This was a very difficult decision for me to make. One of the final straws was watching my ex start to talk to my adolescent daughter in the same way he did to me...demeaning and disrespectful.
When she started to grow up and have a mind of her own, he became completely alienated from her. They now have very little contact (she's 16), largely by his choice. But also by hers. He has been emotionally abusive to her.
You have no idea how sad this makes me. My kids deserved to have a father that loved and protected them. I made a bad choice, and my kids have suffered because of it.
Yikes! Glad you were able to get out of a bad situation. Your story underlines the good that came from feminism and the growth of female participation in the workforce. I fully believe that that is the case and I honor feminism for doing so. However, there are unintended consequences. Feminism may be the wrong place to lay blame, but if not feminism then feminism is a corollary effect.
I would say that feminism, in some ways, has allowed men to feel less attached maritally. Women ARE capable of handling things, and men seem to feel little remorse or guilt for abandoning their families, as a consequence.
I have only to look at my own situation. My ex went from being a full-time dad to a 30% dad. These days, that seems to be about as much as he's willing to invest. He rarely goes beyond 30%. He built a life around himself, and that's what he does.
His daughter went with him to a family reunion, and reported that he said, in a group of family members..."I have 3 priorities...tennis, sex, and beer." My daughter, who is 16, picked up on the fact that his kids weren't even on the list of priorities.
I am not saying the traditional family structure was perfect - far from it as women were trapped by their inability to survive independently. Single parent households carry their own damaging baggage. A new stable family structure has failed to appear. I believe that new family structure is the clan marriage.
In our case, my brother and sister in law, and their kids, and my close friends serve as a surrogate family structure with us. We pitch in and help each other and spend a lot of time together. Most of the families I know don't have much family nearby, so we've formed our own. We socialize together, tote kids around, and take care of each other.
True enough. Personally, I will never get married so that I will never get divorced.
I've noticed that a lot of couples that I know these days, with kids, aren't married. They don't seem any less stable than my marriage was. In fact, they seem more stable.
I would say that at least half of the marriages on my street are miserable.