NOVEMBER, 2002 Volume 2, Issue 20 "GETTING THEM TO UNDERSTAND"

GETTING THEM TO UNDERSTAND

Although I had actually written something else for this newsletter, I saved it for a different month because there’s something bothering me more at the moment that I would like to discuss.

While I was recently in my International Support Chatroom, one of our women from overseas mentioned how difficult her week was. Her husband, who left six months ago, had her two children visit and they met this new boyfriend. He never told her, the mother of these children and primary custodial parent, about this man in his life, so she had no way to prepare her children for what to expect. It was very difficult for her to deal with the thought of her recently split husband to be with a man, and she saw how difficult it was for her children in their young teens to adapt to this.

This is where I come to a parting of the ways with some traditional gay fathers types of thinking. This to me is a blatant disregard for the feelings of the wife and the children. I don’t understand why gay men find it so difficult to understand that we have a major adjustment to make when it comes to accepting their homosexuality. This is the missing link of communication that always has me baffled. What has taken them years to struggle with and accept is expected to just settle in with us within hours, days or weeks.

Gay husbands say that they love us. They claim that they don’t want to hurt us—especially as they are about to leave the marriage. Many of them have already done the damage while they are in the marriages, but now that they are leaving, they want to “make last minute amends.” I am never quite sure how they are making these amends. I have on limited occasions met the gay husband who has given his family the financial or emotional support that the family needs after his departure. I have seen lots of women struggling very desperately as single mothers, working both full time and part time jobs at the same time to balance the bills. I’ve done it for many years, and I know that many of you who have written to me have had to do the same thing because of lack of viable support from your husbands.

I know that I made one major mistake in the aftermath of my marriage that I always tell other women in hopes that they will learn from it. When it came to child support, I never took my ex-husband to court to make sure that he could be more financially responsible to the children. I make no excuses here. I just never had the strength to do it. My ex-husband still had me mentally beaten down even in the years that followed our breakup. I was afraid to go up against him for fear of the verbal attacks he would spew at me. I always wanted to keep it friendly and upbeat for the sake of the children. I know that taking my ex to court would have destroyed that during the years when I was very emotionally vulnerable.

Was my ex financially responsible to us on his own accord? According to him, he was the “dream” ex-husband. He would have people believing that he did everything in the world for the children and me. In his own mind, he honestly believed this. Although his support was very minimal in comparison to what I needed or what I had to pay out daily, he felt no need to do better. For a number of years, his salary was double of mine, and yet, there were years that went by without any support at all. Yes, he would buy the children sneakers twice a year or give them nice gifts for the holidays such as stereos or televisions. He did buy them a bedroom set, and he even took them on trips. But this didn’t help resolve the day-to-day expenses that I had to somehow find a way to manage.

In order to survive financially, I had a second part-time job teaching for a local college. I have been blessed to find employment that fulfills my greatest goals of helping change the quality of life for people; however, working a full-time job that was always longer than full time, and a part-time job that required at least two evenings a week away from the children, put extra hardship on the family as far as spending quality time together. Those are times that can never be brought back, and sadly, these are times that many mothers write to me about with great regret. These are mothers who have to work two and even three jobs to try to balance out the finances that their husbands leave them burdened with.

Excuse me from diverting from my original thought, but I felt the need to express that one as well. Getting back to understanding our feelings when it comes to new relationships and the children, let me say this. There are varying schools of thoughts on whether or not to tell the children, when to tell the children, and the best way to tell the children about their father’s homosexuality. We’ve had these discussions in this newsletter from time to time, and although there are different points of view, I think the bottom line is, “Think of how it will effect the children.” Hopefully, that’s the first thought and not the last. Too many gay fathers in their excitement in coming to terms with themselves have blurted out this news in an untimely way and it has backfired on them and the family.

It’s funny how people have different perspectives of the same situation. When I read letters from the Gay Dad’s organization, I see letter after letter from fathers stating how wonderful their relationship with their children are now that they have revealed the homosexuality issue. Or, they say their relationships with their children would be wonderful if only their ex-wives weren’t poisoning the minds of their children. Now, I feel that it may be true that some ex-wives are saying unkind things about homosexuality. No doubt. But for the most part, I think it’s the lack of responsiveness and understanding the father has towards his children once the news is out. And, along the same vain, I don’t think that children are quite as excited and accepting about it as these fathers would like to believe. My children were never happy about it, and in fact, my son is quite embarrassed about it. He would never dare tell his friends that his father is gay. In fact, he hates the fact that his father is gay. I have found through the years that males are far less likely to be accepting to this news than females, and especially throughout the adolescent years. And trust me when I tell you that I was the most accepting and defending mother of homosexuality you can imagine. Never was heard a discouraging word out of my mouth—at least on the issue of homosexuality.

We all have strong emotions when it comes to how the gay father should be leading his life in front of the children. Some of us are just not ready for it. I know I wasn’t ready for it for quite a while after my marriage ended. When my ex finally had a meaningful gay relationship several years later, I had enough time to prepare myself for the impact it would have on my children. I had already been able to accept my ex’s homosexuality and had been exposed to the world of homosexuality while running my support group. And even then, it still felt awkward and uncomfortable at first. I was grateful that his boyfriend cared about my children and my children enjoyed being with him. In fact, he gave them more quality attention than their father did. And they became very fond of him as I did. I was sorry when the relationship ended several years later because he had become a pleasant part of our lives.

I know that I would have not fared very well had my ex dragged the kids into one of his early fly by night relationships. And I would have been very angry if he introduced the kids to one of his frequent lovers without telling me in advance. My children never knew about my ex’s homosexuality during his early exploits or even during his one long-term relationship until years later. I always appreciated that. It made things much easier for me. I cringed at the thought of my children finding out at a young age. On a personal level, I was happy that my ex didn’t have the need to take my children to gay outings in gay groups like gay fathers. I didn’t want my children to be part of something that they were too young to understand. Was I right about my feelings? I don’t know. They were my feelings, my gut instincts. I thought my children were too young to be exposed to a lifestyle that wasn’t theirs. My ex felt the same way and I was very grateful for that. Maybe on some psychological level, that’s why I never wanted to rock the boat when it came to the issue of financial support. I’m not looking for excuses, just an explanation!

What can be done about this? I think women have the right to set limits when it comes to the children, especially when they are the primary custodial parent. I think we have the right to be real clear on what’s acceptable as far as exposure of our children to what we feel will be uncomfortable as far as situations or information. I think we have the right to say to our ex’s that when someone new is involved with them, we have a right to know before our children walk into it so we can be prepared to discuss it with our children if they feel uncomfortable or confused. And—it is our business, no matter what they think. Anything that affects our children is our business. It needs to start becoming “more about us.” Our feelings need to count and to be heard. And our ex’s need to step back and start understanding our feelings.

Many ex’s complain about how long it takes us to accept their situations. Perhaps if they would put our needs equally next to theirs—not even ahead—then that adjustment period would be shortened by a significant amount. But as long as they keep doing whatever they please whenever they feel like it—especially when it comes to the children, don’t expect an atmosphere of mutual respect and acceptance to surface. In conclusion, guys—show us the money and show us the respect. Those are the ingredients to having a successful ex-marriage. sty, I am really, really glad that this is a new and different year.