When telling many stories, from sad to tragicomic, about divorces and affairs, we usually unwittingly put ourselves in the place of one of the adult participants in the events. We actually go through these tough situations with them. At the same time nearly forgetting that it's often not adults who suffer the most.
Yes, if ex-spouses have children, and the divorce itself is very painful, then it is the kids who usually take the heaviest blow. This is what happened, for example, with the daughter of the user u/Expert_Permission_37, whose story we're about to tell you today.
More info: Reddit
The author of the post caught his wife having an affair 9 years ago, and she took her own life during the divorce
Image credits: SAULO LEITE (not the actual photo)
The woman's parents meanwhile poisoned his teen daughter against him, badmouthing the dad heavily
Image credits: u/Expert_Permission_37
Image credits: Monstera Production (not the actual photo)
So, after a year of struggling with this, the guy let the daughter live with her grandparents and moved to Canada
Image credits: u/Expert_Permission_37
Image credits: George Chambers (not the actual photo)
However, 8 years later, it turned out that the daughter realized her grandparents had lied about the dad, and cut all ties with them
Image credits: u/Expert_Permission_37
Now, the 22-year-old woman is going to attend the author's dad's funeral and the man himself is in two minds about mending things with her
So, meet the Original Poster (OP), a 49-year-old man who 9 years ago caught his wife cheating, and in the process of divorcing, the woman also took her own life. She left behind a 13-year-old daughter - and everything that happened around her parents greatly influenced the girl’s psyche.
According to the author himself, the parents of his ex-wife regularly turned the girl against her father, with disdaining outright lies. The result was that the daughter literally hated the dad, gave him constant tantrums, escaped from home more than once... After a year of such a life, the author gave up and let the girl live with her grandparents.
So it turned out that a year after the death of her mom, the girl cut all ties with the dad, and he, being in a terrible mental state, left for Canada. As the author himself says, "To rebuild his life." However, over the eight years that have passed since then, apparently, the OP has not been very successful in this, because, as he himself admits, “he’s still in the bad place.”
And so, recently the OP's brother got in touch with him, telling him the sad news about the passing of their father. Moreover, it turned out that the author’s daughter, who is now 22 years old, eventually realized that her grandparents were lying to her when they badmouthed her dad.
Now she has already cut contact with them and tried to mend things with her uncle and another grandpa. True, they did not give her father’s contact information, fearing for his mental state (and, according to the original poster, their fears were not in vain). And now she will definitely attend the OP's father's funeral.
But the original poster is not sure if, after all these years, he is ready to establish a relationship with his now adult daughter. He has too many painful memories associated with all this. So the author decided to ask people online for their opinions on what would be best for him to do here?
Image credits: Liza Summer (not the actual photo)
“Of course, this man can be understood - his world actually collapsed overnight, and he experienced a lot of pain also because his daughter wanted nothing to do with him,” says Irina Matveeva, a psychologist and certified NLP specialist, whom Bored Panda asked for a comment here. “At the same time, he should not forget that his daughter suffered much more stress at this time.”
“Thirteen years is a rather difficult age in any family, but here this girl was also affected by the loss of her mother, and her grandparents, who in every possible way turned her against her dad. And then he left, unwittingly confirming all the negative words that were said about him. This, it seems to me, was also a big mistake of this man."
“However, now the circumstances have changed - and it would still be worth trying to mend things with the daughter. After all, now she is already an adult, and not that confused, devastated teenager who avoided communication with her dad. In the end, if the daughter had made the right conclusions for herself, then she definitely deserves to have at least one parent in her life,” Irina summarizes.
As for the people in the comments to the original post, not one of them advised the author to continue self-isolating from his daughter. Moreover, the opinions of responders were divided from criticism of the father for being faint-hearted eight years ago and not continuing to fight for his child, to encouraging advice to reconcile with her.
"Your daughter is not the one at fault. She was a child. Her grandparents were at fault. She figured that out. She cut contact with them. She's making amends," one of the commenters expresses the general opinion of the people there. "Consider that before writing her off for things that had to do with her being used by her grandparents."
"You were also accountable to be her parent during this time and you gave up - maybe for valid reasons of grief and hurt. But again, none of that was your child's fault. Therapy is an option if you aren't already," the same person concludes wisely. And what would you, our dear readers, recommend to the original poster?
People in the comments mainly urged the man to reconcile with his daughter, claiming that she wasn't guilty of her grandparents' words
