Eighteen years ago, at about this time, I sat in the departure lounge of Qantas Airlines Brisbane, Australia, holding my youngest daughters hand, before I departed on a plane. It wasn't any plane, it was a plane that would take me to the USA. When my flight was called for boarding, I held back, holding my daughters hand, until last call. I crouched down, hugged her and kissed her.
"Daddy loves you chickybabe."
I stood, turned, and headed down the gantry tears streaming down my face.
I had no expectation at that time of the events that would follow, that would result in that being the second last occasion I saw that child.
That child is now a grown woman, living her own life, making her own decision. One of those decision is not to have any relationship with me.
I still have her email of four words "Don't contact me again."
My Father, divorced himself, was the scourge of parental alienation with untruthfulness perpetrated by my mother as to why my He wasn't in my life. Later as a teenager, I came to discovered the truth, and even later, as a divorced father myself, learnt that what goes unchallenged, becomes accepted as "the new normal".
But for some, that "new normal" is all they know. As was done to me, was done to the mother our children by her own mother. Years ago - maybe before we were married, the girls mother ran into her Father and when she later sought out to verify the stories she had been told by her mother - his ex wife, she was faced with the reality that what she heard was not accurate. Faced with the consequences, she choose to exclude her Father, unable to accept, that her mother had lied to her about why her Dad was not in her life.
In my forthcoming book, I included this, and other examples of the parental alienation I endured, for two reasons.
It's been 18 years past since I departed Australia, but I never departed my role as a Father. Someday, someone will run into my daughters and say "I read what your Dad went through."
The second reason is its been 18 years past since I left Australia. I write for the next guy. The next guy could be my ex wifes only son - the half brother to my daughters. I thought I was good enough to stop the promulgation of alienation. Here's hoping that my daughters brother does better than those in the family before him.
