Well some of you may know this and some of you may not. My daughter has gone to live with my mother. I am not very happy about this and as a parent I miss her very much. This is a rather complicated thing and I’m not really sure what all to say about it all.
Teens push their boundaries and test limits I know this so my daughter is closer to 16 now but is still 15. I have seen her make very good choices and also some pretty dumb ones. Who hasn’t done that as a teenager. She has made more good ones than bad ones and I’m very proud of her for who she is as a person. She really does try not to follow the flock, herd group and remain her own person. Which has in many cases left her standing on the outside because most of her peers aren’t strong enough to go against the group or their friends when they don’t agree with them. Doodle will and has not played along just because and said things which has in some cases placed her on the outside of a group because she won’t just blindly follow along. I am proud of her for that, However I have also seen this make her question if it is worth it or not when the people she thought were her friend abandon her because she stands up for her own principles and doesn’t cave in to peer pressure.
I have also seen the opposite of this where she has given in to peer pressure and done things which I sure she wishes she had not done. I won’t get into those because those are her things to talk about or not to talk about. I’ve tried to be supportive of her in everything she has done right or wrong and to let her know that when she makes mistakes she is still my daughter and I love her regardless of what she did or didn’t do.
It’s a fine line you have to walk as a parent with kids, especially teens. Then in my situation which is by no mean unique in the US that she has parents who don’t live together and one of them who will not cooperate in coparenting from separate households.
Doodle choose not to live with her mother following things her mother said to her which I don’t know she has ever forgiven her. So for two and half years she live with me while her brother went back and forth spending a week with me and a week with her. I encouraged my daughter to attempt to make amends with her mother and she may have at some point. I know had the roles been reversed that her mother, CPG, would not have done the same thing. Does not do the same thing. Her mother still continues to undermine my relationship with my children and thinks of herself first in every situation before the children.
I don’t put my kids first because I have to, I do it because I want to and I see being a father as the most important thing I do every day. Yes I make mistakes I’m not perfect and I never have said that I am nor do I think I’m better than anyone else. However many people accuse me of this including my ex.
While it pains me everyday for my daughter to be living so far away I’m trying to accept that this is something she feels that she needs to do to find out who she will be later in life. I try to find the positive in the situation and there are several.
She is in a new school but has several relatives there and people she has known for a number of years. Even as the new kid in school she knows people and has made friends with a few others. She does experience the new kid things especially as a girl. My daughter is attractive and this is a fathers nightmare, however it is also nightmarish for a teen age girl. Because other teen girls see her as a threat first to “stealing the attention of boys” rather than as a person. Guys do the same thing but not to the extent that girls do this. She is living with a family member who she has always had a close relationship with and has a job. Something I couldn’t encourage her to do here despite numerous efforts.
So there are a lot of good things going on yet I miss her terribly every day. I tell her these things and also still try to encourage her to be her own person. Hard to put that want as a parent to have your children in your lives and letting them explore who they want to be.
To end this on a happier note. I went to she her cheer at a football game this week. Yes she is a cheerleader. Yes I did say she isn’t a follower earlier and she still isn’t one. She is her own person out there on the field in her squad and she is a team player. You can do both. While the others girls are stiff and rehearsed in their movements I see my daughter enjoying herself and being herself in facial expressions and her demeanor. At the end of the game the football team got beat rather soundly too. Well the opposing team’s cheer leaders decided to yell taunts to my daughters squad. Well they responded yelling back in true cheerleader fashion. All the cheerleader are yelling were number one even though the score board clearly states that not so much today. My daughter isn’t yelling we’re number one she is yelling bring it and is throwing out gang signs and grabbing her crotch and being all urban thug to a bunch of Westby god cheerleaders.
Now my daughter isn’t a thug and isn’t in a gang but I think she recognized that the cheerleaders really had nothing to do with the score at the end of the game and wasn’t going to be the dower little girl to taunts
Not my proudest moment as a dad seeing my daughter be all urban thug but not my worst nightmare either because she is her own person and I would like to think I played some role in giving her the courage to do that by always treating her with respect and listening to her.
Anyway that’s my thing for today, I’m home with my son because he isn’t feeling well. I guess all the pirate fighting he has done lately has taken a toll on his little ninja self.
Ciao
