Last updated on 8 December 2020
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I have failed as a father and ruined my children.
I have done so poorly and with such regularity, one could call my shortfall as a parent epic.
Parenting done well is among the most difficult endeavors anyone will encounter. It’s up there with being president of a country, which you could say is a little like parenting a nation, except you have a few more people who refuse to go to bed on time and who need time outs.
To be sure, failure is a regular part of parenting for everyone, not just me. That’s not much comfort. I try my best but still make one mistake after another raising my three daughters and two step-kids. It’s like a science experiment that spans 21 years, with collateral damage and ruined test tubes scattered about.
Parenting is up there with being president of a country, which you could say is a little like parenting a nation, except you have a few more people who refuse to go to bed on time and who need time outs.
As parents we read Brazelton and talk to other parents, even our own, who also failed often and magnificently, looking for the short cuts to perfect children. But a funny thing happens once we get into it. Once they stop being babies and become real people, it’s as if all that knowledge is wiped from our brains. At least it was for me.
When my girls were little, I knew I was going to be one of those dads who broke down barriers, who went against the norm. I was going to be so close to my daughters that every dad would be jealous and every mom would wonder why they married their guy.
When they were babies, I just had to grab a bottle and when they wailed, wrap their fleece blankets and my arms a little tighter around them. I would whisper silly sounds. They would soon be cooing in their blanket cocoons.
I could almost always make them laugh. I’d drop down on the floor as they crawled and make goofy faces and roll around and they would giggle until they fell asleep. When I came home from road trips, they would be in my lap, telling me in their little girl voices all that had happened over the previous couple of days. I felt significant, like a real father. At night I used to wake and go into their rooms and watch them sleep. I’d listen to their soft, rhythmic breathing. And the world would be right.
At night I used to wake and go into their rooms and watch them sleep. I’d listen to their soft, rhythmic breathing. And the world would be right.
Now the parenting territory is like scorched earth. How do I know? My gauge is how my kids behave and how they treat others, including me. My daughters’ difficulties the past couple of years seem symbolic of my inadequacy as a father. I don’t blame their mother, whom my wife reminds me is at least half of the equation. I take blame because, ironically, I believe I am more conscious and aware and therefore have greater culpability.
My oldest daughter hates me. We have barely spoken since she blew up in my house at my now wife and I three years ago. She has had it exceedingly difficult since her mom and I divorced in 2009. She’s lost friendships. She lashes out frequently at schoolmates and her younger sisters. Her mom once broadcast a fight between she and my oldest on FaceTime just so I could see. It was just like watching one of those family breakdown reality shows on TV I despise so much.
My other two don’t have their older sibling’s volatility, but are nevertheless also a challenge. Because we haven’t had the same conflict, I have occasionally mistaken this for an invitation to have one of those cliched daughter-dad talks. You know– school or life or music or, yes, boys. First I get the look, which I consider a victory because they rarely look up from their smartphones. Sometimes I say things just to see if they are listening. If I persist, I usually get a one word answer and then they return to the important stuff on Instagram.
Meanwhile, I retreat, sullen and defeated, with a heart that aches.
Parenting has been one continuous opportunity to mess up. When my daughters needed space, I barged in to talk. When they wanted to talk, I was often distracted or unavailable.
My divorce has only clarified how badly I parent. They live most of the time with their mom, who also hates me by the way, and though it’s only slightly longer than 10 minutes door to door, I might as well live in New Zealand. Sometimes I’ve played hardball and made them stay at my house. That made them miserable. Other times I’ve been advised to “let go of the rope” and let my girls have a say in things. This usually has meant I don’t get to see them.
Sometimes I say things just to see if they are listening. If I persist, I usually get a one word answer and then they return to the important stuff on Instagram.
Now I have two more kids for whom I feel responsibility and whom I’ve come to care about deeply, my step-children. I’m going to stop using the term “step-” because it carries so much baggage. They’re kids. Now, they’re my kids too.
I’ve seen divorced couples who actually make it work. These people set aside their lives and dedicate everything to their kids in the difficult transition of ending a marriage. Which is probably why I have failed so greatly. I used the opportunity excommunicating from my marriage to completely change the way I approach life, including parenting.
In the past couple of years, as I reflected on how things have gone, I felt that I had missed opportunity after opportunity for success and growth. After the divorce, I was like a rubber band stretched to the limit, then sprung the other way. I became obsessed with fixing my past. In the course of moving forward from my former marriage, I have been accused of moving away from my kids. True, I have changed my approach to parenting, trying to be more paternal, a little more distant and less compliant, because I have come to believe my kids need a strong male figure in their lives, not the doormat I once was.
I was like a rubber band stretched to the limit, then sprung the other way. I became obsessed with fixing my past.
When I was a married I was exceedingly needy of my kids. My ego was paper thin. I used my children for validation because, well, I needed it and couldn’t get it from my ex-wife. You might think I’m being too hard on myself, but let’s be honest. Just because we’re adults doesn’t mean we are also mature. I see so many, including my ex-wife, run around with their egos exposed, seeking validation like heroin addicts needing a fix.
Healthy people who look in the mirror and see exactly who and what they are deserve respect. They see the flaws and the good and accept both. As my wife says, healthy people don’t spend a lot of time feeling guilty. They accept the right amount of responsibility for their choices. Not an ounce more.
Healthy people also keep moving forward. I have built a life-long habit of ruminating over my past and it always makes me feel like crap. I indulge in guilt. I accept blame for everything even when I shouldn’t.
My ego was paper thin. I used my children for validation because, well, I needed it and couldn’t get it from my ex-wife.
Now I see how burdensome it is to ask of little hearts and minds. As I try to take a healthier approach to parenting, I seem a stranger to them. They are unsure of me because of this inconsistency between the way I was when I was married to their mom and how I try to be today. Who wouldn’t be a little freaked out?
My intent is honorable. I want my children to be happy. I especially want them to grow into well adjusted adults, prepared to make it though the challenges of life. Intent is good, but it only goes so far. We parents can’t keep honorably messing up our kids and wash our hands of it even if our intentions are good.
I won’t ever stop trying to figure out parenting. I’ll probably keep failing too. Meanwhile, my kids will move toward adulthood and I will mean less to them. Until, that is, they have their own kids and will fail and fail and fail on their own.
Maybe that’s love. Maybe that is parenting. You keep trying and trying even though you epically screw up. What else is there to parenting–and life–but one series of experiments where we mix the ingredients, see the results, and try something new to get different results. Or keep doing the same damn thing and ruin our kids.
Maybe failure is the wrong word. Maybe I’m a moron for expecting parenting to feel good.
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The title of this essay is taken from a song from one of my favorite post-rock bands, Explosions in the Sky. My wife and all my kids don’t like them much, so I listen when they are not around or put on headphones.
Great reading lately, including this post from a new favorite, James Altucher. Here is one he wrote about comedian Louis C.K.’s genius: http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2014/02/louis-ck-and-the-hare-krishnas-used-this-one-trick-for-success/.
Thank you for reading.