Father's Issues

Yelling from the Rooftops: Not All Divorced Dads Are Bad Guys!

by cmac

Today I was once again confronted by a persistent and disturbing stereotype. A woman was told of a man who had an infant son with his current wife and a teenage daughter from his first marriage who didn't speak to him. Upon hearing the story, the woman immediately assumed that the man had cheated on his first wife with his much younger second wife and that there was a good reason that his daughter didn't speak to him. These assumptions made by other people make many of us second wives despair.

I hope that most people really don't suspect that every man in a second marriage "ditched" his wife of twenty years for a younger woman. But I fear that may not be the case. Yet there are thousands of people in second marriages who work extremely hard each day – perhaps harder than spouses in first marriages – to communicate with their children and create a healthy marriage and family. We do them a disservice when we label them with stereotypes.

So I ask you, the next time you meet a person in his or her second marriage, don't draw any conclusions. Remember:

1. With more and more women in the workplace, more women are initiating divorces. Do not assume that the husband "left" the marriage just because he was generous enough to allow his former wife to keep their marital home.
   
   
2. If a man in a second marriage is married to a woman who is younger, do not assume she is a homewrecker. I know many younger second wives who met their husbands years after their husbands' respective divorces.
   
   
3. A man who pays attention to his second wife is not somehow treating his first wife "like garbage." He is divorced from his first wife. As long as he fulfills the obligations of the order of dissolution and treats his former spouse with civility, he is not morally obligated to take her out to dinner once a week.
   
   
4. Just because a child of a divorced parent may have a poor relationship with his or her noncustodial father, it does not mean that it is the man who made a mess of his "first" family or ruined the relationship with his child. For all anyone knows, it was the wife who ended the marriage and then steadily pursued a campaign of alienating her child from his or her father (which, as a custodial parent, she was in a unique position to do). In any case, few divorces are solely the fault of one party. And sometimes children (especially teenagers) have strained relationships with a parent, divorced or not.

So the next time you hear a story of divorce, stop and ask yourself if it is possible that the person telling the story might be biased. Stop and ask yourself if you are passing judgment without knowing all of the facts. And please keep an open mind.

"cmac" is a former Cafe moderator. She a second wife, stepmom of three, and mom of one adorable baby.

Members only: Talk about it at the cafe!