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She is 12. Visitation has been discontinued. His response was to pack up her belongings and drop them on my porch. She is angry. We were never allowed to express emotions with the AH lived with us so expressing any emotion is overwhelming at best.
My daughter does know he's an addict and of course she loves him anyways but she is having such trouble figuring out how she is going to have a relationship with him and where she fits into his life. She can't go visit due to the addiction and using. He won't show up at alternate venues sober - even for an hour - because as far as he is concerned it's MY way of controlling him. He can't or won't acknowledge that his behavior is damaging for our child. He won't answer his phone if it's my number - though I NEVER call him, don't now and told him it's the only number she can call him from. She's mad she can't see him, she's mad he won't pick up the phone and on some level she understands that his dropping off her belongings means he isn't fighting to see her either.
She intellectually gets that he is a sick addict. Emotionally she is a wreck.
It is heartbreaking.
I will continue to be there and I'm glad for therapy for her. She is really refusing to deal with the addiction and anger so Alateen is out of the question for now. Just getting her to open up to the therapist is difficult (it didn't help that he pushed against therapy for her for months either.) I know this is going to shake out eventually but after speaking with her therapist today I just have a heavy heart for her.
It sucks seeing your child hurting and knowing that you are powerless to do anything about it. Just needed to share that today. I don't want to dwell on it because it is my birthday and I want to go home early and spend some nice time with my daughter and just not be sad or angry for a few hours...
I am still working on teaching my kids the well worn truth that we cannot make someone be something we want them to be. We have to meet them where they are. Right now the ball is in his court, if he can get enough clarity to be sober to see her, then the opportunity will come. If he won't, then we have to accept that.
I think Al-Anon and Al-Ateen meetings would be very good right now for both of you if not already in process.
Writing may be a way. She can write him letters, she can use these to learn detachment, how to write him without the agenda of discussing his addiction, stick to other things, and if he wants to write back he can. That was just a first thought.
Right now my exH is requesting 1-2 hour public meetings by taking my boys to dinner/lunch. I'm giving it a try, he's apparently sober and living in a sober environment after a recent move. My kids will tell me if he's not and that will be that.
Working with kids - I know that they mature and change so rapidly. Just 1 year in the life of a child is huge. Her tune may totally change from age 12 to 13. By next year, she might actually be telling you "Omg mom, thank you for stopping those visits with dad! Love you!" Your daughter is going to be 18 in another 6 years. It will be her task then to negotiate what kind of relationship she has with her dad. So....in the big scheme of things, it's going to be her issue and not yours. Your task now would involve helping her learn how to negotiate relationships and protect herself from harm...negative influences. First things first - You are working on teaching her that drugs and illegal behaviors are dangerous and to not be near those things. That actually takes priority over her having a relationship with her father right now (due to the fact that he's exposing her to these things). Later on, when she knows how to better protect herself and when that is her responsibility, so be it.
She also has a much higher genetic risk of becoming a substance abuser/alcoholic. Being cautious and the lessons you teach her about substance abuse are critical and also more important than the relationship with her dad at the moment.
Provided his addiction doesn't maim or kill him, he will be around when she is 18. You can just do your best to help her be the grounded young adult she will need to be to negotiate having an addict for a father and all the other things that go with starting out her young life when she reaches that age.
A 12-year-old is always going to say "I hate you mom!" (or some version of that if not outright) for whenever they don't get what they want. Imagine the completion of that sentence as "I hate you mom because dad is not here to absorb my negative feelings and you are and I hate you because I'm only just 12 and starting to learn that life is messy and I have to make the best of bad situations when they occur."
When you focus on the deep issues...the spiritual issues (which will include the lessons, values, and morals you have from your HP and those that you are trying to impart on your daughter as a parent), I believe it takes some of the sting out of her teenage attitude and also the fact that her dad is such a screw up. You are doing good things. You are trying to raise a morally sound, well adjusted child. Focus on that, pray, see the good and you will ideally be less overwhelmed by the negativity in all this.
As I said, I work with foster kids daily and when you have been discussing your daughter, 1 particular case of mine keeps coming to mind. An 11 (now 13 year old) girl that I have had on my caseload for 2 years now. Both her parents are addicts/alcoholics. Her father is worse than her mother and her mother is getting sober now and following her case plan. Anyhow, this girl has gone from having both parents on a pedestal and getting very defensive when anyone said anything negative about them (dad included), to then at age 12 starting to say " I hate my dad. He doesn't want a relationship with me cuz he won't get sober. My dad is messed up. He can't have a relationships with me. because he's an alcoholic" and also "I want to be better than that when I grow up." Now at 13, she is not so blazingly angry. She takes periodic calls from him and is kind of like "whatever." She doesn't trust anything her dad says but knows he cares as much as his sickness will allow. All that happened in 2 years - and this is a girl in foster care without a stable mom like you. From the way she used to spout off how great her dad was, to then how awful, and now being able to just be detached and sort of know him for what he is...it's amazing.....and kind of baffling cuz I don't know how exactly or why all those changes in her occurred in her.
So, instead of thinking what her relationships are like now, try focusing on what she might be learning ABOUT relationships. The biggest danger for a girl with an alcoholic dad is that she will learn it's okay to put up with men being alcoholics and addicts and not responsible and reliable and that she can caretake for men rather than having relationships with upstanding and independent men. Already she sounds like she is leaning towards caretaking cuz she knows he's an alcoholic/addict and thinks she can still visit him and take care of both herself and him. The girl I mentioned above learned detachment through many broken promises, anger, sadness, and pain regarding her dad - but she did learn it.
-- Edited by pinkchip on Friday 18th of January 2013 09:43:08 AM
