1. My kids still speak to me, but not much. I’m better than I was, but I was a crap parent. Poverty was part of it. Hooking up with the wrong men, just to have a little more income, or not to pay for child care. Bed chemical decisions. I got myself cleaned up, got out of debt, got rid of the guy who was harassing my boy, and acting like the girl (our kid together ) could do no wrong.
My parents were atrocious, and I really thought I was much better. Actually, I was much better, but I wasn’t enough better. It was hard for me to show love because I never experienced it myself. There were times i didn’t hear from my boy for years, and honestly, I know I deserved that. I wrote him a long letter, apologized for my faults, and honestly have tried to be better. We have a much better relationship now, and while we are not super close, we have something, and I’m grateful.
2. Father to the daughter that cut off contact with her mother, my wife, here. Mother is (still) a narcissist, emotionally and mentally abused the kids until they moved out one by one. Mother also a functioning alcoholic.
The daughter (moved to a different state) cut off all contact with her mother, vowed to never let her see the grandchildren. Mother spent months raging, trying weak apologies, saying things like, "I’m sorry you’re upset." and "You need to grow past what happened." and (to me) "She is stuck in the past."
Daughter and I are very close, I facetime with the grandbabies regularly, and visit on holidays.
3. My 22 Yr old son is currently not speaking to me and I relate to what you’re saying here 100%. It only happened recently but I’ve still sent him a few messages, which he ignores. I know I messed up, I’ve held my hands up to every fault and apologised profusely for not being a better parent.
I chose the wrong relationship when he was younger and had a mental breakdown of my own, i tried to make sure it didnt affect him, but ultimately that was naive of me, of course it did. I love him and just want him to be happy. If that means he has to have space away from me then I can accept that, I understand and only want to respect his wishes. I am a better person than I used to be but just couldn’t get better enough, quick enough. I really hope this is a temporary thing, I miss him terribly.
4. My daughter and I were estranged for 18 months. It.was.hell.
It was also all my fault. I had crossed a boundary and god bless her, she called me on it and told me to go fuck myself. I was incensed! How dare she!
Well she dare because she was right. And I had to go introspective and work on me. She reached out 18 months later and we have been in touch now and have a SOLID relationship.
It is a communicative relationship. Understanding and just being compassionate to each other.
5. 100% my fault, or to be fair 95%. While breaking up with my high school girlfriend, after realizing there was something wrong with her and us, of course, she got pregnant. The breakup was precipitated by her sleeping around, so there was a real question of whether my daughter would be mine.
She was.
I moved back to my podunk hometown, and tried to be a good father. Ex-girlfriend, was looking for a boyfriend/husband, I was not willing to do this. She quickly got pregnant two more times, moving up the economic ladder with every pregnancy. The last guy to get her pregnant owned the country club, so her financial needs were met, but she really didn’t have a man in her life yet. Through the multitude of boyfriends and lovers, I tried to be a father to my daughter, but I was constantly shut out. When I looked at going to court to have court-ordered visitation, I was told by my ex-girlfriend that I would be accused of abuse if I did so. This was not an idle threat.
So I left, and did not do nearly enough to keep in contact with my daughter. She did not like me because of my absence, and because of constantly hearing from her mother, what a piece of shit I was. Again, I chose to leave. I was an adult she was a child, but I was fairly immature and did not see any way out. 25 years later I’m still not sure what I could’ve done differently.
I email my daughter every month or two and she emails me back every year or so. This failure is the great regret of my life.
6. Father of three adult daughters here. I’ll give the situation as it exists now then try to explain how/why it got there.
— Oldest had completely cut me out of her life. We were always distant, even when she was younger, but it got much worse as she got into her 20s. We didn’t speak for years. She is now 33 and we occasionally message when she initiates the convo. The coldest has thawed some but it is still delicate.
— Middle girl is my carbon copy and we had a good relationship when she was younger. When she hit late-teens we drifted apart. Now she is 28 with four kids, only the oldest of which I’ve ever met. Not allowed to see the others. We rarely if ever message each other.
— Youngest daughter treated me like I walked on water. Did so until just a couple of years ago. Recently (just a week or so ago) she informed me she no longer wants any contact with me.
As for the how/why part, I was raised in a single parent home. My mother did her best to provide for our needs but she was cold and distant. No hugs. Any event in school I was automatically blamed before she had any details. If it was proven I was innocent, she would brush off her previous accusation by claiming she was sure I probably did something anyway. Lots more I can add here. Some of it too sensitive to share even in an anonymous board.
I hated the way she was and vowed I would do things differently when/if I had children. Well, I had children. While I did attempt to change my behaviors from what I’d experienced, I slowly added my own ingredients to this soup.
Essentially, I ran our home as a military installation. My girls were quickly and harshly disciplined for even the most minor of offenses. While there were occasional spankings when they were little, the discipline evolved into very binary (go / no go) rules. For instance, you are expected to get this minimum score on a test at school or you can’t go to your friend’s house on the weekend. You didn’t make that grade, you were not going. If you cried and begged and pleaded, you were still not going but now I would restrict / remove some other thing you wanted for not accepting your fate. And so on.
When they did things that were good, I would more or less dismiss this as me not rewarding them for what they should have done anyway.
Basically, they couldn’t win.
I believed at the time that I was building strong girls into strong women. It feels as though I’ve done the exact opposite.
On the rare occasions I do hear from them, and the subject of the past comes up (this is very rare) I get the "I don’t hate you but I don’t want you in my life." speech. It’s deserved but that doesn’t lessen the sting.
My hope for the future is, as they grow older, time passing will allow them to be more comfortable around me. As they are all adults now, my desire to control them as I did when they were kids is gone. I simply want an adult-child/parent relationship. I guess I haven’t earned that right, but I still hope for it one day.
7. My daughter hasn’t spoken to much in the last 2 years. She’ll come to family (her grandparents aunts/uncles/cousins), but only replies to anything I say with one or two word answers.
I wish I could say I don’t know why. But I do. Her mom said she feels I put her second after her mom and divorced. I keep trying to rebuild that bridge. Hopefully in time.
The take away is this. It doesn’t matter how you perceive things, it’s how your child does. Don’t ever let them doubt how you feel about them.
8. I am one of those Moms who always felt that providing for my kids, taking them on vacations, buying them what they needed was enough, didn’t realize love and nurturing were essential ingredients. Now my daughter is 28 and cannot hold a job, emotionally insecure, depressed and blaming me for her failures. She made me realize ( and therapy helped ) that how my actions, behavior might make a child feel they are not valued or loved. I am remorseful and regretting all my actions but unfortunately cannot undo the damage caused.
9. I was an asshole, shitty parent and an alcoholic. He stood over me during an argument when he was 18 (he was 6’4 and I am 5’6) and scared the shit out of me, so I kicked him out. That was 14 years ago and he hasn’t spoken to me since.
I have not been able to apologise, to show him how much I have changed for the better, nor how different I am with his younger brothers (also adults now, teenagers at the time). I miss him every single day, however, it’s his choice and I have to live with that. Thankfully his brothers and I have a wonderful relationship, it took a lot of hard work, and tears, but I am so grateful they are a huge part of my life, along with two grandchildren now.
10. 2 of my 3 don’t talk to me. I stayed with their abusive father, and they hate me for not protecting them by leaving. There’s soo much more to this, but that’s what it all boils down to. It was of course unintentional, and I thought I was doing the "right" thing. I took a lot from him to protect them, but if I could go back, I’d love myself enough to show them what a strong mother looks like and get us all out. That would have been the right way to protect them.
11. My daughter doesn’t talk to me as much anymore.
She moved out when she was 22. I had psychosis episodes for 5 yrs all of a sudden (no history of mental illness like that, just your old run of the mill anxiety and depression) and after her having severe mental issues dealing with the aftermath of a tragedy, I got the mental issues and I had to be hospitalized for suicide attempts. It traumatized her.
I understand why she pulled away, even if it was for something I couldn’t help, and I don’t blame her. My last attempt was in Nov, so I hope with time we will be able to be close again. I text her every few days to tell her that I love her, and she responds in kind. We text about life a few times every few months, but we used to be best friends before the tragedy that upended her life and then mine. It altered the course of our lives.
12. My oldest son replied to me three years ago that yes, he’s still alive, and that having felt happiness for the first time in his life just wanted to be left alone.
I grieve him every day. I grieve for his childhood that I didn’t know how to protect or encourage. I desperately sought love and acceptance from anywhere, while dragging my children with me. I take full responsibility and do not excuse any of the shitty choices I made. All that time, my daily living was in fight or flight mode and I wanted so badly for my kids to be immune to hurt from the world. Instead I taught them to stuff big feelings way down and not show weakness. I showed them that I degraded myself to prop up relationships with people who didn’t care about me and for sure didn’t care about my kids.
But man, at the time I felt such fierce, painful love for these children to protect them and somehow fucked right up just in different ways. I promised I wouldn’t reach out to him again, all I truly want is his happiness and peace, and I will always answer his call if he changes his mind. I would do anything at all in this world to fix this for him.
13. I am/was a terrible parent. I rarely spent anytime with my children. I deserve my children not speaking with me.
14. I accept responsibility for anything that led to the estrangement. I wish I had sought treatment for my untreated mental illness earlier. I love my children to pieces and miss them so badly it hurts. I hope one day they can forgive me
15. My son went NC with me because he feels that it’s best for his personal growth and his peace of mind not to be around people who behave badly or have negative attitudes or dysfunctional ways of relating to each other, and yes, those things have been true of me. I believe that he and I may have differences in our sense of proportion, but it’s really only his perspective that matters because it’s his happiness at stake.
I don’t want to be the reason that his life feels any more fucked up than it already is.
It makes me sad in a way that I can’t even express. I can’t change the past. I was trying so hard to change the present. Now it feels like the light has gone out of my life. It’s so fucked up to know that the best thing you can do for the person you love the best, is to leave them alone.
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