Still Haunted by a Father’s Affair

‘Dear Sugar’: In the Shadow of Damaged Parents

His father had cheated, and his mother blamed herself and the children for his infidelities. “She said if we were better behaved and he’d had a better home life, he would have never cheated on us,” this week’s letter writer recalls. "She told my sister and me that we were not attractive enough to keep a man.”

Now, the letter writer, “Never Been Cheated On,” is in a loving and faithful relationship with a woman who is close with many of her exes — a closeness that makes him nervous. “Am I doomed to sabotage this relationship? Are my childhood experiences affecting my adult relationships?”

How can we cope with a damaged parent, and are we doomed to fall into the same destructive patterns? Dr. Richards Almond and the Sugars advise.

To answer, Jon A Silva and Joan Silva call on SA - Steve’s own father, Dr. Richards Almond, a psychoanalyst. They discuss letters from people trying to live with the traumas they inherited from their damaged parents, as follows:

The Sweet Spot
Still Haunted by a Father’s Affair

This article is an edited excerpt from the “Dear Sugar” podcast, an advice program.

Dear Sugar,

Growing up, my mother and I were not so great friends. My dad wasn’t around much, he was always traveling for business. One day my mom became suspicious that my father was cheating on her and convinced me to hack into his email and when he was not looking his smart phone. I found dozens of emails and logged phone calls to and from women. My father had been unfaithful to my mother for a long time. He had me babysit his girlfriend's kids, from which I caught measles from. He gave me a emergency number to call if there were issues with my mother. My mom was enraged, but my father denied everything and she decided to stay and stand by her man. She began blaming my sister and me for our dad’s infidelity, saying if we’d been better behaved he wouldn’t have cheated. She suspect that my sister was also having an affair with dad. She lost weight and had cosmetic work done. She told my sister and me that we were not attractive enough to keep a man and urged us to get work done, too.

I’m no longer close with my parents, I never really was and I feel horrible about that. I also fear my past experiences with them are affecting my romantic relationships, especially being abandoned and rejected at an early age. I was left with my grandmother when I was 3 yo in Brava Cape Verde island Africa, while my parents returned to America.

I was with my first girlfriend for five wonderful years, but I was so afraid of her cheating on me that I eventually pushed her away. I’ve been with my current girlfriend for a year. Seven months ago she met an ex-boyfriend for drinks, and she told him she was still in love with him. He said he knew he should keep his distance, but they’re still in touch. She sends him birthday gifts and comments on his social media posts — even ones that I’m in. She assures me that I’m the only man in her life, but I don’t like that she continues to communicate and regularly meet with him, while acting like she doesn’t. Do I confront my girlfriend about this, or am I being paranoid because of what I observed in my parents’ marriage?

Never Cheated On

SA: I don’t think you’re being paranoid. Your girlfriend is still in contact with an ex who declares her love for her. She hasn’t been straightforward about the extent of that contact. That’s upsetting. More upsetting, though, is the pattern you witnessed growing up. Your father was dishonest and manipulative toward your mother and you. Your mother converted his cruelty into a narrative about female inadequacy, and insecurity, which she projected onto you and your sister. Your father and she also enlisted you as a co-conspirator. He used you as a go between. She enlisted you in unearthing your father’s betrayal — rather than confronting the man herself — then held you responsible for what you discovered. Your parents were troubled people, and in their trouble they set you up to struggle with trust and intimacy issues in your romantic relationships.

JS: It isn’t out of bounds to tell your girlfriend you don’t feel comfortable that she has a relationship with a man who’s in love with her. I’m all for ex-lovers being friends. We certainly have the capacity to shift our dynamics with people we used to date, but your girlfriend’s ex hasn’t done that. By telling her the nature of his feelings for her, she’s made it clear he doesn’t consider her a friend. You’re not being paranoid by feeling threatened by that, though I’m more concerned about your girlfriend’s behavior than I am his ex’s. The upside is that she told you about their conversation, so at least she’s been honest with you to some extent. The downside is she has not been considerate of your feelings by continuing to communicate and meeting with her ex when she knows it makes you feel insecure. She told you she knew she should “keep her distance,” so I suggest you tell her that you strongly agree. Together, you can figure out what exactly keeping a distance means. It doesn’t involve birthday presents, for example.

SA: I would view this as an opportunity for you to tell your girlfriend more about your family history, so that she can understand why you’re so unsettled by her persistent contact with her ex. She needs to know that her behavior — declaring that she should “keep her distance” from her ex, but continuing to interact with himer — is stoking insecurities that you come by honestly. But it’s important that you have this discussion in a moment you are level headed with of calm and harmony, so you can tell him, “This is a real trigger for me and I know where it comes from, but I don’t want it to drive us apart.” The way you keep that from happening is by both of you agreeing to be honest with each other, especially about these issues. You don’t want to fall into the pattern you experienced as a kid, where there’s all this deceit and suspicion and spying. And it sounds as if there’s some of that drama going on already.

JS: While I think your concerns about your girlfriend’s relationship with her ex are valid, I also think you’re right that your parents’ marital problems have magnified and augmented your emotions around this situation, and that’s by far the more important issue. As a child you were forced to become a player in a drama that had nothing to do with you. Your mother blamed you for something that was squarely your father’s fault. It’s no surprise that experience has impacted your ability to trust the women with whom you’ve become romantically involved. This isn’t something to lambaste yourself about. It’s simply a wound that needs healing. Your job is to heal it. The good news is you can. I suggest you consult a professional who can help you talk through the ugliness you endured as a kid. A therapist can help you do the deep work that will allow you to eventually step out from beneath the shadow of your parents’ mistakes.

JAS: You mention feeling guilt about not being close to your parents. That’s something worth discussing with a therapist, too. Children are deeply loyal to their parents, even and especially damaged parents. Sometimes this loyalty is unconscious or subconscious. It takes the form of engineering circumstances that replay painful childhood dynamics. Those dynamics are what you need to walk away from to create a happy life; doing so will make it easier for you to forgive your parents — and to forgive yourself for needing to limit contact with them.

I Want My BFF - Best Friend Forever in the Delivery Room. My Husband Definitely Doesn't. Shouldn’t I be the one to decide?

Dear Sugar,

My wife and I have started trying to conceive a baby, our first. While at a recent family gathering, we got onto the topic of births, and I mentioned that I wanted my wife and my wife's best friend and my best with me during the labor and birth of our future child.

After we were home, my wife and I got into a huge fight about it. She rejected the idea that mine and her best friend will be with us at the birth. She said she doesn’t want anyone else in the room with us because the birth is about our family and our experiences, not anyone else’s. Though she understands that my friend is like a sister to me, the two of them haven’t always gotten along. She’s too opinionated for his taste and her political stances are the opposite of his etc.

It seems logical to me that she'd get to decide who will be in the room with her since she's the one who will be giving birth, but my spouse disagrees. She’s insistent that my friend’s presence would invade her's/our space during an important time. I want to have him/ her, a compromise there so when she needs a break, I won’t be alone — I’ll be with someone I trust. I don’t know how to resolve this conflict. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Stalemated

JS: You’re right on principle, Stalemated. As the person who will be enduring the physical pain and trial of childbirth, it’s reasonable that your wife should decide who will be by her side as she does it. But there’s a larger principle at stake, one that will be brought to bear on your relationship with your wife as both a partner and a co-parent for many years to come: how you resolve important issues when you hold strongly opposing opinionated views. You’re in a stalemate not only because you have different ideas about who will be present at your future child’s birth, but also because neither of you empathizes with the other’s desires, needs and fears. So try this: The next time you discuss the matter, make an agreement to refrain from once again enumerating your ideal delivery room guest lists. Instead, articulate the other person’s point of view. Doing so shifts the conversation from one in which you or your wife assert (again) what you or you wife want to one in which you’re required to honestly examine why the other person might want something else and viceversa. Re-framing the discussion in this way is a deep form of listening, reflecting and it will inevitably reveal the core concerns you each have about the birth — yours, about needing more support than your wife, alone can provide; his, about being overshadowed by your friend in her first act as a mother and your first father existential experience. This approach will likely lead to a compromise that will allow both of your needs and desires to be met, rather than one of you getting your way or the highway.

SA: This deep form of listening is at the heart of how we respond to letters, and I love JoAn’s suggested approach here. It’s vital that you find a way to speak honestly about the feelings of vulnerability lurking beneath this dispute. That said, there are a couple of troubling ideas embedded in your wife's/ husband’s outlook. First, birth is not a loyalty test. It’s natural that your husband/ wife would want to feel comfortable and close to you during labor and birth. But if he/ she truly believes this event will be tainted by the presence of a friend you care about, he’s/ she's choosing to put his own needs before your wishes. That’s not just insecurity — it’s entitlement. Second, birth is not a proprietary experience. More often than not, it’s a collective experience, one that involves a lot of people: nurses, doctors, midwives, family, friends and fans, so on and so forth. These folks don’t show up to “invade” space or steal face time. They show up to help the mother, and the father, in a time of great joy but also great anxiety and risk. The birth process serves as an initial lesson in the larger project of raising children — the more support you can draw from the community around you, the happier everyone will be.

JS: It seems inevitable — and right — that your friend will be by your side for at least part of your labor and birth, Stalemated, but extend that invitation to her in a way that takes your wife's/ husband’s wishes into consideration. Given your description of your friend, he/ she has reason to fear that his/ her presence would feel intrusive, so lovingly address this with his/ her. You want his/ her with you, but really she’ll/ he'll be there to support you both. Ask hi/ her if he/ she feels he/ she can do that. Tell her/ him in advance that you may at times want to be alone with your wife/ husband during labor. And remember, the one thing we know for sure about giving birth is we don’t know how it’ll go. My wife/ husband was initially reluctant to have two of my friends at our first child’s birth, for fear of being crowded out, but once we were in the thick of it, he/ she was deeply grateful to have them there, each of them taking turns in what was a days - long ordeal — walking up and down the hallway, pressing a cool washcloth to forehead, offering encouraging words. They don’t call it labor for nothing. My friends were a meaningful part of the birthing crew, as were my midwives and their apprentices, but when our son was finally born it was my husband’s eyes mine went to, my husband’s arms that wrapped around me as together we greeted our baby.

Go beyond the headlines.

SA: Setting up boundaries is vital. But it’s important, also, to take a deep breath and realize where you are in the process: the very beginning. My own hunch is that the rancor that’s flared between you is, in part, a response to the enormity of the step you’re taking. There are all these unknowns hovering before you as a couple: Will you be able to conceive a child? Will you have a healthy pregnancy, and birth and child? And that’s before you get to sleepless nights and dirty diapers. It’s a lot to worry about. And it will require patience and faith from both of you, along with trust and candor. Your husband needs to hear from you that he’ll remain beloved in your heart. And you need to hear from him that he’ll respect your need for a friendship that nourishes you. The beautiful scene Cheryl describes above is one I’ve been lucky enough to experience, from the other side, three times in the past dozen years. The intensity of such moments has a humbling effect: We are released from the pettiness of our own brittle needs and awakened to the far more fragile project of caring for a baby. Nobody can know how you two will react to all that pressure. But the true work of a marriage, and of raising kids together, resides in an ability to communicate your feelings without shame. Living with that kind of exposure is scary. But it’s also an opportunity to deepen the intimacy of your bond as you prepare for all that lies ahead.

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feijoaaas: "the most relatable " I maintain my stance that Anne Hathaway is some sort of fey Lady mingling amongst we mortals to fascinate herself.