Should I let my dad meet my daughter? (Long read!)

In My Humble Opinion
21

Thanks again to everyone replying!

My husband is the most wonderful, patient and loving person I could ever hope for. I was pretty messed up when we met as teenagers, and he has helped me to form my self-esteem and work through a number of issues I’ve been dealing with my whole life.

He tells me again and again that it’s really up to me to make this decision because I’m the one struggling with this problem. He can see both sides of the issue and only stipulates that he will not leave our daughter alone with my dad.

As for my mom, she also had her hand in being abusive toward me as I was growing up. Surprisingly, when I graduated from high school I told her about how her actions affected me and she actually apologized! She tries to be more constructive about her comments to me and apologizes when I tell her that she hurts my feelings. That’s why I want to try to please her, she’s made such great strides toward our relationship and I want to keep our relationship a positive one.

My brother is not emotionally expressive (shocking, no?) and prefers to do anything to keep the drama to a minimum. But when push comes to shove, he will protect me if need be.

An important note, the last time my mom asked me to bring my daughter to their house and meet my dad, I laid it out for her. I told my mom that I’m my daughter’s mother. If my dad cares enough to see his granddaughter, then he needs to talk to me directly and ask permission. He can’t wuss out and go around me to see her, he needs to confront me first. I haven’t received any phone calls or emails from him.

Thank you Aspidistra, Snnipe 70E and Sage Rat for sharing your experiences with your toxic family members. It is helping me to round out my opinion on this matter.

I’m swinging between “of course not, he shouldn’t meet her, he was abusive to me!” and “but it would only be a short visit and I can take her away if he starts up”.

At this point I usually think “but why should I allow him to be a grandpa when he obviously doesn’t want to be a dad?” Then I feel selfish and petty.

Orange Skinner, you have brought up the best argument that I have ever heard. When I take away the guilt and family obligation, I honestly can’t say that anything good would come of my dad meeting my daughter. When I presented your questions to my husband, he slowly nodded and said he couldn’t think of any realistically positive outcomes either. The fact that my dad hasn’t reached out to me is speaking volumes about how he feels about our relationship so why would he be a better person for my daughter?

I’m tired of wrestling with this. My daughter is almost 2 and a half years old and I want her to enjoy the grandparents who are putting in the effort and show that they care. I don’t want to bring needless drama into her life. But even when reading through all of your arguments against the meeting, I can’t shake myself of these doubts.

22

Not Asian, but have known several very well, and have an idea of the social framework.

My best idea: since your mother is so stubborn in her desire to have a ‘model family’, she will still be hounding you.
Ignore her pleas to keep up appearances (Chinese: ‘Big Face’) until she has the news that dad is dying.
Let him meet his granddaughter at the end of his life - but very little before that time.
You get closure, the cycle is complete - but you don’t run the risk of his harming your daughter.

My Father was also a vicious asshole. Only his children attended his funeral.
If I could remember the location and it wasn’t that far, I’d drain a kidney on the grave.
That kind of ‘mean drunk’.

23

You seem to be spinning him on one level as some big existential threat to your happiness and on the other hand after you told him you wanted nothing to do with him around 2007 he backed off and disengaged from you as you wished, and now you’re putting it on him that’s he’s never called or emailed you?

He’s in poor health so it’s not like he’s going out of his way to bother you or interact with you at this point. I get that he was a huge asshole but on the other hand the bills got paid and you got a college education.

Realistically this seems like an utterly absurd fear. You are an adult and are 100% in control of his access to yourself and your daughter, and he is an old man in poor health who does not seem particularly inclined to engage with you. If you want to punish him retroactively for being an asshole to you when you growing up by withholding the grandkid do so, but don’t make up silly reasons for it.

24

If my dad continued to ignore me and my family, I’d be fine with that. I wish it were that easy.

It’s the fact that he ignored all of the big milestones in my life, even refusing to visit me in the hospital or talk to me after I had emergency surgery for my appendicitis, and yet he asks my mom to bring my daughter to him so he can see her.

In my mind, if you want to be a grandpa, you have to be a dad too. You can’t ignore your daughter and start fresh and enjoy your granddaughter like you haven’t a care in the world. We both had a hand in this estrangement. But if you’ve ignored your kid for 8 years, how can you expect your kid to allow you to see your granddaughter? Especially when you’re not asking your kid directly?

I’m trying to honestly work through these lifelong problems that I have with my dad. I hope you understand that.

25

Maybe there’s a subtext here I’m not getting but it seems he is doing exactly as you asked since 2007 and staying away from you and anything to do with you a desire which you indicated you made very clear, but this is now his fault for not reaching out?

Honestly, you are injecting way too much unnecessary drama into this scenario and I’m beginning to see why you two are at loggerheads. If you let him see the kid he’ll see the kid and that will be that and everyone goes home. If you want to be an injustice collector have at it, but in the end we sometimes have to acknowledge that our parents may well have been jerks, but life goes on. If you intend to use refusing even limited access to the grandkid as a cudgel for his past assholism own it and move on.

26

My take on moving past:
“Shitty childhood, turn the page”.

It’s over - you are now the one to choose your life’s direction. He can’t hurt you unless you let him.
And, as long as you are alive, you are your daughter’s mother - you can control the who, what, where.

27

I addressed your question in post #24.

You can’t ignore your own daughter and then expect to be able to see your granddaughter. As a parent, it’s my job to look out for my daughter and be protective of her mental and emotional state. It upsets me that my dad who was supposed to do that for me did the exact opposite. And he won’t even be mature about it and talk to me directly about meeting my daughter, he would rather try to have my mom bring her to him. That’s not ok.

I am trying to address this issue within myself and try to understand why it makes me upset and how to handle the situation. I am not trying to be an “injustice collector” as you would put it. I think the problem is your inability to see how complex this situation is for me and how our toxic relationship is causing me to be weary of any possibility of us being able to work any type of relationship.

In Asian cultures, family is everything and you are always looking out for the whole. In my case, I am unable to overlook my dad’s abusive treatment to keep things copacetic with my family. I refused to allow myself to be treated in that horrible manner and I am being given a hard time by my mom and my brother for not sucking it up and taking it for the team. I’m not going to model that type of behavior for my daughter.

There is a lot of gray area in life and I think this is firmly gray, some people are seeing this in very black and white terms. Because this affects a number of areas of my life, I cannot make a black or white decision, at least at this time. For now, I am only surrounding myself with positive people because that’s the type of environment I want for my daughter. To say that my childhood was chaotic would be putting it mildly and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

Thank you to everyone who have validated that this is a difficult situation and have provided constructive suggestions.

28

I’m married into a never-a-dull-moment-with-loads-of-drama huge extended mainland Chinese family. My two cents FWIW:

  1. Grandparents can (not guaranteed but realistically can) morph from absolute evil into almost model grandparents. Weird. Fucking uncanny and unsettling to be honest.
  2. I would never ever let my daughter be alone with how you describe your father
  3. Grandpa needs to man up and reach out directly to you and then be prepared to take whatever conditions you lay down. “Tuesday 10:00am for 5 minutes at the Starbucks, and only if I’m in a good mood, my daughter is happy and I feel like it” is perfectly acceptable.
  4. Many Asian cultures have a “grandchild amnesty” clause as in “don’t you want to meet your grandchild?” Kinda like “I haven’t seen you for 20 years since you abandoned us, and you have the goddamn nerve to show up on xmas as if nothing happened” “ya, but it’s Christmas so man up and deal”.
  5. Mom should butt out of this one.

Best of luck, we know it’s hard, and hope whatever you choose works out for the best.

29

Greatgranddaughter, granddaughter and daughter of abusers here…

I can’t tell what would I have done if I’d had children, but I can’t see where we would have missed anything good by missing the spectacle of Great-grandma Laura snarling at her daughter “you are a complete moron”, learning to avoid “provoking” Grandpa’s sexual assaults, or learning that Grandma’s remarks on our many faults had no external triggers. Then again, my aunt’s ups and downs and my mother’s notions that pinches leaving bruises “do not hurt” aren’t exactly something I miss (ok, so my mother cut the pinching once I spelled out that those bruises weren’t from the kiss of the wind - but she shouldn’t have caused them in the first place!).

If my brother had even less contact with that side of the family than he does, he’d have all my backing for it. As is, he’s been very careful to watch how Mom (the only one of the bunch that’s physically close to them) interacts with his kids, and has never left them alone with any of the others. She’s a lot better grandma than mother, but she’s so poisonous that she can’t completely avoid spitting green.

30

My wife had a best friend growing up who was Asian. Her parents were similar although not so harsh as what you describe. My wife said going over to their house was kind of scary since you were afraid to raise your voice and everything was spotless and perfect. Everything was based around work and achievement. My wife said she never saw her father smile let alone laugh and he seldom showed any kind of love or affection. Her friend grew up and (gasp) married a musician. You see in their circle music is something you do for enrichment or fun, not to do as a living! She later went on to have 6 kids.

But I have heard he got over this. Both grandparents have learned to loosen up and accept a little chaos. They had to if they wanted to ever see their grandkids. Now we see pictures of Grandpa down on all 4’s with a couple of kids on his back giving pony rides. That is quite an accomplishment considering in their Asian culture grandfathers are supposed to be these honored people who sit quietly and kids should be in submission around them.

However I dont think this change would have happened if her friend had not been strong and laid out the ground rules. She doesnt allow any criticism of her husband, their semi-bohemian lifestyle, or their wild kids.

31

I also grew up in an abusive household. My father was physically abusive as well as mentally and emotionally, and sexually toward my sisters. He’s dead so I don’t have to worry about him any longer.

My other brother sexually abused both my younger brother and me, as well as some other children. I confronted him a number of years back, gave him a chance to apologize. He really didn’t take responsibility for it or give a meaningful apology. After pressing him for one, his words literally were that “I am sorry that bad things happened to you.” I told him to fuck off and never contact me again. Naturally, I would never allow him anywhere near my kids.

I’m sure that it would be a little harder with my father, were he still alive, but I would have never permitted unsupervised visits.

My uncle was more like your father, with less physical abuse than what my father was capable of, but he still messed up his kids’ lives with the emotional and mental abuse. Some of my cousins simply banned him from their children’s lives, others let the be contact and were surprised that he was a better grandfather than a father. However, some of the cousins couldn’t allow it because of the emotional turmoil it caused them.

I know that there is a hell of a lot more guilt in Asian countries than in the West. However, you first need to take care of yourself. It’s not a little thing which you are worrying over. No one here, or anywhere, can really tell you the answer. It really is up to you.

I wouldn’t worry too much about the loss of her grandfather in your daughter’s life. Sure, ideally we would like to provide more loving people for our children, but it can’t be at the cost of severe distress to you. That would be worse for your daughter.

If you feel like it’s necessary, keeping him out of her and your lives is not the worst thing in the world. Don’t worry about your mother and the guilt. Asian mothers live off that. You aren’t a bad daughter if you don’t cave into her games.

Although you didn’t say anything about this, did you have much of a reaction to your daughter’s birth? I don’t really know how to phrase this right, but with me, I was surprised at the emotions which were raised up when we had our daughter. I don’t know what I would have done if he had still been alive and wanted to meet her. Parents feel so protective, and here would have been a clear and present danger. I don’t think I could have handled it, even had my father turned out to be the sweetest grandfather around.

Also, don’t worry about people who tell you to suck up to your father because he paid college. People who haven’t grown up in hell don’t know what it’s like. Nothing you say can help them understand.

32

Why try to create a relationship between your daughter and someone from whom she must be protected?

33

I can’t help but feel this is more about your mum than your dad. It sounds like mum is the one who is pushing for the ‘family reunion’ so she can pretend she’s got one big happy family.

I only ever had one grandfather (on my dad’s side) and I don’t remember even really questioning it. So I wouldn’t worry that your daughter feels bereft of a grandparent, kids really don’t think that way. It wasn’t until I was a teenager that I really started wondering, and my mum said that he was not a good man and that was enough for me.

If your mum wasn’t pushing you, would you feel at all inclined to reach out to your dad?

34

Toxic people surround themselves with enablers who will do their damndest to convince you that you do not have the right to walk away from a relationship with them. Do not fall for this. You know nothing positive can come out of this relationship. Don’t expose your daughter to your abuser.

35

Beat me to it, although my version was more like "WTF is up with your mom?"

Let’s call it what it is: your mom is being emotionally manipulative.

Set your boundaries. Firmly. Next time she brings it up, tell her what those boundaries are. “Mom, it’s not happening. Not ever. I won’t tell you again. Stop asking.”

Then the next time she brings it up: “I told you I’m not having this conversation again.” Then change the subject, hang up the phone, or walk away.

Then the next time, hang up / walk away without a word.

Either she’ll figure it out and stop asking. or you are removing yourself from the issue. Either way it works out for you.

Most importantly, be consistent. If you give her reason to believe wheedling and whining might work on you to get what she wants, she will NEVER stop.

Also, she’ll probably ask why, but she doesn’t actually care about your reasons – she’s just looking for something she can argue you out of so she can argue you into what she wants. Don’t give her that. “Because I said so” is the best answer you can give.

You’re “depriving” her of an emotionally abusive man. HE is depriving her of a grandfather.

Sometimes families look different than the picture postcard. You know what? That’s perfectly okay.

36

I recognise a degree of what I call ‘cosmic guilt’ at work here. Let me explain.

I also grew up in a somewhat emotionally abusive situation. Oldest of three boys. Parents split up when I was six. My mother was emotionally weak and we were always on the edge financially. And my mother used me as her sole emotional support almost from the day my dad left. No, she never hit me or said anything deliberately to hurt me, but being exposed to so much of her emotional pain on a daily basis really took its toll. Anyway, I survived. But everything fell apart when I got married and she refused at accept my wife. My mother and had a big blowup during a visit shortly after we were married and she ended up throwing my wife and myself out of the house. I cut off all contact, and we went through the better part of 15 years with no contact, then a truce, then another blowup, then a truce, etc.

Things are largely OK with my mother now for the last few years, but only since we had our two kids. But we still only skype with my mother once in a month, and might see her in person once a year, if that much. She has not met my youngest daughter yet. I should add that we have lived outside the US for about 15 years, and it just isn’t ‘worth it’ to go through the trouble and expense of visiting her. And it isn’t so much that I am afraid that we will have another fight or that she will say/do something bad with my girls, it’s just that, well, I don’t care that much. There, I said it, I don’t care about my mother.

After all the years of emotional abuse and then the treatment of me and my spouse and cyclical coldwar, I just lost my feelings of love for her. Things are OK now and may stay that way, but I think at some point my heart died. And that is what makes me sad. I want to love my mother, and want to be a good son. But that’s in my head, not my heart. And this lack of true filial love makes me feel very guilty. A son should love his mother, and I don’t really. That’s not the correct way of things. It is cosmically wrong. Thus ‘cosmic guilt’. It doesn’t matter that my mother brought this on herself, it is still wrong.

Perhaps I am a bit messed in the head, but I wonder if you aren’t experiencing the same sort of cosmic guilt with your father. Yes, he was a jerk and deserved everything he got. And yes, it seems that he has accepted you and your daughter not being in his life, but perhaps you still feel this is not the way the universe should be?

Sorry for the new age psychobabble :slight_smile:

37

And I should just add that no one is guilting me to feel this way. My mother seems to be quite resigned to the status quo, as is the rest of my family (who are not that close with her either). And my wife too. And I do not believe that not having a close relationship with their paternal grandmother will have any long-term impact on my girls. But I still feel it is Wrong.

And if I imagine a similar situation happening between my girls and me, it is crushingly painful.

I admit that mine may be a somewhat unique way of viewing things, but this cosmic view of right and wrong is very important for me, even if it isn’t rational. So maybe this is in some way how you feel with your father? I would say that as long as nothing actually negative comes from your or your daughter’s interaction with your father, if the fact that you made the effort makes you feel better at some level, despite all rational reasoning against, then it is OK to allow a carefully-controlled meeting.

38

Are you certain your dad is going to be a hard ass on your daughter as well?

My mother wasn’t abusive to me but she was a total hard ass (she was a VP of a major company and was very comfortable bossing people around.). But when it came to dealing with my son, good lord! She practically gave the kid diabetes!

39

End of a conversation in which a priest had just encouraged me to get away from my mother before she drove me crazier than she is.
Me: “guess this kind of situation is why the commandment is to honor your parents, it doesn’t say to love them or to put up with them.”
Him: “yeah, some parents do manage to strangle love. And if you ask me, sometimes honoring your parents just means being accurate in what names you call them.”

40

I like your priest :smiley: