I'm going there.

You don't see your kid. Ever. You don't spend Christmas with her. Or Thanksgiving. Or Easter. Or Fourth of July. You don't see her on her birthday. You can't possibly talk about her and her new baby. 

Doesn't that behavior raise a red flag in your new life? Doesn't she think you're an asshole for abandoning your kid?

I'm guessing you've crafted some story about how horrible Cass is and how Kati just hasn't been the same since they got together. Maybe you tell her how they froze you out or how they have been just awful toward you, so your exile is warranted. 

Here's the truth, my love. 

Your daughter is struggling. Hard. 

You abandoned her and she knows it. She doesn't trust your words, your promises that you'll show up. She is hurt so deeply that you are ignoring her beautiful baby and don't seem to want to be part of this really wonderful part of her life. 

But here's the thing. Your daughter knows that this version of you isn't the real you. Like I do, she knows the core of you that loves her. She knows who you really are. She knows you're a dad who has always loved her. Always protected her. Always believed in her. 

She wants to love you, but right now she's afraid to. She's afraid you'll hurt her again. 

And she's feeling alone, too. All alone. Her mom is a psychopath and now her dad is gone. 

If your new life, your choice, your reality means you have to be away from her (away from her in heart, not just distance), it's not the right choice, Jim. And you know that. 

I'm guessing you justify this in some way by saying that you screwed up so badly and are so worthless, that she is better off without you. 

That's not true. She will never be better off without you. 

I know that you might not have had the best example of great parenting with your dad. I also know that you made it a point to do better than he did. You made her life better than the one you were given. You handled a very difficult situation, a Deaf kid born to very young parents, better than many would have. You taught her to say I love you and you gave her time. Lots and lots of time. 

Time in the combine . Time on the river bank. Time at bike races. Time at basketball games. Time at sleepovers. Time with Reba and Blue. Time. 

She could care less if you lost a business. She could give a rip whether you're rich, poor, tall, short, fat, skinny, bearded, clean-shaven, a truck driver or a ditch digger. 

You can't get this time back. 

She needs you. 

That feeling you have where you're not sure of your worth? The one that comes from your dad never quite putting you first. The one that has you always trying to measure up and always feeling like you fall short? The one where the ground under your feet is not entirely stable and you're not sure if you can trust yourself? 

You're creating that same scenario for her right now. 





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

You should have been there.

This past Saturday was Zoe's wedding in Neenah.  I went up early on Friday to help with the last-minute stuff that surrounds events like this. You remember how it goes ... eerily similar to our trek to Phoenix when Lynda got married. Errands to run, drama to damper and divert, smiles to interject ... just trying to make this sort of high-pressure thing happens with as little chaos as possible.  There honestly wasn't much to do on Friday. Lynda and Deb had it all pretty well under control. The hotel was just a block off the main drag in Neenah, so after running a couple of errands, Rob, Lynda and I walked to a local spot for dinner as everyone else headed toward the rehearsal activities.  Sitting in that bar, full of its Friday night crowd, it was hard to not think about what you'd have ordered or if you'd have thought it was too loud. We talked about Dylan's upcoming wedding and Kati's adventures in mom-hood. Our threesome was missing a piece. You should have be...
Read more

Are you OK?

I think you're not. Maybe I need to believe that for any of this to make sense.  If you had just walked away from me, I think I could get my head around it.  But you walked away from everyone and everything that ever mattered in your life. You left with two saddles, a red duffle bag, some tools, a few deer mounts, a turkey, some guns, and the clothes on your back.  I guess you didn't arrive in my life with much more than that.  But you walked away from your daughter.  Who does that?  Please get some help ... before this eats you up from the inside out or before you do this to someone else. 
Read more

Big balls.

You know how sometimes things that seem very different from each other really aren't?  For instance, love and hate seem like opposite ends of the spectrum, but in reality, they're two sides of the same coin. You have to really care about someone to love them or hate them. There's passion involved with both.  The reality is that the opposite of love is indifference. No feeling at all.  I wonder if courage and coward are like that.  You literally started living with another woman, in another state, moved with her three times, started a totally new existence and did not tell a single soul where you were. You lied to everyone you knew. (Except for the brief period in NC when you told me about the grading company.) For all practcial purposes, you disappeared totally and fell off the face of the earth, while building a totally new life in complete hiding.  You either have the biggest balls of anyone I know or you are the biggest coward I have ever met. Or maybe it's a...
Read more