How You Go Through Deadbeat Dad Situatio

[StephanieR2]

I was reading this blog http://susiead.blogspot.com/2011/07/real-price-that-deadbeat-parents-pay.html and I was asking myself what was the best attitude to use to go through a deadbeat dad situation, which I'm currently going through.

Do you feel like you're better off fighting every injustice that comes by with all your energy? Or do you think it's better to move on to the point that you will forget about it and spend your energy somewhere else, despite getting screwed on a few instances?

I find it personally hard to fight for the money that my children deserve because I know that somehow they probably feel that something is going wrong. I don't want my children to live in a stressful environment or be fake to them...

What do you think?

[jfjohnson13]

I have a daughter who just turned two. Her father is an alcoholic/addict who became abusive after her birth. I left him immediately, and she doesn't know who he is. She has seen him a couple times and only his first name was used. If your deadbeat has a job and can pay child support, all you have to do is file for it in court, and the judge will order it. Your children deserve that much. My take on it has become, I will take what I can get from him, but I won't waste my energy trying to get something that just isn't there. It is so much more important to let yourself heal and be a good mother than involve the deadbeat in ways that stress you out. He is, after all, a deadbeat, and you are the mother. You have to decide your limits and stick to them so your children have at least one healthy, happy parent who can be there for them!

[pharmer28]

i salute any single mom here. my mother was a single mother and she busted ass so we had food and shelter. We made the best out of it. Forget about him and move on to bigger and better things. All he will do is bring you down. I wish you the best dear

[regina1158]

My mother was a single mother and I have to say that all single mothers are amazing women. The best thing I can tell you is to keep you head up and stay strong. I would try and get support if you can but like everyone else says don’t stress yourself about it. As a single mother you just have to be strong and do your best to you can for your kids. When they grow up the will be thankful for everything you go through to provide for them. So hang in there it won’t always be easy but it can be done.

[diaperdad]

I am a single dad (why don't we get the same love and admiration as single moms?).

Here is my take on the deadbeat parent situation: You can fight, or you can use that energy to make your life better in another way. What are you fighting for? Can you get it in another way?

[Byuiso]

I agree I believe it is harder on Single Dads because they will always have to deal with the pressuring questions about Mommy...

[diaperdad]

I meant love and admiration from the general public, not our kids. The question was about dealing with deadbeat DADs not deadbeat PARENTS. Then pharmer28 said they salute any single mom, not they salute any single PARENT.

regina1158 says singles mothers are amazing women. Single dads are amazing men. Single PARENTS are amazing PARENTS.

[wolverin99]

I am a single father who has raised his daughter alone, now 7, since she was 6 months old. I changed the diapers, I made the bottles, I followed her around for six weeks with a camera waiting for her to take her first steps, I haul her to her brownie, dance, cheer meetings. I help with her class parties, go to the parent teacher meetings, volunteer for bus duty.

I do not get child support, I do not get help with insurance, or alimony or anything else. And before I taught my daughter how to read a calendar she barely ever saw her mother. The terrible feeling you have when a little girl stands at the window waiting for her mother to come pick her up, knowing there is a 90% chance she will be disappointed again, is one of the most painful feelings in the world.

I never say a bad thing about her mother in front of her, but I continually have to remind her mother that, "You are the parent, she is the child. Do not wait for her to call you, or to complain that you did not pick her up. Make promises you can keep, then keep them. It is that easy. I gave up a long time ago on ever getting any child support out of her. Sure I could take it to the county, but throwing her in jail will not help our situation or make her visit her daughter more often.

The other day in the car my daughter asked me, "Is it okay if I think a boy is cute?" "Of course," I answered, "Your dad is really cute!" She giggled, "No Dad, I mean a boy in my class?" I answered carefully, "Sure, it is okay for you to think a boy is cute." She reassured me, "I am not going to kiss him or anything!" I answered in my most outraged voice, "I should hope not!" She waited a bit and said, "You think it would be okay if someday I kissed a boy?" She had paused before she asked and now studied my face as I worked up an answer. Seven years of parenting flooded my head I realized that one day she was going to kiss a boy and there was nothing to I could do to stop it. She would not have a mother to run to and tell, and I had a choice to make. Would I be the father my father was? Should I be what society has expected of me? Would I be standing with a shotgun at the door ready to blink the porch light if they took too long outside the door?

I took a deep breath. "Someday you will kiss a boy, and it will be one of the most exciting days of your life. When that happens I want you to run and tell your Daddy, because I want to be just as excited."

She turned her head away from me, I could tell she was crying. But I knew I had said the right thing. My mother was a single parent and she had to be mother, father, friend and confident when I had no one else to turn to. It does not matter if you are a mother or father, and it does not matter if you have a deadbeat parent that is a mother or father. We all face the same thing, how do you handle it? I choose to put my daughter first. I know she is growing up to be an intelligent young woman that sadly, may have to face the same thing. When I wonder what I should do, I ask myself, what would I want my daughter to do, if this was her in the situation.