any time we’re in contact (which is only when we deal with our son). Aside from it being beneath me, I loved this woman once and the memory of our relationship deserves better. It’s all been like this for years and there is NOTHING that can be done about it.
So, yeah, she’s won. It was a rigged game with the way the court system is, but she’s still won nonetheless. I’m not going to just keep torturing myself out of principle. There are new people in my life that want me there, who I can make happy, and who are there for me. Would I like to see my son? Absolutely. I’d also like to be 25 again, wealthy, and be able to run a marathon. You have to accept what you can get in life, and gracefully let go of the things you cannot have. Maybe one day when he has some greater autonomy there might be something more I can do. But right now, i have two choices. Try to see my son out of principle and get humiliated and hurt, or spend the time with new people who have come around me and shown me nothing but love and support. I choose the latter.
Scott- your comment illustrates why so many men abandon their kids. I appreciate your ex is being abusive and unreasonable. But your son deserves a father who fights through that abuse for the sake of his love for his son – and yes, principle.
So, I should continue to run my life into the ground out of principle? How do I go about that fight? The judge has spoken, spoken, and spoken again. I have lost. He wasn’t abandoned–and I resent the implication otherwise. He was awarded by the courts. Not because there is anything wrong with me. Rather, because I can and do hold a job, while she doesn’t and won’t.
I’m sorry, but your comments come off as incredibly smug. It’s not a surprise, but it’s far from the first time I hear it and as much as I don’t wish to fan the flames of the war of the sexes, basically invariably from women. As if I have a duty to run my life into the ground just to show that I’ve done so for him. If there were some reasonable chance of success, that would be one thing. But that’s not the case, or at least it isn’t as things stand.
What does it profit my son for me to subject myself and my other loved ones (yes, my son is extremely important, but other people matter too and I’m NOT ashamed to say that my own happiness still matters!) to the constant cycle of grief, stress and abuse, when it results in absolutely nothing? I owe my son a great many things. But burning my life down and being unable to build anything new just for show isn’t amongst it.
This is an important topic for both sides to discuss and learn from, I think. It is important to know that it is easy to think the one side has it worse than the other when it comes to dead beat parents. Its easy to let bias slip when your all alone (at least as a parent) raising your kids seemly by yourself. However this isn’t a gender thing, It is often many reasons for those who say I love my kids to pieces but never follow that statement up with action. Instead its absence they give back after saying those words. My ex-wife’s child hood environment was hell, abusive father, mother and father constantly splitting up, sexually attacked by a family member, attacked by her boyfriends. I don’t have time to go into the full history, but the bottom line today is that I think she feels unworthy as a mother, she feels the kids are better off with me, she is mixed up with a bad abusive new husband who just beat her up bad last weekend and refuses to press charges, part of her feels she is still doing well as a parent even though she is absent because she never abused her kids, like she was a s child. She is broken, been broken for a while. 14 years she had in safe home. I’m not saying we didn’t argue or it was a perfect fairy tail marriage, but she never worried about violence, a bruise or abuse. Now she agrees the kids need to stay with me and she “moved out” to her mothers to escape the abuse. To find out she is pushing him to get medication to magically fix him so she can live with him again. The months preceding this domestic violence are littered with tears of disappointment. Missed holidays, birthdays and skipping out on her time with her 2 boys…I have to work, I’m going out of town, no call no shows, I have a party, I cant tonight, we (her new boyfriend and her) are arguing so they shouldn’t come up…just to name a few. But now she wants to mover further away almost an hour with a guy she know I wont let our kids around now that he has shown his violent ways. I fear she will completely disappear from our boys life. I want her part of their life, but I also want my boys to have the safe childhood they deserve. So its hard to watch her disappear, but deep down I’m just preparing for when my boys need explanations at the time when they can handle it. I never bad talk their mother, and I wont allow them to either. They know when they are an adult I will explain to them what happened the best I can but for now its ok to be feel the way you feel, and know your mother does love you. It feels like I may have rambled, but I don’t have time to proofread….Good luck to you all, stay strong and just show up, be there!
Good advice even for those happily married, but with parents/in-laws who are distant emotionally but not geographically and don’t show up for their grandchildren.
db
I am having a particularly crappy day, and was searching for some topics that may give me some comfort or the ability to find energy to get through the day. Oddly, I cam e across this topic and felt I should comment from the single father perspective.
Before anyone tries to discredit my opinion, let me give you some of background. Single father of 3 amazing kids. Their mother and I went our separate ways approximately 15 years ago, Although it was not my choice to split …. here we are 15 years later, apart and having somewhat successfully moved on.
I have been in their life every step of the way. It has not been easy. I can’t remember how many times I had to wipe the tears from my eyes when I drove into their mothers driveway to drop them off. It was equally hard not having them full time to tuck them in every night. Being there every day when they got home from school. I often wondered how a father could make a concious choice to ‘not be there’ for their children. I think the answer given by the author of this post has a lot of merit.
We all have choices. I made mine and chose to be an integral part of my childrens lives. I will never look back with regrets however I feel scarred inside and like I have let them down. It is a tremendously hard thing to split from a person you care for, It takes a lot of maturity to differentiate between the grieving process of feelings you have for your ‘ex’ while trying to emotionally be the strong father (or parent) you need to be for your kids. Add to that the likelihood of interference from meddling in-laws, bitter friends … family and anyone else interfering or adding to the animosity levels of a separation/divorce.
Take it from a guy who has been there and survived the process. It ain’t easy … and in fact can take you to the edge of insanity at times. I don’t condone the behavious of fathers who walk away or neglect their duties, but sometimes I do understand why they are absent. Sometimes, it has nothing to do with the kids at all. I just wish their was a magical answer to it all that protected the kids in the journey.
Brad, thanks so much for chiming in. Your words will help and support others, and I hope that helps you through your crappy day :)
This feels like my situation except that my wife left me. It’s nice to hear the process is survivable but it would be so much nicer to have a reference to work from. Any places you found good advice and support?
My husband and I were married 20 years. He was mostly verbally abusive and sometimes physically. We have two boys 12 and 17. We finally separated after he came home drunk and hit me. My son called 911 and he is being charged. He is able to see kids supervised but its been 9 months since and he has only seen them twice. He doesnt call either. My youngest is heartbroken and misses him. I just dont understand how after all these years he would walk away from our boys as well. He had not worked for the past year and we lost our home to the bank. Je is still mot working, possibly drinking heavily and living in another town with his mom. I just cant wrap my head around this. My youngest is now seeing a counsellor. My 17 year old says he’s ok not seeing dad.
I was looking up, why dad don’t talk to the kids…and this what I found.
I was married 19 years. I would say the marriage wasnt perfect and had issues. He got sick (cancer) had it removed (doctor hit the small bowel) then he lost his whole small bowel…Took care of him for 3years and got him back on his feet and he went back to work.
When this all started our children was in 4th and 5th grade.
Our kids didn’t do well… when had to change to smaller class size school 6th through 8th. I couldnt handle him working overseas for fear of him going in rejections. He wouldn’t call, nor write. After return he then started drinking ( or was drinking overseas… and I already knew bowel would stop functioning and go into rejection….I just told him hey don’t your think we’ve been through enough… he went back over seas found him a young woman… then left us in 2009 got him an apartment and then in 2010 moved overseas left again/ returned 2012… then he filed for divorce in… kicked us out of our home (of 19 years) in the middle of wint. ( because he won in divorce, but then wouldn’t give me my half) ( our children couldn’t do high school) we were homeless for like 2 years.. we bounced around from home to home. It was a night mire… and our kids was in an out of mental health hospitals…
I still am angry…
The biginning of 2015 took back to court, for my half in the divorce and he said he would pay me GOT A CONSENT ORDER (we had to go back to my hometown and live with my mother, which was out of state) he has not paid me yet. In all that time from Oct. 2012 til Jan 2015 he ignored the courts…and is still in Contempt of Court…
I finally got an apartment (low income) in my hometown Oct.2104….
I know I am a strong woman for I was a stay home mom. Some how I have managed to get a job…( help my children to get their highschool diploma) and struggle to keep a roof over our head, I don’t have much, but God has bless me with a bed ( we were sleeping on air mattresses) we are up off the floor… and a kitchen table, ( that I pay on each month) some things, have been given to us…like, loveseat, TV in the living room…and very little clothing because is just couldn’t hang on to what was in my storage unit…
My story is pretty incredible… but I still have anger for I feel in my heart that my ex husband doesn’t want to communicate with his kids because he doesn’t want me knowing his life style…. He is on his third wife…
My road has been long and I still am traveling it…trying to help my kids get on their feet… while I have so many worries of how am I going to do all of this….by myself…with a car seeing it’s last days…
I wish I could write a book for those who want to be donor…for those….stay home mother’s…
I am still angry… but struggle to be happy… what you said, maybe true, but I refuse to believe it in my case….I think he is all about himself…selfish…
You are an incredibly strong woman…. and thank God for people like you…it isn’t fair and most solo parents ahve to do twice the work with half the money….it is a job! Course we love our kids…but let’s get real….the drop kick other parent, usually the father should help at least firstly financially, considering the burden placed on the carer parent….and of course make every effort to at least contact their child, phone call, letter whatever that does not cost anything.
Sick of shitty parents, again majority fathers who cannot be arsed to contact…I really believe most mothers foremost want this, and can skip the financial and physical support if only the other parent demonstrated their love for their child. Right on; selfish and irresponsible…in the end their loss but unfair and I dare say damaging for the innocent victims…the child/ren.
I actually get to see this from a couple of different sides. I have been divorced for 2 years and I have a 10 yr old boy and 7 yr old girl. My son was adopted by my ex when he was 3 and doesn’t personally know his bio dad. He does know that my ex adopted him. Unfortunately he is an addict. He can be a good dad when he is clean but not very good when he is not. My son isn’t very close to him but my daughter thinks he hung the moon. I try really hard not to burst her bubble. I figure if anyone is going to do that it will be him not me. He is court ordered to pay $200 a month in child support and I have never gotten it. He hasn’t worked for years so I figure it is just a lost cause. I still continue to let my kids see him because I think the feeling of abandonment is worse than anything. Now that I am engaged it is harder to co parent with him. My fiance has a horrible relationship with his ex. She is conniving and horrible. She has made many false police reports about domestic violence and we are actually in the process of one of those claims now. He is an AMAZING father and man and it is very hard to watch him get so discouraged. He also has one son by another woman who refuses to let him see him because she is afraid her son will leave her. I just feel so bad for everyone who has to go through this. Not all moms are perfect and not all dads are perfect. The only advice I have is DON’T let your feelings for your ex cloud how you parent. Only think about your children and how you can make their lives amazing (with or without) the other parent. So many times we let how we feel guide us and it hurts our children so bad!
I think my divorce is tough until I hear stories like this – it is really too bad that everyone has to get so crazy and can’t just get along — even on a cursory basis — for the sake of the kids. Good luck
I have not seen my kids in two and a half years, not by choice either.My ex wife basically got everything in the divorce and all I got was memories of our kids.the most painful thing is this person I once loved is using our kids as a weapon I don’t even bother reaching out because she is in control of everything.my daughter and I use to be so close before the divorce I wouldn’t even recognize her of I were to see her, the courts couldn’t give two shits if you see your children or not.their bottom line is money and to make sure you continue to pay.Best interest for the kids my ass! I’ll never get to see her grow up I didn’t even see her lose her first tooth, her mom probably got her brainwashed beyond what words can describe.my dad never had a relationship with his father because of his mother.So many dads out there want to be good fathers, their efforts and intentions are never good enough but holy shit that green stuff that gets deposited in my bank account every two weeks from my Job sure is.when will women stop alienating their children from their fathers especially dads who love their kids. When you get a divorce when you have kids not only do you lose a soul mate but chances are you will lose your children too.I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy.evidently money and material things mean more to people men &women (not all) but just about everyone, than the love for a child. Not to get biblical here but the Devil certainly has a foothold over the family unit, enough so to drive a wedge between them and distance children from their parents. I go to bed and wake up thinking about the same thing, my kids.this is what living a nightmare is.one that you don’t wake up from and realize it was all just a bad dream.
Really? Who are these men? My son’s dad has’nt supported my son, nor his two daughters from another woman. He is 40 years old. Lives with his daddy and gets paid tax free money cash under the table from his little side ” jobs” a jackass of all trades. Never will he even think of seeking to work for a paycheck because he hates the idea of his money being garnished to help support anyone but him. Sorry, Deadbeats pull the plug on your life support theory.
Thank you for posting this! I am in a similar situation.
I’ll spare the details, but my 5-year-old’s father somehow finds a way to stay current on his 8-month-old mortgage, support his non-working wife and their new child while not being able to find work as a house painter for eight months. He got a job just before the child support hearing he requested in June to make it look like he is making an effort in front of the Magistrate. He, then quit his new “legitimate” job the following day. Unfortunately for our little family, this is his pattern.
I could write a detailed saga of laughable child support laws and their impotence when it comes to enforcement but it would be pointless. Additionally, I barely have the time and energy to continue the struggle to pay for child care so that I might work and support my daughter while raising her pretty much entirely alone. (I would LOVE to see some of that parenting time the father spent so much money and effort to attain actually happen so that I could get a break from single parentdom). It really isn’t worth the cyberspace though.
I will say that I was surprised at the lack of “deadbeat” comments/stories here. I expected many more. If only it were for a lack of deadbeats….
Thank you for posting this, it’s good to know there are others out there with similar struggles.
Hey June – trust me, there are plenty of women who share these frustrations. Here, however, I urge women to focus their energies on letting go of what they can’t control, i.e. ex husbands, lousy family court laws, and narrow their energies to what you CAN control: building your career and income, being an awesome mom, nurturing friendships and romantic life.
Hang in there. It does get better!
moneystepper what a great quote , thankyou I just sent that to my ex :
‘sometimes there are things in life more important than your own self-importance.’
I use to have so much hate towards my ex husband after he left us high and dry for a new love when I was 8 months pregnant. The hate got stronger when a few months later they had welcomed a new child. they had bought a house, a new car and it seemed like we had never happened. there were times at the store that my card would decline because I thought he would have sent childsupport only to inform me after I had called that he did not get paid yet. At that time I was taking care of both kids and working hard to survive only to be taken back to court because he figured sole custody would be better for him! It was so unfair of him to even think that was an option and anger just got bigger and bigger. I am not saying I was always right but when it came to my kids I have always been there and he could have done the same! Noone told him to have an affair, no one told him it’s ok to have more kids if you can’t support the once you have and no one told him it’s ok to just not call your kids in 3 weeks or cancel yet another spring break with them.These are all decisions he has made and has to live with. I had to learn and accept that this is who he is and that something as precious as our children will never change him!
Divorce is horriable but you are not divorcing your children! How can you as a person just walk away from something so special, so real and so innocent?
This happened to me recently as well…I feel your pain.
Parents,
I am 39 years old, Father of two Beautiful Girls. I Physically abused the Mother, was in Jail a few times, I had problems with Alcohol, Drugs, Violence, Self-Esteem. I believed she never loved me, thought she was always up to something, lying to me, wasn’t faithful. I was so closed off and abusive that I literally destroyed every fabric of my family unit with her. We’ve been separated now for almost 6 years, my Daughters are 4 and 5 and we split time with them. She has them at least 75% of the time these days and for the most part since we separated. As a result of my actions and lack of, she has Primary Residence, Guardianship, Sole-Custody.
I am not going to give this big Heroic speech, but I decided to “man-up” and stop acting like a child, solve my problems, get clean, and get it together and CHANGE. Never did it again.
I for years after the last Jail term seemed a bit too kissy with everyone, like I was too nice, it really did create more problems and distrust, but that’s how rock bottom it was for me. I had no fight left inside me. Still don’t. Always has to be a positive solution. Don’t give up.
I have to completely agree with BOB and TOM. But I will state before I proceed that both Men and Women are capable of being the exact same way, depending on the “person” or “personality”. The statistics DO NOT lie. The statistics do seem to favor the Women in both Canada and the US and probably elsewhere. This is true. Very frustrating to one Sex.
Men are naturally viewed as the more dominant and aggressive “sex” through history and especially when it comes to violence or abuse, trust me “I know”, and now neglect. At least that’s the statistical evidence or seemingly blunt view that is generally perceived by the public. Which as other men have stated in this BLOG that they feel defeated by, or used by the system with minimal gains and so “What’s the point?”. It’s really easy to become defeated by the person telling you to give everything, but offers nothing. I also know what that feels like.
The problem is the Family Court System. Lawyers need to make money and Judges need to be Justified. Right? So this whole perpetual motion of a malfunctioning wheel of pain seems to be what is causing families so much terror. The Kids in most cases are helpless to this. So what is the solution to a situation seeking success? Cut out the courts. Agree to disagree. Resolve things if and where possible by being HUMANE about things and putting your own sexist comments, disputes, negative thoughts aside and re-focus on the original reason the Children were created, out of Love and Concern for one another.
I am in pain tonight because as I wrote this, clear and clean of drugs, sober of mind, happy of heart excited to see my babies and she only packed two nights worth of clothing after telling me that she still doesn’t trust me after all these years and yet finds another excuse to shave time, or limit my time with them. There is literally nothing I can do now, but take her to court.
Because I am a Father that can’t afford hefty child support, barely is able to make his parent portion at Daycare, and has had a rocky history, but Absolutely lives for and loves his two Daughters. All I can do now is fight for them.
SO….
If a parent doesn’t want to be in their children’s lives, then they don’t deserve too.
Does life end at child support? Nope. Should one pay more than the other? Never.
Are the family courts broken? Absolutely, Absolute Power Corrupts.
Is there more fighting then resolve in the world today? Ya know it! FOCUS.
Do Men deserve the same statistics as Women? Wait you mean Equal Rights? Maybe women will help us this time around, maybe things will change.
Finally.. is the child (or children) happy? Go make sure!
Scott.
wow ur fight is commendable and ur vulnerability admirable keep fighting the good fight and be glad you were given the opportunity to see the error of your ways for have you not your children would have suffered and you never would have grown as a man or father…..little bit by little it will get better and you can rest well with urself knowing you gave it all u got and to their little hearts thats means a whole lot
Hi! I stumbled onto this page after going on Google and typing “fathers who don’t see their kids because the mother is too difficult”. This of course is the excuse my ex doesn’t see our children. I’m 29 and a first time mom, I had twins 3 months ago. Anyone could tell you kids were at the bottom of a long list of things I wanted to do. I am quite honest about my deplorable selfish behavior at times and I thought I could never get over myself enough to give a child the attention I know they need. Thankfully when my boy and girl were born every second since then has been willingly devoted to them.
My ex has 3 other kids with an ex wife and he makes a big effort to see them and pick them up every week. While I was pregnant my ex promised that even if we didn’t stay together he would be there for them no matter what, this unfortunately was an empty promise. We broke up in my 8th month when he cheated on me with his ex wife, I sucked it up swallowed all my feelings about it and gave birth to the twins 3 weeks early. When he did show up at the hospital it was a day later and he stayed all of 2 minutes before telling me he was going to go out drinking with his friends to celebrate the birth of our children. Needless to say these type of situations have progressed and he has spent no more then 2 hours collectively with them since they were born. We didn’t speak for the last month, until I had some news about my health. I have had 2 surgeries during which I had to imagine what would happen to my little ones if anything happened to me. This was the driving force to reconnect with him and see where we fell on a list of priorities. He has since made 2 attempts to spend time with the babies but each time he was a no show.
The last time I spoke to him a few days ago he was supposed to call and come by to see them but he called after 10pm and proceeded to say he didn’t call or show up because I’m too difficult to be around. I’m still upset about things that apparently he has never sat and considered and when he does call I do go into a tirade usually about him flaking off his visit or the fact that he hasn’t helped with diapers or formula…ever! We got into a very hurtful exchange at the end of which he propositioned me for sex. He couldn’t come by and see the babies that day but he can call later that night and try to come over when they are asleep. After I hung up on him he has not called back since.
I’m so upset it’s hard to stop obsessing, Am I being too difficult I mean yeah nobody would want to call someone who is always pissed off and in fight mode, but he has never once held himself accountable as a father to my kids. he picks up his other 3 every weekend and he can’t spare an hour for my baby twins? Then I start thinking it must be my fault there’s something wrong with me I’ve done something to cause this and now my kids will never have an active dad. Then I think. no I told him in the beginning this was terrifying to me and my father was never around I didn’t want that for my kids. It really messed me up that my dad had another family he was with and never was there for me. it’s a terrible thing to take on the responsibility that I may have ruined things for my children because I couldn’t keep my mouth shut and stop nagging. Or will they respect me for demanding better for them and not allowing someone who doesn’t care about them forced on them? I don’t know and I’m so mad and hurt don’t want it to be about me it’s got to be about them but where do I draw the line? I’m so angry and confused I just want to give my kids the best shot at a happy life.
Wow…. I say this with emotion and tearful eyes because I I’m going through the same thing with the father of my two boys and went through the same with my own father. I constantly question my actions, my thoughts, my words.
I’ve given my boys father many many chances to be there and now that I’m truly done, I’m the bad person, selfish one. From time to time I question if I should change and yet give him another chance, perhaps I’m the one that with my nagging is pushing him away. But NO, I must understand and keep in mind that I have done what I think is best for my children. As for my dad, trust me I went theouythe same thing. I always prayed that my children did not go through what I went through. At one point I recall all asking my children’s father to not do to my sons what my dad did to me; forget about me, focus on his other family….. sadly it is all happening again. I’ve learned that I can’t keep focusing on what his not doing, I now focus on what I can do to better myself as a mother and a mother only. Good luck , blessing do you and your little ones
While I can sympathize with Tom to some extent, it should be noted that the data themselves don’t lie, our interpretation of what they mean can vary. Women may be getting more support because women in general earn less than men, especially if they took maternity leave or were stay-at-home parents for a long time. You also have to consider the custody arrangement. Mothers usually take more responsibility for child care. After watching my own mother and two girlfriends go through divorce after being stay-at-home mothers for years, I have to point out that being out of the work force for 5 or 10 years often has a devastating effect on the stay-at-home parent’s future earning ability. People who are unemployed for long periods of time have much more trouble getting a job at all, and they’ve lost out on years of possible promotions and experience and retirement savings during the years when they are young and energetic enough to achieve them. Many face the terrifying prospect of living in poverty, not only for themselves but for their children, too, no matter how hard they are willing to work. Most, but not all, fathers don’t take responsibility for even close to 50% of child care following divorce, even if they did while married, which is unlikely. That means that even if the parent in this situation lands a job, it’s a serious challenge to keep it when she is frequently missing work when the kids are sick or have dentist, doctor, or other appointments. One of my divorced friends missed two weeks of work when her 3 kids got sick one after the other and her ex refused to take the kids even though he only works several days a month, and then she had to take unpaid leave and put her job at risk when she or they got sick again later. Fathers and the courts don’t seem to count the cost of all of the child care that a non-custodial parent gets from the custodial parent when they calculate child support and alimony, either. Try calculating the cost of paying for basic child care for three kids for all of the hours your ex takes care of the them, including medical appointments, parent-teacher conferences, etc., if you don’t go to them. Even if you consider that she should take responsibility for half of the child care, the cost would be substantial, and you would pay even more for nurse care for sick children. Imagine going to work the next day after staying up all night cleaning up vomit, too. I personally know of several cases where fathers told the mothers they didn’t want custody and wouldn’t fight for it, but only if the mothers agreed to forego child support. They all gave in because it made them sick to think that someone like that could get even partial custody of their child. I think treating a child like nothing more than a financial liability is worse than treating a man like an ATM. To many “fathers,” a wife is just someone they can use like an unpaid servant and child care worker so they can advance their own careers. They act like the work of being a parent is nothing and without value, and yet they can’t seem to do it themselves. Many women who take most of the responsibility for child care need child support and alimony just to get by. They’re not living the lifestyles of the rich and famous, and it’s only fair that they share in the proceeds of the career their ex was only able to achieve because their spouse took on nearly all of the work of running the home and caring for the kids. And please remember that leaving your ex in poverty affects your children even after they are grown. They might end up eventually paying the bills that she can’t. I hope you’re not really going to tell younger family members not to have kids. Imagine for one minute how it would make your kids feel if they heard you said that. Please don’t let your bitterness add to their pain. Finally, I want to dropkick any fathers who say they don’t call their kids because they have nothing to say. Maybe your kids have something to say; it’s not all about you.
And when the dad leaves poof just like that and abandons his child, and instead, has more children with someone new. My ex spent months convincing me to have a child then disappears. Talk about livid. My child is beautiful and perfect in every way and truly deserved better. My life has grown difficult beyond measure, and we both suffer over that low life’s choice.
I’m sorry to hear of you challenges, Cynthia. But I hear a lot in your comments that you have willingly given away your power — HE convinced YOU to have a baby. YOU are struggling because of HIM. You are an educated person. You can find a way with your child. But first you must retire your anger for him,and funnel that energy into building a positive life for you and your young, beautiful family.