I Hate My Father’s Girlfriend
Your parents are divorced. Your father met someone new and now he has a girlfriend. Maybe she’s younger than him, maybe she’s not. The trouble is, you don’t like her.
Maybe you didn’t like her from the moment you met her, maybe it took a little while before you were turned off. The point is, you and she don’t get along.
Maybe you don’t like the idea that the ‘old man’ has got a girlfriend, period. After the divorce he was supposed to set up a separate home and live there alone, at least that is how you envisioned it would go. A girlfriend did not figure into your post-divorce plan for your family.
You’re probably still trying to get over the feelings you have about their divorce. You might even feel a little protective of your mother. If she’s alone and not dating or living with anyone, your unhappiness about your father’s new love-life will chances are be even worse.
It’s easy to feel like you’re about to lose even more when your separated or divorced parents start dating other people. Most adult children of divorce secretly hope their separated parents will be living apart only as long as it takes them to realize they should be living back together again as a family. This fantasy obviously applies only to those couples whose ‘toxicity’ levels were within manageable limits when they were together.
The fact is, they will probably never get back together. The fact is, they are probably trying to go on with their love-lives or at least they should. Getting along with your father’s girlfriend is something you do for him, and not really for yourself. It’s like a one way gift of love. Whether you like her or not is immaterial. The point is, he does, and that’s all that matters.
Of course, I’m not talking about situations where you see or hear about some form of abuse taking place. Like she’s emotionally abusive, or squandering his money while he stands by mesmerized. If that’s the case you have to do what’s right and interfere.
Of course, it won’t be pretty. Your father will probably accuse you of carrying out your mother’s secret directives to mess up his new love-life out of some deranged jealousy. Regardless, you love him and shouldn’t just standby and watch him get fleeced.
If you’re lucky, in time you’ll find something in your father’s girlfriend that is likable. This would allow you to have your own separate relationship with her. Of course the situation becomes even more important if your father truly loves her and plans to marry her.
Look at it this way, your father’s new love interest could be exactly what he and your mother need to jump start their separate love-lives. It’s very common for one divorced spouse to lag behind while the other goes on with his or her life. You don’t want that for your mother, right?
Once you’ve finally accepted the fact that their marriage is gone, you’ll realize that moving on with their love-lives is healthier. I know you want them to be healthy. Even if your father has chosen the wrong person to be his girlfriend (according to your estimation), he’s trying.
For that you have to give him credit. Of course, if the original reason they (your parents) broke up is because of his cheating on your mother, this whole thing will be considerably more difficult for you.
Every time you look at your father’s new lover, you’ll feel your mother’s pain as well as your own. The pain of losing your intact family. If his current lover is the woman who he had the affair with, there’s not much else to say. The chances of improving how you feel about her is slim at best. I don’t blame you for being upset.
If his current lover is someone else, you could give her chance. Remind yourself you shouldn’t be in the ‘middle,’ entangled in the emotions going on between your divorced parents, and your father has the right to go on with his love-life.
Comments? Welcome. Dr. Tom Jordan
Thank you for this article.
Almost everyone I know including myself would say I’m an easy going accepting person with any person in my life. But my single parents get involved with their new lovers, its a little annoying, no matter who they are. If I feel they are good for each other, or I personally enjoy them, then it is easier for me to accept. But if the person seems to me to be illogically chosen whether it be personal interest compatibility or just their own bonkersness, it will drive me to the edge of myself, silently cursing them and wishing they would be completely out of my life…I can’t describe the irking pain it gives me. I’ll get completely insensitively critical of them. Right now I’m speaking about my Dad’s new girlfriend who he met in person twice before she moved in our home. I knew her for two days before he said she’s moving in, she was already packed and ready for it..so it wasn’t even an option it seemed. If she actually made him happy and was into the same things as him, I think I would be more sympathetic and embrace it, but they aren’t. My dad loves the outdoors and physical activities, she doesn’t. She’s into being paranoid about NWO GMOs and how corrupt everything is, and my dad can’t stand talking about those things. I feel my dad is in it for the sex and their common religion, or cult, Eckankar. A strange thing is that I mostly have the same beliefs as her about conspiracy theories, but she is so fanatically paranoid about them that she has actually given me anxiety attacks, which I never have experienced before. I really feel a strange squirrelly energy from her as she tries to be so fakely positive and happy. She told me from the beginning not to talk about negative things because she feels a dark force come around her..I think she’s schizophrenic to be honest..I see a strangeness in her wide open eyes and in how fast she talks with gitters. All in all from the moment I heard she was moving in I was pissed..so this might be adding to my assumptions about her mental health, but I do think she is unstable, and my dad is only there for the sex and religious belief fixes.
My ex girlfriend, though, has just broken up with me a month before she moved in, which added to my stress and anxiety I believe, as we had a home together with two dogs and I was completely content, until she said you need to get out..moving back to my hometown was like amnesic experience, like none of what I built with my ex lover had happened..so moving back into my Dad’s with a psycho moving in really tipped me over the edge. I need to get out, but I hate paying for rent, but at this point it sounds way better than needing to go through turmoil with this fake witch. My dad and I used to be to ends of a river, and now it feels like a giant beaver dam has blocked our flow, and I just can’t stand it anymore.