u/Sweet_Face2277

WHYYYYYY is it so normalized for dads to be dead beats???? Dads are just as much of a parent to a child or children as moms are. They BOTH created that child. Just because the mother made and carried that child doesn’t mean that she should be taking on all of the responsibility alone. Why do they get away with doing less than the bare minimum?? And no it’s not all dads, there are some great dads out there. But the majority of men who are fathers don’t do nearly as much as mothers. My son’s dad is barely around, barely calls our son, doesn’t do appointments or school registration or activities or regular day to day care never has to cook meals. It’s just something I cannot accept and maybe I need to so it doesn’t continue making me so angry, but it’s literally 2026. The stigma that moms are the ones who do everything while dads do whatever they want needs to end. Best believe I put my son’s dad on child support as soon as I saw that he wasn’t physically supporting our child. He has an income withholding order but if it weren’t for that, he wouldn’t pay. It’s absolute bare minimum per month. He also has great insurance through his job but refuses to put our son on it. I just don’t get it and it makes me so mad. I couldn’t imagine going weeks without seeing my child and not knowing what and how he’s doing every day and not being involved with raising him. How are they not guilty??

I am the 2nd oldest of 4 kids. My mom and dad divorced in 2008 when I was 11 years old. My dad was having an affair with a family friend. The divorce was very messy and my dad immediately put the woman he had an affair with above us. We started being with him every other week and during that time we were miserable. He would limit how much we could eat, he would tend to his wife’s and wife’s daughter’s needs before ours, he wouldn’t let us speak to our mom, and he was always angry with us. Eventually custody switched to him having us every other weekend, and things continued to get worse. One day, things were really bad at his house and the police were called. I can’t remember exactly what happened but after that I never went back to my dad’s house. He slowly stopped reaching out to me, stopped trying to see me, stopped any contact. He still had my 2 younger siblings every other weekend but eventually he lost custody of them as well. He cut off all contact with all of his 4 kids. When all of us had turned 18 except for my youngest sister, he signed his rights to her over to our stepdad at the time, who actually ended up leaving us too. When I graduated high school, he randomly showed up after not having contact with me for 2-3 years and gave me a note saying that he’ll always be here for me etc. but he continued to not want anything to do with me. From that day in 2015 to present, the only contact we had was him telling me he was kicking me off of his health insurance. I happened to be pregnant at that time and I told him that and he told me “best wishes”. He never contacted me again after that. I am 29 now and have struggled so much to heal from my father. I have bad codependency issues, self esteem issues, and look for the void my dad left in other men. We still live in the same town, he lives with the same woman and her daughter (his step daughter) as well as my half brother whom was born around the time he lost custody of me. It’s so hard thinking about how he has 4 kids that he raised for many years and then just went to no contact with them and not even caring about them. He walked his step daughter down the aisle at her wedding and that was so painful for me because one thing I get really upset about is the fact that I don’t have a dad to walk me down the aisle when I get married someday. I often wonder what he tells people when he’s asked how many kids he has. I wonder if he feels guilty, I wonder if he misses us, I wonder if he wants to reach out but never does. It’s so weird because I am still mourning the fact that I don’t have a father, but if he were to reach out and want to reconcile, I wouldn’t. He is a very toxic and mentally ill man who never got help. He has bipolar disorder and is a diagnosed narcissist. My other siblings have moved on and it doesn’t affect them much anymore, but it still affects me so much every single day.

My 5 year old son’s dad and I met in our junior year of high school (2014ish) I was going through some tough family stuff and being a middle child of 4 kids, being with him made me finally feel seen and wanted. It was no relationship to write home about. But I had never seen a healthy relationship in my life. After about a year of dating, I was on vacation with family when a girl I knew from school messaged me and told me that he had been cheating on me. I stupidly stayed with him but we ended up breaking up the beginning of my senior year. He had dropped out of school. The break up was messy, he went insane saying he was going to drive his car into a ditch, etc. and he couldn’t be without me. After that, we both went our separate ways and both got into other serious relationships. Fast forward to 2019, I was about to finish college and ended up breaking it off with my boyfriend at the time. I reconnected with some friends from high school and we eventually ran into my son’s dad while we were out. Him and I rekindled pretty quickly and ended up back together. About a year later I found out I was pregnant. When our son was only 10 months old, we had a huge break up that was extremely messy and we both did and said awful things to each other. After I moved out we ended up being on and off constantly for the next few years (2022-present). The last time we were together was the beginning of 2025. Sometimes he will be so kind and nice and caring and other times he is so cold and mean and disrespectful. He doesn’t see our son much, I am the primary parent and I have our son about 90% of the time. He doesn’t show any recognition or appreciation for how much I do and how great of a mom I am to our son. He works out of town Monday-Friday and doesn’t see our son until usually Sunday’s. He doesn’t even call or text during the week to see how our son is doing or to talk to him. Lately I’ve been crying every single night after my son goes to sleep, mourning that love I felt with his dad. But even knowing all of the horrible things we’ve done to each other, I still can’t move on. And I don’t know why. I’m in therapy and hoping to find some peace that way, but right now it seems impossible.

My 5 year old son’s dad and I met in our junior year of high school (2014ish) I was going through some tough family stuff and being a middle child of 4 kids, being with him made me finally feel seen and wanted. It was no relationship to write home about. But I had never seen a healthy relationship in my life. After about a year of dating, I was on vacation with family when a girl I knew from school messaged me and told me that he had been cheating on me. I stupidly stayed with him but we ended up breaking up the beginning of my senior year. He had dropped out of school. The break up was messy, he went insane saying he was going to drive his car into a ditch, etc. and he couldn’t be without me. After that, we both went our separate ways and both got into other serious relationships. Fast forward to 2019, I was about to finish college and ended up breaking it off with my boyfriend at the time. I reconnected with some friends from high school and we eventually ran into my son’s dad while we were out. Him and I rekindled pretty quickly and ended up back together. About a year later I found out I was pregnant. When our son was only 10 months old, we had a huge break up that was extremely messy and we both did and said awful things to each other. After I moved out we ended up being on and off constantly for the next few years (2022-present). The last time we were together was the beginning of 2025. Sometimes he will be so kind and nice and caring and other times he is so cold and mean and disrespectful. He doesn’t see our son much, I am the primary parent and I have our son about 90% of the time. He doesn’t show any recognition or appreciation for how much I do and how great of a mom I am to our son. He works out of town Monday-Friday and doesn’t see our son until usually Sunday’s. He doesn’t even call or text during the week to see how our son is doing or to talk to him. Lately I’ve been crying every single night after my son goes to sleep, mourning that love I felt with his dad. But even knowing all of the horrible things we’ve done to each other, I still can’t move on. And I don’t know why. I’m in therapy and hoping to find some peace that way, but right now it seems impossible.

My 5 year old son’s dad and I met in our junior year of high school (2014ish) I was going through some tough family stuff and being a middle child of 4 kids, being with him made me finally feel seen and wanted. It was no relationship to write home about. But I had never seen a healthy relationship in my life. After about a year of dating, I was on vacation with family when a girl I knew from school messaged me and told me that he had been cheating on me. I stupidly stayed with him but we ended up breaking up the beginning of my senior year. He had dropped out of school. The break up was messy, he went insane saying he was going to drive his car into a ditch, etc. and he couldn’t be without me. After that, we both went our separate ways and both got into other serious relationships. Fast forward to 2019, I was about to finish college and ended up breaking it off with my boyfriend at the time. I reconnected with some friends from high school and we eventually ran into my son’s dad while we were out. Him and I rekindled pretty quickly and ended up back together. About a year later I found out I was pregnant. When our son was only 10 months old, we had a huge break up that was extremely messy and we both did and said awful things to each other. After I moved out we ended up being on and off constantly for the next few years (2022-present). The last time we were together was the beginning of 2025. Sometimes he will be so kind and nice and caring and other times he is so cold and mean and disrespectful. He doesn’t see our son much, I am the primary parent and I have our son about 90% of the time. He doesn’t show any recognition or appreciation for how much I do and how great of a mom I am to our son. He works out of town Monday-Friday and doesn’t see our son until usually Sunday’s. He doesn’t even call or text during the week to see how our son is doing or to talk to him. Lately I’ve been crying every single night after my son goes to sleep, mourning that love I felt with his dad. But even knowing all of the horrible things we’ve done to each other, I still can’t move on. And I don’t know why. I’m in therapy and hoping to find some peace that way, but right now it seems impossible.