Ask an absentee father.

[LadyForCamus]

I'm sorry; I wasn't trying to bait you with that question at all.  Every person's individual set of circumstances will yield different sets of possible outcomes.  Not knowing the specifics of yours, I was genuinely curious how the weighing of positive versus negative potential outcomes had turned out for you.  Obviously, if she has no idea that her "father" is not her bio-father, showing up on her door step would be devastating.

LOL, no..nononono, no apologies.  Not what this thread is about.  Besides, I'm not so fragile.   There's really nothing that anyone can say in this thread that I'd take as baiting, nothing that will get under my skin.  

Yeah, it;s likely to be shitty, that;s the thing that seems not to have crossed the mind of doorstep dads, shall we call them.  

I understand, and I agree.  My husband's bio-mom left when he was approx. one and a half years old.  She was 19, and his father was (is) a drunk who NEVER came around to help.  Always at the bar.  My husband was raised by his grandmother and he turned out an emotionally healthy, well-adjusted, hard working adult.  Bio-mom has made a descent attempt over the last few years to ignite a relationship with my husband and our son via phone conversations (she lives out of state) and he accommodates her because he understands that the connection helps assuage her obvious guilt, but he has no emotional or psychological need for her in his life.   There is no "mommy-gap" in his psyche.  She remains a stranger to him, and sometimes that's the best thing for everyone involved.

Sometimes, I'd agree.

I am genuinely sorry for your open wound.  [emoji45]  I can't imagine what it must feel like to have a child out in the world somewhere knowing that there aren't any realistic paths to healing that pain, or at least closing the gap.  

Like any of lifes disappointments, we learn to cope, right?  I'm mostly a jovial dude, not in spite of but because of these sorts of things in my life.  I used to be a sourpuss.....then I learned about -real- anguish, lol.

Perhaps you could reach out to her mother discreetly, and feel her out?  Maybe showing an interest from your end will generate some empathy (or maybe guilt) out of the ex?

Maybe, someday, here again though I'd leave the impetus with her mother.  I don't need her empathy and don't think she has anything to feel guilty about.  As terrible as it all might sound, from just this end of the convo, there are reasons for all of this, on the other end.   I make jokes, but she's a great person (I -did- marry her, I have good taste).  Strangely enough (or really, not, knowing the specifics), it's my own family that irritates the shit out of me in all this (and in our marriage it was the same for us both).  We parted on as amicable terms as any marriage does, I think.  There was only one lawyer, there was no argument, no case.  The last day I saw either of them was also the last day I hopped in the sack with the ex, lol.  

It just didn't work out, and our support networks were too far from each other for us to maintain anything beyond what we had.  She couldn't (and wouldn't) stay where we lived, which is where I'm from... thus the house needed to go(she is raising my daughter, after all - and why would I need that house if not for them?).   She wanted a clean slate and I wanted her to have what she wanted.  There are always consequnces to mistakes, they are inescapable - for someone.  I saw an opportunity to see to it that someone wasn;t going to be the woman who was determined to raise my child, and also to have a life apart from me - which she deserves. I should have added a caveat to the story earlier. She visits my family because it;s cheaper than a hotel, and she used to take our daughter to disney regularly. I think she just wanted to take our duaghter to disney, not deal with me, because if they were that close and I knew it I couldn't help myself, showing up babbling, whimpering and whining and begging and pleading. Who wants that noise? No one. They just wanted to see the Magic fucking Kingdom, rgr?

Well, it sounds like you handled the entire situation like a mature adult with only his family's best interests in mind. You certainly can't beat yourself up for THAT. The least she could have done is repay that selflessness with some interaction and involvement on her end. [emoji848]