to be utterly disgusted with the father on Child of our Time?

[Bogeyface]

Who "had a phobia of needles" so he fucked off the Scotland and eventually shagged someone else because he "couldnt deal with it". Thereby, making his affair, him breaking up the family and breaking his wife and his childs heart, the fault of his child who got diabetes.

Even as he was speaking I thought "YOU FUCKING BASTARD!!!! Even after all this time you are making excuses!"

"Looking back, possibly it wasnt the best thing to do"

Oh, you think?!

No of course I dont think that. I mean that there was no editting involved in what he said. They didnt splice bits of film together to put words into his mouth. He said that he couldnt cope with his sons diabetes, that he took the job in Scotland so he didnt have to deal with it and then used his needle phobia as an excuse. However you edit it, he said those words.

At 12 years old this boy has been in secondary school for at least one, possibly even two years.

I wouldn't expect a 12 year old to say something along the lines of "Dad fell in love with someone else", maybe a 7 or 8 year old but at 12, no I would expect them to understand the concept of an affair. Also it appears the father is living in the same place and his new gf hasn't been mentioned so it comes across that it was or is an affair and not a new girlfriend or falling in love with someone else. I think saying affair is an age appropriate way of explaining dad was shagging someone else.

Bogey you think that no editing was involved? Really? So you think that this man just turned up and that was his whole interview?

As I said above, this is a TV show about children. Not about parents. Your OP is nasty, ignorant and deeply insensitive to the child because none of it is his fault and your blaming his dads response to his diabetes for the end of his parent's marriage is insensitive in the extreme. His parent's marriage broke down because of them. Not him. Not his diabetes. Them.

But, again, as I said above, The parent's relationship is not relevant to the show. Had this been a programme about marital breakdown, you would have heard something a lot different from the same interview.

As I said above, no not literally no editting. But he did say those words, he admitted it. I dont see how you can spin that to be anything other than what it is.

I didnt blame his dads response for the end of the marriage, his dad did. His dad admitted that he couldnt cope and ran away. I didnt say that, his dad did.

Bogey, that was one of many things his dad said in his interview. To take that as the only or real reason for the end of the marriage is naive at best.

I didnt say that that was the only reason for the end of their marriage. I said that HE said it was the reason.

As someone who has been cheated on I know that a cheater will pick on the reason they have convinced themselves was the cause of the problems and stick with it. He probably still believes that it was because of his "needle phobia" when in reality they were both going through a very hard time, depression, finding out about their sons condition, etc.

Actually, thinking about it, he said he couldnt deal with it and ran away. She said that he left when she needed him most. Was it the diabetes or the fact that his wife suddenly needed him?

I don't know Bogey. That child was diagnosed when he was 4yo. How long after that did the dad leave? Did he run away immediately?

I think that you are projecting your hurt and your betrayal onto a preteen boy, that you don't know, whose life is difficult enough.

a) My understanding is that he left pretty early on
b) How am I projecting when I have not been the wife in that situation?
and c) my "projection" is hardly going to affect a child who I dont know and have no connection with.

a) Your understanding is that he left pretty early. Where does that understanding come from? Were you told or are you filling in the blanks yourself?

b). You have already said that you were cheated on and then went on to post your understanding of men who cheat, so I think that you are embittered by your experience. I understand that, but your pain is your own. It is not this boy's.

c). You have started this post on a very prominent (perhaps the most prominent) Internet site for parents in the UK. Maybe the child will not read this. Maybe this thread will die. But if it doesn't, do you really want a preteen boy to think less if his father or, even worse, blame himself or his diabetes for the breakdown of his parent's relationship because of your post?

I have read trolls who post nastiness about the deceased making the same argument.

And you say I am projecting?!

His father admitted on TV that he left because he couldnt cope. What I do or do not post on MN will never compare to that.

I should say

a) I understood that from what the father said on the programme
b) yes I have been cheated on but I have never been left, when ill myself, trying to come to terms with and learn how to deal with my child having a lifelong (and if dealt with wrongly, potentially life limiting) condition
c) see above.

Yes Bogey I say that you are projecting. But so did you.

I said I was projecting about the cheating, not about anything else. RTFT

You were projecting onto the mother. You were projecting your feelings about the dad cheating. You have been projecting throughout this thread.

However you edit it, he said those words.

And he probably said a whole lot of other stuff with other information that you didn't see or hear. He may well have been lead by the interviewer into to saying something which, whilst basically true, is not what actually happened.

I thought this was going to be about the Dad (wills dad? still married) whose wife was upset she had never been able to go back to work after having children. He said something fucking patronising like 'she's got enough to do in the house'.

He had a phobia of needles. He couldn't cope. Yes he went about it the wrong way but sometimes just getting the heck out works best.

Well it's lucky the mum didn't have a phobia of needles and bugger off too isn't it, as otherwise the boy would have ended up in care.

I totally agree with what the Op is saying by the way and I haven't been cheated on, so no projecting here.

Actually it doesn't matter what caused the end of that couple's relationship, what matters is how poorly the father dealt with it!!!

By all means end a bad marriage, but don't simply absent yourself to escape it, leaving your depressed wife to cope with an ill child.

This is what the man did. He simply took a job hundreds of miles away. How did he think that boy would feel? Did he not think that boy might feel abandonned?

And even now, three years later, the boy said he still didn't have much contact with his Dad 'because he's always working'.

The issue here, is not that thisn man left, the issue is how little effort he made to help his son throguh the break up!

they both dealt with it badly.

And coming back to someone's point that he said what he said, again, if anyone remembers the child who went off to the choral school, the mother was seen to be saying something along the lines of "it's just so much quieter without him here," which was construed as them being glad he was out of the way. The same mother came on to a thread on mn after the programme was aired and confirmed that that line had been edited out of a different conversation and placed in that context to make it look as if that was what she had said when actually she hadn't. Anyone who thinks a programme can't be edited to make it sound as if someone said exactly what the makers want it to look like is delusional.

and I have no doubt that if it had been the mother unable to cope with the diabetes we would be seeing an entirely different thread. "walk a mile in someone's shoes/have no right to judge/probably has mental health issues," would probably enter into the equasion, but much different here because it's a man obviously.

I think the opposite. ie i think people judge a woman who walks out on her kids much more harshly than they do a man. If a man leaves people just think "Oh the relationship didn't work out, probably for the best." If I walked out on my kids tomorrow i doubt that's what anyone would be saying, and rightly so.