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writes: A chap posted a question about his 15 y/o daughter who rejected him after his divorce. I was completely taken aback at the vitriol of the first couple of responders, who basically said “what did you expect you bastard.” I posted an answer that was, I thought, way more compassionate. “Hey, Dad’s human and fallible and too bad your parents’ marriage broke up but he still loves you …” And felt damned good about that post, and reveled in it for a couple of hours.What completely caught me off guard was my response later that same day to a 20-something girl who complained that her 40-some b/f’s teenage kids hated her. I told her that she was smoking something if she thought his kids could stand to be in a room with her.It hit me that I seemed to be taking opposite sides of the same question.I wasn’t. Not really. But the vitriol that went to the first guy, that seemed so unreasonable, I realized I was turning on the second poster, the ‘other woman’.And that made me think about how my answers, my ‘advice’ as it were, comes so much from my own conflicted experience. And how my ‘compassion’ can seem to turn on a dime.My parents divorced after 30 years. I could write a book about it, but the bottom line was that it had become a terribly bad marriage and it needed to end. I was maybe 12 at the time; I didn’t know Dad had someone else to go to. And maybe I didn’t fully understand that Mom really drove him out, and that he’d have left regardless.On my first trip to see my Dad after he left, I met ‘the other woman’, who was all of a year older than my oldest sister. I wasn’t impressed.I was left living with my mother, who could be most easily be described as a basket case for quite some time after Dad left. And I was left to try to put the pieces together.Dad and his new young thing were totally in love, and to my adolescent eyes completely gross about it. But he didn’t have custody – my visits to him every month or so were special, the rules were relaxed, and it was often damned fun. I’d really wanted to be grown-up anyway, and on those visits we drank, we laughed, and it was frankly an exhilarating time.And then I went home to my weeping mother.I understand that my Dad had to leave, for his own sanity. And I give him credit for staying in touch, for letting me know that I was and remained important to him.I give my Mom immense credit for eventually pulling herself together and making an independent life for herself, at 50, for the first time and at a time when it was still unusual for women to do so.My first thought about those women who posted in response to that poor bugger was they seriously lacked compassion. That after all the girl was 15, and at that age we’ve all got to ‘suck it up, buttercup.’ And I don’t think that’s completely wrong.But when I saw what I wrote to the 20-something, I realized there was more to it. Ya, Dad left because he had to. Ya, I thought I was sucking it up when I was 12, 13, whatever. But 30+ years later evidently there are still some issues.
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reader, anonymous, writes (11 September 2009): old guy, i am fairly new here but i do enjoy your input. I have noticed that sometimes in the course of a few hours there will be a post from a female telling some story and i feel like, oh, poor gal...treated so cold. Then soon afterward a post comes from a male who tells an identical story from the other point of view...and i think,poor guy! Lol... i often wonder if both parties have posted from a single relationship, and we tell them both that they have been done wrong! Lol i enjoy the answers and there is some very good advice given.
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reader, anonymous, writes (14 June 2009): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThanks, SY, for the compliment!
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reader, anonymous, writes (14 June 2009): You're a very good writer and you provide very good insite. I like your answers and your article. I'm not victim of divorce, luckily. If you write an informative article then i would love to use it to reference people with these problems, as i often do with Satindesire's article and people asking about virginity. When did we become friends? Because i went to add you, and you were already there.. i had reciprocated when i thought i was adding.. it was confusing. ~SY.
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reader, anonymous, writes (19 April 2009): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionTo anon Apr. 17.
You didn't provide any details, so I'm left with my assumptions about who you are and where you come from.
I won't dispute that most men in these situation are like my father -- that they leave older, fatter wives for younger, thinner women, and that they don't tend to try to take the kids with them.
I *will* dispute that I'm my father, and that I responded that way. My conflict was because I had been child in that situation, and that I *resented* what my father had done, leaving my mother for the younger woman. And I responded that way, to the younger woman, in sympathy with the children who were caught up in the situation -- that someone seemingly impossibly young could try to take on the role of a mother.
I have to laugh at the assertion that I'm going to do what my father did. I'm the one who got fat. If anyone is going to move on to an adventure with some young thing, it's my wife, who can still fit in to her wedding dress after 20+ years.
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reader, anonymous, writes (17 April 2009): O.k why do men wait till a women has had his children got fat, lost her looks then leave and move onto a younger women. They paint these values and ideals to their children for years and eventually throw it all in the pan to live life again. How come they never take the kids with them, no they are too busy with the younger women who won't put up with his children.Every women eventually pulls herself together. OMG your mother was 50 I guess he didn't want her to find someone else thats why he left it so late.
Children natuarally get angry but most come around if the parent is persistant. The 15yr old could forgive her father and when it comes to her this thing happening when a man leaves her....because it does come around. Some young girls think of this before it happens to them. He should not have been whining, he has his new life, he can't have his cake and eat it. You as a man feel more sympathy for your father because you are your father. You realise at your age how easy it is that a man would want another women and now you understand that because every now and again you have those urges. If you haven't already acted upon them you will. No wonder your sympathetic.
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reader, anonymous, writes (28 March 2009): Your article was very impressive and true! One thing we need to remember is that We are all human! We all have the same goals...Getting through this complicated thing, we call our life! And advisers we do let our own experiences come through and effect how we feel about the questions! But to be an effective and helpful "Aunt" we need to posess compasion for every questioner...which of course, we don't always do, because we all have our own baggage! So all we can do is the best we are capable of! Thank you for your insight! I have also found myself taking opposite sides of the fence! I wil try to remember to have equal compassion and caring for all questioners. After all, if they are writing in to this site...they all need help!
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