Interesting
So dh sent a heartfelt letter to his daughter in reply to her hostile phone call and hangup.. This was last week. No response..no meaningful relationship in years .She left this weekend for her semester abroad and dh called me this afternoon, stymied because he got a text from his ex telling him that daughter had arrived safely at her destination. He was scratching his head as to why notify him at all? Especially in light of all the recent wars. Especially because they are assuming he gives a shit, which he does. It seems that what I have observed is that when major troubles go down, ex notifies him. I think this has nothing to do with the daughters, but is indicative of dh and ex relationship. He was HER father figure. She was terribly abusive to him and he took it. I guess she just thinks she is special, entitled, and no matter what crap they toss at him, he doesn't waiver in how he cares about them..
Dh does not let go. I asked
Dh does not let go. I asked him today why he did not end the conversation last week in which she clearly was abusive. His answer.. "Because I still have hope...I was reaching for a better outcome." I told him that he just allows abuse......he never ever demands respect. He gets crumbs tossed at him, like today.. When you think about, clearly his daughter quickly notified her mother upon her arrival.......she couldn't do the same for him, hell.....she hasn't seen him in over a year. She just takes his money......
So honestly, what nerve the ex has..........they are special .......
So sad and hard to stand
So sad and hard to stand by I bet. the only thing to do is not discuss her and try to live the best life you can. I try to do that for the most part but problems do arise.
Wish I had an answer for you and for myself.
Hugs.
If he were here I would tell
If he were here I would tell him that by constantly going back he is playing right into the mental power play that's being played.
Daddy there is only one way to break this up and that is to withdraw from the playing field. Completely and absolutely - no calls - hell no cards, no gifts, no messages via third parties. Block both of them from any social sites you may have such as Facebook and absolutely emails. Yes both of these people as if you were starting a new life in the wilds of Africa or Asia.
Eventually - perhaps years the girl will get in touch. Most likely after she is married and decides she wants a complete family picture but it could be anytime after a few years has passed. You must persevere in your strength and never make any attempts for this to work.
You see when you stop playing the game you remove ALL the power from them. Now helpless on the playing field she must make some sort of advance to get you back into the game. You must make that on your terms and very slowly. No anger, no recriminations, no questions are to be asked or accepted from her when the day comes. You have then demonstrated that you can walk away and never come back and can do it again on the slightest whim. Once she understands that she will come to accept you as an equal - not as a peon to be kicked around.
Until you start acting like a man you will not be treated as one and a man only take so much bullshit then he walks away.
Unless you like being a martyr. I'm serious - some people like that role "Oh look at pitiful me - pay me attention and treat me special". If you enjoy that status then leave things as they are with you texting, calling, carding and presenting gifts - whatever it is you're currently doing.
Newmodel when your husband seems truly down about his relationship - maybe he is now - give him this advise and remind him that at this point he has little to lose and emphasize that it may take years - even a decade - before she sees the light.
Yes I've been there and done that - successfully.
O C.......right on! But he
O C.......right on! But he is incapable of doing this. He will not shut the door, so he is left with people who engage in mind games and they hold all the cards. And oh yeah they are victims of his somehow. Forget all their aggression, past and present. I told dh that they operate at a different radio frequency than most......they live a fantasy world where they beat him to a pulp one day, then ask him the next why he just can not move forward? It has become so predictable.
The sentence that jumped out
The sentence that jumped out at me was this: He was HER father figure...
I wonder if there is something to it.
Hmm... this is really interesting. I am glad you brought it up, NAI. My DH has just sent a letter to OSD that has a mention of something similar. He pretty much told her that the post-Xmas rant she dispatched to him was abusive, and that he would not engage in an abisuve relationship with anyone, BTDT. Then he pointed out that the OSD is running a very real risk of turning into the same ball-buster ( he used a different term) as her mother and maternal grandmother. They have both tried to annihilate the men they were married to. Fire-breathing dragons have nothing on them. BM was a closeted lesbian for the first 45 years of her life, and DH suspects that her mother might have been one as well. So the hatred of men runs very deep in their family culture and possibly broader, ethnic, culture. Railing against DH on behalf of the skids, is the BM actually also railing against her late father? All men? Their phallic symbols?
Yes PS.......dh totally
Yes PS.......dh totally agrees he was his ex's father figure. I even saw an old Xmas card "to father". From the ex! Lol!! And that was years ago.. His ex comes from a divorced family in which the mother was and is " the best" and father was maligned and discarded. His ex had NO relationship with her own father, other than to use him to make repairs at her home.
Ex is not a lesbian. Ex and her daughters are very seductive in dress........they live way above their means.
So dh sees a pattern........whenever ex gets nervous, she reaches out to him, like today. Sees no reason why he would not be pacing the floors waiting to hear princess arrived safely.. Just like princess expresses anger that daddy has not visited her at her fancy college.......well look at what you have done to your father, why would he show up to a place a day's drive away? She can't even pick up the phone when he calls the past year..
So the pattern was set in
So the pattern was set in BM's childhood, and the alientation now spans generations, in your SDs' family of origin. My skids's BM also hails from a family where "the father was maligned and discarded". It becomes so much easier to malign and discard the husband then, so that the next generation goes through the same damaging experience. Repetition complusion.. no relationship with the father, no use for one with the husband. I bet the SDs ( yours and mine) will pick up the baton and pass it on. I can just see OSD laying into her husband 20 years from now and "protecting" his children from him, assuring them that he is toxic. She is practicing for a lifetime of dysfunction. Seems like there is really no progress.
And these women are great at
And these women are great at picking good kind men! But men who are not savvy themselves.. Interestingly , all the ex's sisters and herself got themselves pregnant prior to marriage, they set the traps.....and reeled them in.. All very attractive perfectly coiffed females strangely endowed with big boobs!! Lol......( kind of like Darwinian selection)??
So I look forward to the day we can unhook the money train. I know that they will always continue to be a prescence in dh's life because he just can not bring himself to shutting the door, if even for a moment. He just will not reject them, not seeing he is rejecting their awful behavior and setting much needed boundaries.
Your DH is a classic abuse
Your DH is a classic abuse victim. He keeps tucking his tail between his legs and crawling back for his next beating. Just like an abused dog that crawls back to its abusive owner because that is what it knows.
Time for DH to cut the X and the daughter loose, grow some confidence and some sack and establish his criteria for how he will be treated and wait for the toxic women to crawl back to him for their behavioral beating and clarity of how he will be treated or they are not welcome in his life under any circumstance.
End of problem, beginning of a new life.
There is a thin line between hope and stupidity when it comes to tolerance of abusive relationships and abusive behavior.
IMHO of course.
He just doesn't see his
He just doesn't see his behavior as problematic. It has been a life long affliction, born into a family of many children, and his father was a workaholic........and my dh was a middle child who never really was a child. Always working, always helping out. He does not see his behavior as a curse, which I see it as.
He has known his ex most of his life and this was their relationship from the very beginning. What person do you know who would date a college freshman at another college, pay for everything, and accept her dating others once she gets on campus? And my dh was a college senior at the time!!
No.......I do not believe he is capable of shutting the door. He runs at the crumbs......
What bothers me is that from time to time he tosses out comments that he believes I am in competition with his daughter because I tell him not to accept the crumbs. I do not even deny or comment any longer....he just can't see the obvious.
Has he ever tried therapy? He
Has he ever tried therapy? He could use it for himself, you know. He is ready to accept being treated badly way too eagerly.
He needs healthy relationships with his daughters, not just any relationships.
He does not believe in any
He does not believe in any therapy. He feels that it is pointless to respond to their accusations and would view such a thing as being defensive. He views anger as a waste of time and just does not respond to all the abuse. He ignores it for the most part such that it is standard behavior.. Maybe it has evolved as to that is how they get his attention?
I will never forget 4 years ago, the last time I saw his daughter. There had been a verbal argument in the driveway, daughter and ex drove off in a rage. Half hour goes by........phone rings I answer.....it was his daughter, who calmly said hello to me and asked for her father. Within an instant of him taking phone.....she became hysterical, screaming and he never said a word......
......and he calmly put phone in his pocket with her screaming, and he carried on his work outside in the garden!!
This is what I have observed. They do things that would have driven other men to physical violence against themselves, and he calmly ignores it all.. Lol