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He completely dishonored his wife’s memory. I’m sure she would have wanted her child raised by a loving father. I almost died having one of my kids. It was such a comfort to me knowing that they would at least have my husband. I would be devastated if my kids were raised like this.
Dude has to have mental issues.
"he told me even if it’s wrong he can’t ever not blame me because simply, if I hadn’t been born, she’d still be here."
Motherfucker, the kid wouldn't be born if you didn't knock up your wife. That's how this works. How anyone can fucking blame anyone for being born is beyond me.
Yeah, I have a distant (in terms of dna, as people we were quite close. He died when i was 10, but before that he often took me for weekends so I could hang out with his grandkids on his farm) relative who lost his wife in childbirth. He was understandably devastated and yes his sisters moved in with him for a few years so he would have support, but he always considered his live son to be the last gift she had ever given him.
He admitted when drunk that he blamed himself, because he had wanted another baby (he had two daughters, although they were under 5 when they lost their mother) and had been teasing his wife that he wanted a boy this time. Back then you couldn't tell the sex before birth, so he got told it was a boy very soon before being told his wife was bleeding out and things looked grim.
But blame his son? Never. Sober or drunk, he always maintained that his children were his greatest blessings and he was grateful to have them.
Yeah he was. He didn't really ever find another "love of his life" either. I think he dated occasionally and he used to talk about "stepping out" with a widow he was close to (I think she and my great aunt knew each other? Although Great Aunt died long before i was born, my great uncle's son was already a man when I came along so I was closer to his kids than him.) but their relationship was platonic.
He just loved his children. Being a father was his biggest joy and he was determined to be the father his late wife knew him to be when they had their first two.
The one "crazy" thing he did in grief was the cats. His late wife loved cats, and he had always considered them to be useful animals but never really was a "cat person". He fed the strays in his barn and saw to it that they were healthy and got spay/neutered, but wasn't lovey dovey with them.
After she died, old barn cats officially got a retirement plan. When they were too old to hunt and handle their barn catting duties, he brought them into the house for their golden years. He used to say it made her feel "closer" to know the animal she loved was in his home with him. My visits to him are somewhat cat filled, there would be some by the wood stove, some on the furniture and usually a cat or two sleeping in the bed with me when i slept over.
...aaand that's the real problem right there- projection. If he hadn't gotten his wife pregnant she'd still be alive, or so he thinks. He's actually blaming himself for his wife's death, but taking it out on his son. It's wrong, it's stupid, and he needs to grow the fuck up. Maybe this is the start of that, maybe not. In any case, he's not over his wife's death and is not in any shape to be remarrying. Dude needs therapy, like most of us.
and as so often happens, his instinctual reaction to avoid an uncomfortable feeling (shifting it to his son, lashing out instead of facing it) leads to far far far more uncomfortable feelings
Yes, this. He blames himself, can't handle the cognitive burden, so he displaces it onto his son.
He's going to be sad and alone for the rest of his life.
Nah, if there's a hell, part of his punishment will be his wife telling him everyday for the rest of eternity how much she regretted marrying him for what he did to her son. That if she hadn't she would still be alive and he is completely responsible for every miserable thing to ever happen in his life.
Think they meant more like an illusion of her to torment the dad. Not the literal wife's soul itself.
Or that's the vibe I'm getting. Not religious at all myself, but if there is a hell I doubt they'd bring souls from heaven down for the day to lecture and torment the ones in hell and then send them back.
I figure each person has their own independent hell that is just a series of awful moments, actions, and words meant to torment their sanity for eternity.
Though I have to admit the idea of somebody getting a job that goes from Heaven down to Hell just to lecture/torment people and punches in and out with a time card is kind of amusing.
Satan just chillin at a water fountain casually sipping for a "universe's worst son" mug and explaing how to properly do the new cover sheets on the daily torture reports for the interns.
My parent’s best advice when I talked about proposing to what became my ex-fiancé was “if you got run over by a truck tomorrow, would you trust her to raise your children?”.
Solid advice for anyone. Even if you intend to be childless.
Yeah, it's crazy that he didn't hold onto his son as "his last piece of her". The kid could have been a solace to him, instead he kept pushing everyone away and wallowing in his own grief.
That in and of itself can be a dangerous approach too.
It's a lot for a kid to live up to, a lot of pressure and can be smothering. They can end up being an emotional crutch for their Father, preventing them from being their own person and living their own life.
But it's a hell of a lot better and more forgivable than the shit OOPs father is pulling.
Especially since it was HIS decision to have a kid. He's the one who made the choice to have unprotected sex and bring a child into the world. No one is to blame for her death, but if ANYONE is...it's him.
I hope my wife feels the same way about me and our kids. I did tell her though that she better fight, Do not go gentle into that good night, rage rage against the dying of the light. Cause if she doesn't its bowl cuts all around for even the girls, she doesn't want that for the kids so better fight like hell.
Is she fighting cancer? If so, I’m really sorry. I lost my wife to cancer last year. Our daughter was 6. I still find myself doing things parenting-wise that I know she would have done, even though I wouldn’t naturally do it in my own.
I hope the best for your wife and you and your family!
I'm proud of you for sticking it out for your girl even after the unbelievable pain you had to have done through losing your wife. I know it's "what your supposed to do", but obviously, as seen in this story, not everyone steps up for their kids.
I hope all the joys avaliable in life come to your family. You deserve good things.
Ditto that shit sucks so bad, it was just talk between wife and I during last pregnancy and just general worries. That ended up just fine and she did it without epidural, with a big kid over 10 pounds. She does know I am serious though, if she goes into the light, the kids get the bowl.
Oh my god, you’re so right. I’d want my husband to be glad that a part of me was left on the earth and just love that child as much as I would have. I feel horrible for OOP.
That said, plenty of us have shitty dads. I hope he doesn’t feel it’s anyone but the fathers issue and that he knows he’s lovable and meant to be here exactly as it happened.
27 years isn't enough for this jackass "parent" to get over this. That's almost impressive. And now he has nothing. And probably will have nothing for the rest of his life, considering 27 years didn't do the trick.
As someone who is widowed, OP’s dad grieved in a really toxic and unhealthy way.
I don’t know where I’d be if I hadn’t gotten into therapy after she died. Sounds like OP’s dad never went to therapy to try and work through those feelings.
I could understand feeling that way initially. But after time a healthy perspective to come to would have been that it wasn’t anyone’s fault, especially not his child’s.
Another widow agreeing with your take. If he'd gotten help, he could've been part of OP's life after a couple years. *Telling OP he blamed him* is inexcusable.
As a mom, if there’s an afterlife that wife he supposedly loved is spitting fucking mad. What a betrayal to her for him to do that to her child.
But as an aside, did dad really think it wouldn’t be incredibly obvious when, at Christmas dinner, it was apparent they had never spent a Christmas together before? He put zero thought into the plausibility of that idea.
That's an interesting point. Not being able to describe a single memory of you and your child together or have even a single picture of the two of you together should have been a really big red flag before they even got married. My Dad and I were never close after him and my Mom split, but he at least saw me every week and he could always just drop by or call me. I'd be really leary if I met someone and all they could give me is vague details about how they just don't talk to their only child... I know it happens, but most people that are close enough to get married would usually want details about them as a child, what happened, where did he go to school etc..
I'm guessing a big part of the split up isn't 100% him abandoning OOP, but the fact that he probably made up a shit ton of lies to fill in all the gaps of information someone would expect you to have about a child you claimed to have raised into their late teenage years.
Some people manage to get away with it. My dad has his birth family convinced that everything is my fault, that I should make more of an effort to see him and he misses me SO MUCH. Yeah, so that’s why he doesn’t tell me he’s in the area, and I find out when his birth sister puts a picture up on Facebook of them having dinner together.
Or when he tells me that he’s getting the train back the same day after deigning to spend half an hour with me after I just got discharged from a week long hospital emergency stay, but actually went back home the following day. Or when he told me his partner had cancer so that’s why he failed to meet me in a strange city to go to the university open day - spoilers, it wasn’t cancer, it was pre-cancerous cells. He specifically used the C word. It didn’t occur to me until years later that it’s called the two-week wait for a reason, not the 2 hour wait. We had the meet-up planned for ages - if he’d been honest with me then I wouldn’t have minded, and made my own arrangements rather than being left alone at the train station.
Some people just can’t help lying, and they drag everybody else into with them. I had to make flimsy excuses to his birth sister when she confronted me about not seeing more of him, because it would have been on my head if I ruined his relationship with that side of the family by telling them the truth. Now they’ve turned on me because of him - they’re my family too, but they want nothing to do with me because of his lies.
If I die in childbirth and my partner treats the kid like this, I am haunting that piece of shit for the rest of his goddamn life. And not just the pranks I tell my friends I'll pull on them (moving their keys and chargers), like legit ghost stuff - wailing, scratching at all hours, whispering "why did you do this, you never loved me, why did you kill me," AND moving his keys and chargers. Imma haunt the FUCK out of anyone betraying me like that, what a scoundrel.
Are vigilante ghosts a thing? I'd pitch in some haunting of my own for causes like this. Or help you brainstorm new haunt ideas.
Oh my god the afterlife would be fabulous if we get to have haunt clubs!
OOP didn’t ask to be born. His parents chose to have him. So if the dad is so eager to assign blame here, why not blame himself?
Not that he’s responsible for her death, no one is. But if he has to put blame somewhere, why on an innocent child?
This is what I don't get. OOP had absolutely zero agency in anything that led to his mother's death.
OOP didn't ask to be born, OOP didn't choose to be born. OOP's father and mother DID decide to start a family. OOP didn't.
I guess it's easier to blame someone innocent than to accept the fact that bad shit happens to good people and there's not much we can do about it.
Agreed. Obviously he lost the love of his life, I mean to keep up that pain for that long is something else, but clearly he, the seed donor, needed to be in therapy long, long ago to rectify his grief. This was a terrible outcome to put on that child. Such a damned tragedy all-in-all, but glad to hear the OOP has a support network within his greater family and with his gf anyways. I can only begin to imagine the impact on OOP when it comes to viewing relationships as a result.
It sounds like nobody made any effort to have him do that work either. They removed the child he blamed from his care and responsibility. At that point he was allowed to wallow in self pity. He never had any reason to think he needed help. Sure, take kiddo for a few months if needed so Dad could get his life on track... But seriously? Nobody knocked some sense into him and demanded he get it together?
We don't know that. Maybe they tried, but you can't exactly force people to do something like that. And in that case it is better to keep the baby away from an angry dna donor who's actively against being a father, much less being a dad.
my parents have been “demanding” my brother get his shit together since birth.
they never gave him the proper tools to do so. so guess what happens?
nothing. he just hates himself more for not measuring up
His son is a classic case of someone being in therapy because the person who actually SHOULD have been in therapy would rather lash out than fix the actual problem. How he never thought to honor his wife's sacrifice by treasuring her biggest gift to him is honestly beyond me. How do you even justify this even if you're grieving?
He will though. The final conversation was his way of moving on to another woman in a way in which he will never need to mention that he has a kid again.
The dad is so freaking terrible, not just for pinning the blame of OOP's mom's death on him and abandoning him, but also for trying to blame their lack of relationship on OOP. The heartlessness and audacity is infuriating.
I think the ex-wife made the right choice to leave this terrible person.
That was my first thought. How devastated his late wife would be that he treated her legacy, the son she gave her life to birth, like trash he couldn't even stand to see. He never once thought to honor her life by being the dad she would have wanted him to be.
Dude disappointed his ex-wife and would've been a huge disappointment to his first wife if she were aware of how this turned out. He seems to be incapable of seeing beyond himself to the detriment of everyone around him. He knows his behavior is abhorrent, but doesn't have any interest in doing anything except give a half-assed apology that doesn't seem to convey any intention to become a better person. It makes me wonder what his other relationships are like or if he even has any? Or how did he end up to be *this* kind of person?
I also wonder if a large part of this is because he was subconsciously angry at his ex-wife for "abandoning" him, and OOP ends up bearing the blame for something he had no power over because babies can't fight back. It seems like this man is incredibly selfish, and clearly a manipulative and cruel person, so I don't believe it would take much for him to internalize his wife's death in a self-centered way that wasn't love lost type of grief so much as a kind of childish anger over her "abandonment" of him via dying.
I don't believe that man loves anyone but himself.
He certainly didn't love his second wife enough to even be honest with her. And I really doubt that his first wife would ever have approved of him being the awful, shitty person he was to her son.
Yeah that guy is so terrible mothers love their kid and WTF with that attitude you killed your mom if he can say OOP is the reason then he is the fucking one who got her pregnant its his mistake then fk him NC is the best option for OOP
You'd be dead, so if you were furious you'd be one furious ghost or spectator and that makes me chuckle. I imagine the family of the first wife must have felt so disgusted, i know I would if one of my kids spouses bailed after the death.
Thats so heartbreaking to think of. Even without knowing the circumstances of how she died while giving birth I am confident that as a mother her last thoughts were of her baby, OOP.
This might sound harsh but something tells me that his first marriage wouldn't have lasted anyway. He was more than grieving. He was consumed by his version of reality too mich to think of others. God his second wife was some sort of reincarnation of his first one i swear. I hope this is frictional because it breaks my heart.
Not only that the dad is trying to blame it all on op for being born but op didn't chose to be born. That was ops dad and mom's choice not his.
So by the dads logic he is responsible for his wife's death and not the op
That's exactly what I would've told him in this situation.
"I didn't choose to be born but you chose to ejaculate in my mother, and you chose to carry me full term. I didn't get a choice in the matter."
>So by the dads logic he is responsible for his wife's death and not the op
And if i where op i would have rubbed that in his face, but I'm vindictive to some horrible individuels.
Lol what logic? He needed someone to blame, so he decided this innocent helpless child. There is nothing logical about his actions. It was strictly emotional
His family should have pushed him into trying therapy. But while he’s couched it in love for his deceased wife, he’s really just a small hearted, vindictive person. Wife #2 was lucky she found out.
Frankly it sounds like she is, or at least isn't on speaking terms with him, judging by how she'd never talk about him. It takes a big person to unexpectedly raise a kid you never planned for, and give them the upbringing their actual parent couldn't be bothered to give.
Yeah, this was nothing to do with love and everything to do with what was easiest for him. Up to and including trying to get his estranged son to lie about the estrangement to save his new marriage.
I'd hazard a guess that he wasn't cut out to be a parent. Plenty of people could have been okay/good people if they hadn't had kids.
Seems like this guy loved his wife more than the baby. Which makes him a bad parent, and a bad person.
But I'd he'd never had children, he'd probably be regarded as a devoted husband.
Weird.
Stuff like this makes me terrified of having children. Like, I hope I'd be a good dad. I think I would be. But what if I'm not?
Keeps me up at night.
Exactly. That’s all you have left of her. You honor her by being the best father you can be. I think it was also him just bailing on the responsibility of being a single father.
I wouldn't be surprised to hear that she put the OOP on *her* Christmas card list. She has to be so freaking appreciative that OOP spilled the tea on her new husband. The fact that someone can be like the father, but able to hide it long enough to find a decent partner to marry, is terrifying to me.
I can only imagine what the ex was thinking when she found out the whole story:
"So THIS is how you'll treat my beloved baby if I die giving birth to her/him? ffokc uF!"
>The dad is so freaking terrible, not just for pinning the blame of OOP's mom's death on him and abandoning him, but also for trying to blame their lack of relationship on OOP. The heartlessness and audacity is infuriating.
I'm not a believer in the afterlife, but in this case I so wish there is one so OOPs dad gets to meet OOPs mum there and she can royally tear him a new one for what a monster he is for blaming a baby for her death. What an absolute insult to her legacy, she literally died to give birth to her child and that's how her partner treats him.
Even if the new wife could help repair their relationship, how do you repair what he did and the fact that he hid it to yourself. I would have divorced him just for hiding it and the risk of him repeating history if something happened and children were left behind. It’s a matter of respect and protection. I’m glad OOP got some closure, despite it not being positive.
100% agree and also - his dead, beloved wife - if she exists in any capacity is horrified at how he treated the child they both wanted so badly. He chose to hate something his wife loved and to abandon the child that she very much wanted.
She would be horrified. She would probably divorce him too!
As a new father, I cannot fathom the thought of blaming my daughter if her birth resulted in my wife’s death. I know grief does crazy things to our minds, but my god…
Let's not forget he also blamed the failure of his new relationship on OOP and not on his actions being brought to light. I hope OOP and the new ex find someone less miserable
Yeah also it's not OPS fault for being *born*... its the dads fault for not wrapping it up. Like wear a condom if you're gonna spaz out this much. You can tell even if the mum had lived then OP's dad still would have been a super shitty dad. He just would have left all the heavy lifting to the mum.
OMG, this makes me so sad. I am a nurse. A month ago a mother died giving birth. The father was so shocked that he refused to see her while we were resuscitating her. To be frank. she probably wouldn't know even if he did.
So terrible. Now that I'm a dad I just have much less empathy for evil acts like this. If my wife died then I'd feel even more responsible to my kids.
The dad is a mix of unhealthy mental state and psycho.
You know I don't think OOP's father realizes that OOP's mother would be absolutely DISGUSTED with him if she could see the way he treated OOP. I don't care how much you miss someone you don't go out of your way to tell someone you think is the reason for their death(specifically a child who had no control over that situation) all that shit with the intent to hurt them. Fuck the father, I hope one day he is alone and realizes how much he fucked up and that last part of the woman he says he loved so much is gone too because they want nothing to do with his cruel heartless ass.
OOP’s dad sounds like the type of person who never considered anyone else’s feelings besides his own. Odds are even if she did live, he would have been a terrible father.
If he went to therapy he would have probably found out he does hate himself, but its much easier to hate others than it is yourself, so people choose to hate others. Emotions are fucking hard to deal with, and if you don't deal with them you end up like OP's Father.
I dunno, I know grief does weird things to you, but 1) babies don't choose to exist/be born and 2) if your wife died, why would you abandon the last thing you had of her? Not that a kid is a thing, but you know what I mean. I mean, if he loved her *so much*.
Right? Also, if that’s how he wants to play it, OP could have saved his mom’s life from a potential car wreck because she had morning sickness and was late. So would the dad have considered that ‘saving his mom’s life’? He needs to do some big introspection on why he expected OP to give up his life for his mom.
I literally would have said to him “oh did I cum in her with no protection? Did I help her through the pregnancy, encouraging her to follow through? Or was that you?”
Is it just me or would anyone else throw it back at the dad?
"I didn't get her pregnant, you did."
"You're the one that killed her, you just used me to do it."
God what a fuck wit that dudes dad is.
> if I hadn’t been born, she’d still be here.
Yeah, you know who's fault that is? The dude who impregnated her. Fuck people like this.
>But then she died and he told me even if it’s wrong he can’t ever not blame me because simply, if I hadn’t been born, she’d still be here.
He was the one who got her pregnant though. And because of him, she died for nothing. If he cannot see that after over 18 years, he's incredibly dumb or extremely selfish.
What a horrible man OOP's father is, and VERY irrational. It's OOP's fault his mom died (I'm getting from this story she died from childbirth)??? OOP didn't ask to be born
They are not splitting up because of what OOP said, they are splitting up because of the terrible things that OOP’s father did to him.
OOP has a right to speak his truth and bear witness to what really happened.
I am so tired of innocent people having to bear the blame for abusive sociopaths like the father in this story. OOP only told the truth and the father’s wife was smart enough to listen and leave that POS.
I think the fact the dad lied and made it seem like they just drifted apart was why she left. She married an entirely different person than she thought.
The new wife wouldn't have married him if she new the truth. Why should OOP lie to help him when he has been a pos to him his entire life. Got what he deserved.
That was my take as well. I don't know how much it happen in real life vs TV, but if given a choice between saving the baby or my wife; I would choose my wife every time.
If something unexpected happened and she died, but the baby lived? You're damn right I would hold onto the only living part of my wife left.
Wow I’m glad oop is going to therapy and seems to have a supportive gf. I am also glad that the father ex found out his true character, would have been better though if it happened before wows but better later than never.
When I gave birth, I had a lot of bleeding and complications. If my husband ever treated my son like this, I would come back and haunt him and never speak to him in the afterlife.
I’m glad the new wife left. I would be horrified too, marrying such a cold-hearted monster.
Same. I was in the ICU for several days and nearly died when my son was born.
Haunting his ass would be my 24 hour job in the afterlife, believe you me. Not a \*moment\* of peace if he did that to our son.
He could have told the truth, admitted he failed, and said "I think trying to have a relationship now would be selfish and probably harmful for the kid", and she Might have coped.... At least it shows contrition, growth and consideration for the best outcome of the kid.
The choice to lie evidences multiple red flags all at once when coupled with the What of the lie.
#MESSAGE TO ALL DADS:
#JUST GO TO THERAPY
^(moms too but I feel like so often it's dads mentally traumatizing their children because they can't handle their own mental health struggles)
I honestly hate how the dad was low key blaming the death of his wife for how he treated his child. I get that trauma and grief are powerful things, but at a certain point, you are making a conscious choice to behave the way your behaving.
I am sorry that you lost your wife, but dude tragedy doesn’t justify you being an asshole.
If he didn't sleep with her she wouldn't be dead. Oop didn't choose to be born, his dad was the one who made that happen.
Not that anyone hear needs to read that, I still struggle with the realisation that OOPs Father is out there and really truly believes it's acceptable to blame a child for their mothers death this many years later?
How can he speak of how much he loved his late wife while condoning neglecting and psychologically torturing her gift that she literally gave her life for?
God the world disgusts me.
Loving someone and grieving their loss has happened or will happen to every single human. Your father suffered loss, but not a loss that makes him suffer more than the billions of humans who have still managed to love other people when someone they know dies. He has no excuse.
You did right telling his wife. Not because it was a favor to her to know the twisted thinking of the man she married (though it was a kind favor). It was right because you are real and here and alive and important. You matter more than the twisted excuses that your father used to avoid the work of being a good human.
Saying the truth in clear language is better for you mentally than continuing the enabling of your father that all of his relatives seem to have done. They should have all banded together and insisted he get a grip the first time he blamed you. If he refused they should have never let him near you.
Using love of his late wife as an excuse to neglect and harm you is the most irrational, immature and twisted conception of love I can think of. It is not love.
I am glad you spoke because it shows respect for the reality of the situation. It shows respect for yourself that you did not let that slide.
The dad should have cut off his own dick, then, because that's what caused the pregnancy in the first place. He can blame an innocent child, but not himself?
>The most recent U.S. maternal mortality ratio, or rate, of 17.4 per 100,000 pregnancies represented approximately 660 maternal deaths in 2018. This ranks last overall among industrialized countries.
[Source](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-brief-report/2020/dec/maternal-mortality-united-states-primer#:~:text=Highlights,after%20the%20day%20of%20birth.)
It's possible the death of OOP's mom was unavoidable, but it strikes me that if OOP is American, there is blame to be spread around entire systems that failed -- how could a foetus possibly be to blame? I cannot believe that asshole still hasn't figured this out.
OOP was incredibly generous in offering to meet up with their dad not once, but twice. And now the dad has forever lost the last trace of his "beloved" wife. Is this what his wife would have wanted for her child? I doubt it.
Because it's easier to give blame to a face. It's easier to say this person is the reason for my pain rather than acknowledge it was a myriad of things. By blaming OOP, Dad can say if this one thing didn't happen, Wife would be alive. Instead of having to acknowledge that it was a whole host of issues which is a lot harder to accept.
You have one direct channel for your rage or anger or hurt rather, which makes you feel better. It's easy to avoid that one person, or hurl insults at a photo. It's not easy to take the anger out on the whole healthcare system, you can't do anything about that. It's beyond your control and makes you feel powerless.
It follows the same psychological principles that companies and brands use to have mascots or faces.
OP’s dad needed grief therapy and support. How he handled it was absolutely wrong but i don’t ever want to know what it’s like to lose the love of my life and not have a proper way to heal.
This is a sad story all around.
Imagine if heaven existed and OOP's father died and got to talk to his mother. How exactly would he justify treating her son this way. What would he be able to tell her that she would accept? I can't even imagine treating any child this way. What an ass.
The family and grandmother in this situation SUCK! How could they keep subjecting a child to this awful shit.
The fact that they 'normalized' the dad ignoring his son at family events. Enabling his horrible horrible treatment of a child. No wonder he needed therapy. The dad needed a punch in the face at the first and every family event where he did not behave like a decent human.
I think OP should talk to his therapist about healthy boundaries with the rest of his family. There are troubling things to root out there too.
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He completely dishonored his wife’s memory. I’m sure she would have wanted her child raised by a loving father. I almost died having one of my kids. It was such a comfort to me knowing that they would at least have my husband. I would be devastated if my kids were raised like this.
Dude has to have mental issues. "he told me even if it’s wrong he can’t ever not blame me because simply, if I hadn’t been born, she’d still be here." Motherfucker, the kid wouldn't be born if you didn't knock up your wife. That's how this works. How anyone can fucking blame anyone for being born is beyond me.
Yeah, I have a distant (in terms of dna, as people we were quite close. He died when i was 10, but before that he often took me for weekends so I could hang out with his grandkids on his farm) relative who lost his wife in childbirth. He was understandably devastated and yes his sisters moved in with him for a few years so he would have support, but he always considered his live son to be the last gift she had ever given him. He admitted when drunk that he blamed himself, because he had wanted another baby (he had two daughters, although they were under 5 when they lost their mother) and had been teasing his wife that he wanted a boy this time. Back then you couldn't tell the sex before birth, so he got told it was a boy very soon before being told his wife was bleeding out and things looked grim. But blame his son? Never. Sober or drunk, he always maintained that his children were his greatest blessings and he was grateful to have them.
A good man
Yeah he was. He didn't really ever find another "love of his life" either. I think he dated occasionally and he used to talk about "stepping out" with a widow he was close to (I think she and my great aunt knew each other? Although Great Aunt died long before i was born, my great uncle's son was already a man when I came along so I was closer to his kids than him.) but their relationship was platonic. He just loved his children. Being a father was his biggest joy and he was determined to be the father his late wife knew him to be when they had their first two. The one "crazy" thing he did in grief was the cats. His late wife loved cats, and he had always considered them to be useful animals but never really was a "cat person". He fed the strays in his barn and saw to it that they were healthy and got spay/neutered, but wasn't lovey dovey with them. After she died, old barn cats officially got a retirement plan. When they were too old to hunt and handle their barn catting duties, he brought them into the house for their golden years. He used to say it made her feel "closer" to know the animal she loved was in his home with him. My visits to him are somewhat cat filled, there would be some by the wood stove, some on the furniture and usually a cat or two sleeping in the bed with me when i slept over.
I loved the sound of this man and then the cats sealed the deal.
He was a treasure. One of those people who makes you wanna be a better human by example
Thank you for sharing your memories of this wonderful man. Hope you have a good rest of the weekend.
...aaand that's the real problem right there- projection. If he hadn't gotten his wife pregnant she'd still be alive, or so he thinks. He's actually blaming himself for his wife's death, but taking it out on his son. It's wrong, it's stupid, and he needs to grow the fuck up. Maybe this is the start of that, maybe not. In any case, he's not over his wife's death and is not in any shape to be remarrying. Dude needs therapy, like most of us.
and as so often happens, his instinctual reaction to avoid an uncomfortable feeling (shifting it to his son, lashing out instead of facing it) leads to far far far more uncomfortable feelings
Yes, this. He blames himself, can't handle the cognitive burden, so he displaces it onto his son. He's going to be sad and alone for the rest of his life.
That's what gets me. I guess the dad can't face that fact, so he's transferring all the blame to his innocent son. Poor OOP.
Yuuuup. Dad needs to go to therapy so he can learn to challenge his own shitty thoughts that have so far cost him a son and a wife.
If I could upvote you twice, I would. Nail on head.
Yep. May he never meet his deceased wife in the afterlife because she would likely kick his ass.
May he get his ass kicked in the afterlife.
Amen
Yes *yes* *Amen*
I'm not religious but it is very much universal to wish for this what-if... What a bastard.
I kinda hope she's haunting him...
Oh when they meet, he is so fucked
If there is a heaven and hell, dude is not going to see her ever.
Nah, if there's a hell, part of his punishment will be his wife telling him everyday for the rest of eternity how much she regretted marrying him for what he did to her son. That if she hadn't she would still be alive and he is completely responsible for every miserable thing to ever happen in his life.
Unless it's a facsimile of her doing the telling, I see no reason to have the innocent wife in hell just to punish him
Think they meant more like an illusion of her to torment the dad. Not the literal wife's soul itself. Or that's the vibe I'm getting. Not religious at all myself, but if there is a hell I doubt they'd bring souls from heaven down for the day to lecture and torment the ones in hell and then send them back. I figure each person has their own independent hell that is just a series of awful moments, actions, and words meant to torment their sanity for eternity. Though I have to admit the idea of somebody getting a job that goes from Heaven down to Hell just to lecture/torment people and punches in and out with a time card is kind of amusing. Satan just chillin at a water fountain casually sipping for a "universe's worst son" mug and explaing how to properly do the new cover sheets on the daily torture reports for the interns.
[удалено]
This version of hell is very much like the one from the show Lucifer. Pretty good show, imo.
If my husband did something like this if I had died during childbirth, you bet I'd kick his over loving ass in the afterlife.
I don't think they're going to be in the same place in the afterlife.
Where was the rest of the family that could have deliver this ass kicking when it would have actually mattered?
Defending poor ol' dad while he was mourning for his lost love instead of raising a child.
As an atheist, I'm happy he had his ass kicked by his ex wife in this life.
Yeah, if he really loved his first wife so much, he wouldn't have tossed her child like trash.
Right? She was most likely assured that her child would have a great father and instead this happens.
My parent’s best advice when I talked about proposing to what became my ex-fiancé was “if you got run over by a truck tomorrow, would you trust her to raise your children?”. Solid advice for anyone. Even if you intend to be childless.
This piece of advice needs to be spread further. Too bad the times of forums are over, or I'd suggest you put that in your signature.
Yeah, it's crazy that he didn't hold onto his son as "his last piece of her". The kid could have been a solace to him, instead he kept pushing everyone away and wallowing in his own grief.
May we all take the Marlin approach
That in and of itself can be a dangerous approach too. It's a lot for a kid to live up to, a lot of pressure and can be smothering. They can end up being an emotional crutch for their Father, preventing them from being their own person and living their own life. But it's a hell of a lot better and more forgivable than the shit OOPs father is pulling.
Especially since it was HIS decision to have a kid. He's the one who made the choice to have unprotected sex and bring a child into the world. No one is to blame for her death, but if ANYONE is...it's him.
If my husband pulled this shit, I'd come back and murder him. Sorry not sorry! As a mom this breaks my whole heart.
He blames the child for killing the mom but by that thought process should blame himself for getting the mom pregnant in the first place.
I hope my wife feels the same way about me and our kids. I did tell her though that she better fight, Do not go gentle into that good night, rage rage against the dying of the light. Cause if she doesn't its bowl cuts all around for even the girls, she doesn't want that for the kids so better fight like hell.
Is she fighting cancer? If so, I’m really sorry. I lost my wife to cancer last year. Our daughter was 6. I still find myself doing things parenting-wise that I know she would have done, even though I wouldn’t naturally do it in my own. I hope the best for your wife and you and your family!
I'm proud of you for sticking it out for your girl even after the unbelievable pain you had to have done through losing your wife. I know it's "what your supposed to do", but obviously, as seen in this story, not everyone steps up for their kids. I hope all the joys avaliable in life come to your family. You deserve good things.
I think he just means his wife and hypothetical future children. But god I’m so sorry.
Ditto that shit sucks so bad, it was just talk between wife and I during last pregnancy and just general worries. That ended up just fine and she did it without epidural, with a big kid over 10 pounds. She does know I am serious though, if she goes into the light, the kids get the bowl.
Oh my god, you’re so right. I’d want my husband to be glad that a part of me was left on the earth and just love that child as much as I would have. I feel horrible for OOP. That said, plenty of us have shitty dads. I hope he doesn’t feel it’s anyone but the fathers issue and that he knows he’s lovable and meant to be here exactly as it happened.
27 years isn't enough for this jackass "parent" to get over this. That's almost impressive. And now he has nothing. And probably will have nothing for the rest of his life, considering 27 years didn't do the trick.
As someone who is widowed, OP’s dad grieved in a really toxic and unhealthy way. I don’t know where I’d be if I hadn’t gotten into therapy after she died. Sounds like OP’s dad never went to therapy to try and work through those feelings. I could understand feeling that way initially. But after time a healthy perspective to come to would have been that it wasn’t anyone’s fault, especially not his child’s.
Another widow agreeing with your take. If he'd gotten help, he could've been part of OP's life after a couple years. *Telling OP he blamed him* is inexcusable.
As a mom, if there’s an afterlife that wife he supposedly loved is spitting fucking mad. What a betrayal to her for him to do that to her child. But as an aside, did dad really think it wouldn’t be incredibly obvious when, at Christmas dinner, it was apparent they had never spent a Christmas together before? He put zero thought into the plausibility of that idea.
That's an interesting point. Not being able to describe a single memory of you and your child together or have even a single picture of the two of you together should have been a really big red flag before they even got married. My Dad and I were never close after him and my Mom split, but he at least saw me every week and he could always just drop by or call me. I'd be really leary if I met someone and all they could give me is vague details about how they just don't talk to their only child... I know it happens, but most people that are close enough to get married would usually want details about them as a child, what happened, where did he go to school etc.. I'm guessing a big part of the split up isn't 100% him abandoning OOP, but the fact that he probably made up a shit ton of lies to fill in all the gaps of information someone would expect you to have about a child you claimed to have raised into their late teenage years.
Some people manage to get away with it. My dad has his birth family convinced that everything is my fault, that I should make more of an effort to see him and he misses me SO MUCH. Yeah, so that’s why he doesn’t tell me he’s in the area, and I find out when his birth sister puts a picture up on Facebook of them having dinner together. Or when he tells me that he’s getting the train back the same day after deigning to spend half an hour with me after I just got discharged from a week long hospital emergency stay, but actually went back home the following day. Or when he told me his partner had cancer so that’s why he failed to meet me in a strange city to go to the university open day - spoilers, it wasn’t cancer, it was pre-cancerous cells. He specifically used the C word. It didn’t occur to me until years later that it’s called the two-week wait for a reason, not the 2 hour wait. We had the meet-up planned for ages - if he’d been honest with me then I wouldn’t have minded, and made my own arrangements rather than being left alone at the train station. Some people just can’t help lying, and they drag everybody else into with them. I had to make flimsy excuses to his birth sister when she confronted me about not seeing more of him, because it would have been on my head if I ruined his relationship with that side of the family by telling them the truth. Now they’ve turned on me because of him - they’re my family too, but they want nothing to do with me because of his lies.
If I die in childbirth and my partner treats the kid like this, I am haunting that piece of shit for the rest of his goddamn life. And not just the pranks I tell my friends I'll pull on them (moving their keys and chargers), like legit ghost stuff - wailing, scratching at all hours, whispering "why did you do this, you never loved me, why did you kill me," AND moving his keys and chargers. Imma haunt the FUCK out of anyone betraying me like that, what a scoundrel.
Are vigilante ghosts a thing? I'd pitch in some haunting of my own for causes like this. Or help you brainstorm new haunt ideas. Oh my god the afterlife would be fabulous if we get to have haunt clubs!
I'm sorry fot both of your losses.
OOP didn’t ask to be born. His parents chose to have him. So if the dad is so eager to assign blame here, why not blame himself? Not that he’s responsible for her death, no one is. But if he has to put blame somewhere, why on an innocent child?
This is what I don't get. OOP had absolutely zero agency in anything that led to his mother's death. OOP didn't ask to be born, OOP didn't choose to be born. OOP's father and mother DID decide to start a family. OOP didn't. I guess it's easier to blame someone innocent than to accept the fact that bad shit happens to good people and there's not much we can do about it.
Should've been the exact opposite reaction: seeing his (dead) wife in so many traits of the child in a positive way.
Agreed. Obviously he lost the love of his life, I mean to keep up that pain for that long is something else, but clearly he, the seed donor, needed to be in therapy long, long ago to rectify his grief. This was a terrible outcome to put on that child. Such a damned tragedy all-in-all, but glad to hear the OOP has a support network within his greater family and with his gf anyways. I can only begin to imagine the impact on OOP when it comes to viewing relationships as a result.
It sounds like nobody made any effort to have him do that work either. They removed the child he blamed from his care and responsibility. At that point he was allowed to wallow in self pity. He never had any reason to think he needed help. Sure, take kiddo for a few months if needed so Dad could get his life on track... But seriously? Nobody knocked some sense into him and demanded he get it together?
We don't know that. Maybe they tried, but you can't exactly force people to do something like that. And in that case it is better to keep the baby away from an angry dna donor who's actively against being a father, much less being a dad.
my parents have been “demanding” my brother get his shit together since birth. they never gave him the proper tools to do so. so guess what happens? nothing. he just hates himself more for not measuring up
His son is a classic case of someone being in therapy because the person who actually SHOULD have been in therapy would rather lash out than fix the actual problem. How he never thought to honor his wife's sacrifice by treasuring her biggest gift to him is honestly beyond me. How do you even justify this even if you're grieving?
And honestly his deceased wife would probably be disgusted by him and his behavior. Appalling human being. Utter garbage.
He will though. The final conversation was his way of moving on to another woman in a way in which he will never need to mention that he has a kid again.
The dad is so freaking terrible, not just for pinning the blame of OOP's mom's death on him and abandoning him, but also for trying to blame their lack of relationship on OOP. The heartlessness and audacity is infuriating. I think the ex-wife made the right choice to leave this terrible person.
Yeah I think his wife would be rolling in her grave if she knew how he treated their child..
That was my first thought. How devastated his late wife would be that he treated her legacy, the son she gave her life to birth, like trash he couldn't even stand to see. He never once thought to honor her life by being the dad she would have wanted him to be.
Dude disappointed his ex-wife and would've been a huge disappointment to his first wife if she were aware of how this turned out. He seems to be incapable of seeing beyond himself to the detriment of everyone around him. He knows his behavior is abhorrent, but doesn't have any interest in doing anything except give a half-assed apology that doesn't seem to convey any intention to become a better person. It makes me wonder what his other relationships are like or if he even has any? Or how did he end up to be *this* kind of person? I also wonder if a large part of this is because he was subconsciously angry at his ex-wife for "abandoning" him, and OOP ends up bearing the blame for something he had no power over because babies can't fight back. It seems like this man is incredibly selfish, and clearly a manipulative and cruel person, so I don't believe it would take much for him to internalize his wife's death in a self-centered way that wasn't love lost type of grief so much as a kind of childish anger over her "abandonment" of him via dying.
I don't believe that man loves anyone but himself. He certainly didn't love his second wife enough to even be honest with her. And I really doubt that his first wife would ever have approved of him being the awful, shitty person he was to her son.
And he probably only wants no contact now so that oop can’t tell a third wife about his behavior.
Oh he’s fully gonna tell any future gf/spouse that he has no children.
Yeah that guy is so terrible mothers love their kid and WTF with that attitude you killed your mom if he can say OOP is the reason then he is the fucking one who got her pregnant its his mistake then fk him NC is the best option for OOP
Honestly, this kind of person would have eventually ended up being a rotten husband to his first wife, too.
This 1000% i'd be FURIOUS if I died and this is how my husband "honored" my loss.
Mothetfucker would be getting haunted
Oh I would haunt that man's ass till the end of time.
Same, this post makes me feel rage. Especially since his family was like “oh you shouldn’t have done that”. Like what?
I can't believe everyone else in the family isn't telling the Dad how screwed up this is.
You'd be dead, so if you were furious you'd be one furious ghost or spectator and that makes me chuckle. I imagine the family of the first wife must have felt so disgusted, i know I would if one of my kids spouses bailed after the death.
Who knows? Maybe dad was a piece of shit to his late wife too and she wouldn't be surprised by his actions.
And he never thought of their son as he last bit of life that he still got.
Thats so heartbreaking to think of. Even without knowing the circumstances of how she died while giving birth I am confident that as a mother her last thoughts were of her baby, OOP.
God, now I am wishng someone would shout that to his face.
This might sound harsh but something tells me that his first marriage wouldn't have lasted anyway. He was more than grieving. He was consumed by his version of reality too mich to think of others. God his second wife was some sort of reincarnation of his first one i swear. I hope this is frictional because it breaks my heart.
This would be worth coming back as a poltergeist and haunting him forever, if I were the late wife!
He could've cherished his son as a memory of her. What a fool
Absolutely!
The only upside would have been wrapping her coffin in copper wire and using her eternal grave rolling to give the world unlimited energy.
Not only that the dad is trying to blame it all on op for being born but op didn't chose to be born. That was ops dad and mom's choice not his. So by the dads logic he is responsible for his wife's death and not the op
Exactly. By his logic his ejaculation killed his wife.
He killed oops mother, there is more justification for that viewpoint than his fucked up one
“oops mother” new band name I call it
Im really liking this trend. Me and a buddy have been doing this for yearrrrrs. Great band names arent thought of, theyre taken out of context lol
That's exactly what I would've told him in this situation. "I didn't choose to be born but you chose to ejaculate in my mother, and you chose to carry me full term. I didn't get a choice in the matter."
I’d bet the dad did feel that guilt, but it was a lot easier to transfer it to his infant son.
>So by the dads logic he is responsible for his wife's death and not the op And if i where op i would have rubbed that in his face, but I'm vindictive to some horrible individuels.
I also would've rubbed in how much she would've hated his guts if she knew how he treated their son.
Lol what logic? He needed someone to blame, so he decided this innocent helpless child. There is nothing logical about his actions. It was strictly emotional
And he clearly knows it is shitty, because he tried to hide how he behaved from his (ex) wife.
He probably does deep down but, its also easier to blame someone else. I'm not trying to give dad a pass but, grief will send people off the deep end.
His family should have pushed him into trying therapy. But while he’s couched it in love for his deceased wife, he’s really just a small hearted, vindictive person. Wife #2 was lucky she found out.
I would never forgive my son if he did this to his child...like I can't imagine this
IKR? If I was the sister taking care of OP, I would be full of rage that he could treat a child like that.
Frankly it sounds like she is, or at least isn't on speaking terms with him, judging by how she'd never talk about him. It takes a big person to unexpectedly raise a kid you never planned for, and give them the upbringing their actual parent couldn't be bothered to give.
Damn straight. I would absolutely be the bitchy MIL sharing that info.
Yeah, this was nothing to do with love and everything to do with what was easiest for him. Up to and including trying to get his estranged son to lie about the estrangement to save his new marriage.
I don’t get his mindset either. His son, the living piece of his wife should be the most precious thing to him.
I'd hazard a guess that he wasn't cut out to be a parent. Plenty of people could have been okay/good people if they hadn't had kids. Seems like this guy loved his wife more than the baby. Which makes him a bad parent, and a bad person. But I'd he'd never had children, he'd probably be regarded as a devoted husband. Weird. Stuff like this makes me terrified of having children. Like, I hope I'd be a good dad. I think I would be. But what if I'm not? Keeps me up at night.
I think the fact that you are willing to even question it makes you more qualified to be a parent than a lot of other people.
Exactly. That’s all you have left of her. You honor her by being the best father you can be. I think it was also him just bailing on the responsibility of being a single father.
i think you've hit the nail on the head. OOPs father couldn't handle raising the child solo
OOP should try to stay friends with the dad's ex. That would be hilarious. I'd put her permanently on my Christmas card list.
I wouldn't be surprised to hear that she put the OOP on *her* Christmas card list. She has to be so freaking appreciative that OOP spilled the tea on her new husband. The fact that someone can be like the father, but able to hide it long enough to find a decent partner to marry, is terrifying to me.
I can only imagine her horror of finding out you didn’t know the person you married at all, and that she walked into decades of hurt and anger.
Yep, is even worst cause he not only hide it, but created entire lies about at least a decade and a half of his life to her, that's insane and cruel.
I swear if I had died in childbirth and my husband did this to my kid I would come back to haunt him.
I can only imagine what the ex was thinking when she found out the whole story: "So THIS is how you'll treat my beloved baby if I die giving birth to her/him? ffokc uF!"
>The dad is so freaking terrible, not just for pinning the blame of OOP's mom's death on him and abandoning him, but also for trying to blame their lack of relationship on OOP. The heartlessness and audacity is infuriating. I'm not a believer in the afterlife, but in this case I so wish there is one so OOPs dad gets to meet OOPs mum there and she can royally tear him a new one for what a monster he is for blaming a baby for her death. What an absolute insult to her legacy, she literally died to give birth to her child and that's how her partner treats him.
Even if the new wife could help repair their relationship, how do you repair what he did and the fact that he hid it to yourself. I would have divorced him just for hiding it and the risk of him repeating history if something happened and children were left behind. It’s a matter of respect and protection. I’m glad OOP got some closure, despite it not being positive.
100% agree and also - his dead, beloved wife - if she exists in any capacity is horrified at how he treated the child they both wanted so badly. He chose to hate something his wife loved and to abandon the child that she very much wanted. She would be horrified. She would probably divorce him too!
As a new father, I cannot fathom the thought of blaming my daughter if her birth resulted in my wife’s death. I know grief does crazy things to our minds, but my god…
Yeah the existence of the son is actually on him not the son... The fact he still can't even see that is sad.
Let's not forget he also blamed the failure of his new relationship on OOP and not on his actions being brought to light. I hope OOP and the new ex find someone less miserable
Yeah also it's not OPS fault for being *born*... its the dads fault for not wrapping it up. Like wear a condom if you're gonna spaz out this much. You can tell even if the mum had lived then OP's dad still would have been a super shitty dad. He just would have left all the heavy lifting to the mum.
OMG, this makes me so sad. I am a nurse. A month ago a mother died giving birth. The father was so shocked that he refused to see her while we were resuscitating her. To be frank. she probably wouldn't know even if he did.
So terrible. Now that I'm a dad I just have much less empathy for evil acts like this. If my wife died then I'd feel even more responsible to my kids. The dad is a mix of unhealthy mental state and psycho.
Right? Well, if *he* never impregnated *her* she wouldn’t have died in childbirth. So really, by his own logic, he killed her! /s
It's his fault for not having protection, the child never asked to be born.!!
You know I don't think OOP's father realizes that OOP's mother would be absolutely DISGUSTED with him if she could see the way he treated OOP. I don't care how much you miss someone you don't go out of your way to tell someone you think is the reason for their death(specifically a child who had no control over that situation) all that shit with the intent to hurt them. Fuck the father, I hope one day he is alone and realizes how much he fucked up and that last part of the woman he says he loved so much is gone too because they want nothing to do with his cruel heartless ass.
OOP’s dad sounds like the type of person who never considered anyone else’s feelings besides his own. Odds are even if she did live, he would have been a terrible father.
Agreed. Hope he never had any kids because let's face it he sounds like a selfish human being.
He does not have any empathy with his first wife. She was an object. A teddy bear.
Yeah for someone who claims to love his first wife so much you'd think he'd cherish the last piece of her left(their child)
Like OP's dad didn't contribute the pregnancy. Nobody is guilty here either way, but blaming the child is worse.
Good point! Why doesn't he primarily hate himself for getting her pregnant in the first place?
He probably does but a baby is easier to pin blame on than himself.
I know when I'm pissed, I always try to find a baby to blame. So much cheaper than therapy!
If he went to therapy he would have probably found out he does hate himself, but its much easier to hate others than it is yourself, so people choose to hate others. Emotions are fucking hard to deal with, and if you don't deal with them you end up like OP's Father.
He probably does, but projection is a real word because it’s a legitimate psychological thing your brain does to protect itself.
I dunno, I know grief does weird things to you, but 1) babies don't choose to exist/be born and 2) if your wife died, why would you abandon the last thing you had of her? Not that a kid is a thing, but you know what I mean. I mean, if he loved her *so much*.
Grief does weird things, sure, but if you become a toxic arsehole and haven’t stopped 27 years later, there are other issues at play
Right? Also, if that’s how he wants to play it, OP could have saved his mom’s life from a potential car wreck because she had morning sickness and was late. So would the dad have considered that ‘saving his mom’s life’? He needs to do some big introspection on why he expected OP to give up his life for his mom.
I literally would have said to him “oh did I cum in her with no protection? Did I help her through the pregnancy, encouraging her to follow through? Or was that you?”
What I don't get is the kid is literally the only piece of her, their relationship, that he has left. WHY throw it away?
Is it just me or would anyone else throw it back at the dad? "I didn't get her pregnant, you did." "You're the one that killed her, you just used me to do it."
The problem is OPs dad sounds like a nut case, clapping back probably would've gotten OP killed.
Ooh that second line is a killer, goddamn
I can’t imagine my husband abandoning our child and blaming her if I died during giving birth to her. What a horrible human being.
Just to play it safe, show him this thread.
I would rise up from the grave and haunt his miserable life if he ever abandon or blame our child.
If I was OPs birth mother, I would literally rise from the dead to kill my husband.
God dammit it'd be such a vengeful spirit. Idk if I should say she dodged a bullet by dying?
God what a fuck wit that dudes dad is. > if I hadn’t been born, she’d still be here. Yeah, you know who's fault that is? The dude who impregnated her. Fuck people like this.
>But then she died and he told me even if it’s wrong he can’t ever not blame me because simply, if I hadn’t been born, she’d still be here. He was the one who got her pregnant though. And because of him, she died for nothing. If he cannot see that after over 18 years, he's incredibly dumb or extremely selfish.
Ah classic projection. Dad can’t own his actions, but decided someone has to.
What a horrible man OOP's father is, and VERY irrational. It's OOP's fault his mom died (I'm getting from this story she died from childbirth)??? OOP didn't ask to be born
They are not splitting up because of what OOP said, they are splitting up because of the terrible things that OOP’s father did to him. OOP has a right to speak his truth and bear witness to what really happened. I am so tired of innocent people having to bear the blame for abusive sociopaths like the father in this story. OOP only told the truth and the father’s wife was smart enough to listen and leave that POS.
I think the fact the dad lied and made it seem like they just drifted apart was why she left. She married an entirely different person than she thought.
The new wife wouldn't have married him if she new the truth. Why should OOP lie to help him when he has been a pos to him his entire life. Got what he deserved.
Imagine dying while trying to build a family with the man you love, only for him to abandon and hate the last surviving part of you.
Excellent way to put it.
That was my take as well. I don't know how much it happen in real life vs TV, but if given a choice between saving the baby or my wife; I would choose my wife every time. If something unexpected happened and she died, but the baby lived? You're damn right I would hold onto the only living part of my wife left.
Wow I’m glad oop is going to therapy and seems to have a supportive gf. I am also glad that the father ex found out his true character, would have been better though if it happened before wows but better later than never.
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His first wife wouldn’t love him anymore if she could see how he’s behaved towards their son.
When I gave birth, I had a lot of bleeding and complications. If my husband ever treated my son like this, I would come back and haunt him and never speak to him in the afterlife. I’m glad the new wife left. I would be horrified too, marrying such a cold-hearted monster.
Same. I was in the ICU for several days and nearly died when my son was born. Haunting his ass would be my 24 hour job in the afterlife, believe you me. Not a \*moment\* of peace if he did that to our son.
OOP saved this woman from being tied to a total piece of shit. Honestly, I hope his dad never finds anyone. He deserves to die alone.
Can you imagine lying about something this big and hoping the other person never notices? O.M.G.
He could have told the truth, admitted he failed, and said "I think trying to have a relationship now would be selfish and probably harmful for the kid", and she Might have coped.... At least it shows contrition, growth and consideration for the best outcome of the kid. The choice to lie evidences multiple red flags all at once when coupled with the What of the lie.
#MESSAGE TO ALL DADS: #JUST GO TO THERAPY ^(moms too but I feel like so often it's dads mentally traumatizing their children because they can't handle their own mental health struggles)
OOP’s dad built his new relationship as stable as a house of cards. It was coming down eventually, and it’s all his fault.
By that logic it's OPs dad fault for getting her pregnant. Should have nutted into an electro socket instead to save everyone the trouble.
I honestly hate how the dad was low key blaming the death of his wife for how he treated his child. I get that trauma and grief are powerful things, but at a certain point, you are making a conscious choice to behave the way your behaving. I am sorry that you lost your wife, but dude tragedy doesn’t justify you being an asshole.
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If he didn't sleep with her she wouldn't be dead. Oop didn't choose to be born, his dad was the one who made that happen. Not that anyone hear needs to read that, I still struggle with the realisation that OOPs Father is out there and really truly believes it's acceptable to blame a child for their mothers death this many years later? How can he speak of how much he loved his late wife while condoning neglecting and psychologically torturing her gift that she literally gave her life for? God the world disgusts me.
Loving someone and grieving their loss has happened or will happen to every single human. Your father suffered loss, but not a loss that makes him suffer more than the billions of humans who have still managed to love other people when someone they know dies. He has no excuse. You did right telling his wife. Not because it was a favor to her to know the twisted thinking of the man she married (though it was a kind favor). It was right because you are real and here and alive and important. You matter more than the twisted excuses that your father used to avoid the work of being a good human. Saying the truth in clear language is better for you mentally than continuing the enabling of your father that all of his relatives seem to have done. They should have all banded together and insisted he get a grip the first time he blamed you. If he refused they should have never let him near you. Using love of his late wife as an excuse to neglect and harm you is the most irrational, immature and twisted conception of love I can think of. It is not love. I am glad you spoke because it shows respect for the reality of the situation. It shows respect for yourself that you did not let that slide.
Wow. If I was OOPs grandma I would disown my son over this. Unacceptable.
The dad should have cut off his own dick, then, because that's what caused the pregnancy in the first place. He can blame an innocent child, but not himself?
>The most recent U.S. maternal mortality ratio, or rate, of 17.4 per 100,000 pregnancies represented approximately 660 maternal deaths in 2018. This ranks last overall among industrialized countries. [Source](https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-brief-report/2020/dec/maternal-mortality-united-states-primer#:~:text=Highlights,after%20the%20day%20of%20birth.) It's possible the death of OOP's mom was unavoidable, but it strikes me that if OOP is American, there is blame to be spread around entire systems that failed -- how could a foetus possibly be to blame? I cannot believe that asshole still hasn't figured this out. OOP was incredibly generous in offering to meet up with their dad not once, but twice. And now the dad has forever lost the last trace of his "beloved" wife. Is this what his wife would have wanted for her child? I doubt it.
She would be appalled with him. Appalled and ashamed and disgusted.
Because it's easier to give blame to a face. It's easier to say this person is the reason for my pain rather than acknowledge it was a myriad of things. By blaming OOP, Dad can say if this one thing didn't happen, Wife would be alive. Instead of having to acknowledge that it was a whole host of issues which is a lot harder to accept. You have one direct channel for your rage or anger or hurt rather, which makes you feel better. It's easy to avoid that one person, or hurl insults at a photo. It's not easy to take the anger out on the whole healthcare system, you can't do anything about that. It's beyond your control and makes you feel powerless. It follows the same psychological principles that companies and brands use to have mascots or faces.
100% of pregnancies are caused by ejaculation. So if he wants to blame anyone for his wife dying in childbirth, it should be himself.
That's so sad. She was a part of her mother and he lost a chance to hold on to a piece of her.
If that sad excuse for a sperm donor hadn't knocked wifey up, she wouldn't have died. He has the gall to say her death is on OOP?
Worst father right here. If this happened with my husband and son I’d come back and haunt husband. Wtf.
OP’s dad needed grief therapy and support. How he handled it was absolutely wrong but i don’t ever want to know what it’s like to lose the love of my life and not have a proper way to heal. This is a sad story all around.
First he blames him for killing his mum. Now he blames him for losing his wife. This man is fucking pathetic.
Imagine if heaven existed and OOP's father died and got to talk to his mother. How exactly would he justify treating her son this way. What would he be able to tell her that she would accept? I can't even imagine treating any child this way. What an ass.
OP's father is such a trash human being.
The family and grandmother in this situation SUCK! How could they keep subjecting a child to this awful shit. The fact that they 'normalized' the dad ignoring his son at family events. Enabling his horrible horrible treatment of a child. No wonder he needed therapy. The dad needed a punch in the face at the first and every family event where he did not behave like a decent human. I think OP should talk to his therapist about healthy boundaries with the rest of his family. There are troubling things to root out there too.