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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think this is hope?

12 replies

netflixprice · 19/10/2023 21:44

Me (63 year old male) and my daughter (31 year old woman) have been trying to repair our relationship for many years. I left her at 11 to go and marry someone half way across the world. It really impacted my daughter and we have tried to mend our relationship since then. My daughter describes being around me as 'physically cringing' and 'tense'.

For the past few years she visits when suits her and I go with it.

Tonight I just received this message from her. - I love you dad ❤️ sorry I’m not the best daughter and don’t visit enough. But I do think about you every day and love you a lot xx

I am made up but don't want to get my hopes up. But AIBU to think this may be her giving an olive branch?

OP posts:
Squiggles23 · 19/10/2023 23:29

Sounds like it 😊

Aquamarine1029 · 19/10/2023 23:44

Interesting. Why would she need to extend and olive branch to you? You are the one who abandoned her. You were the adult who made the choice to flounce out of your 11 year old child's life to live your best life, not giving a shit about the lifelong impact that would have on her. Parent of the Year, eh?

Am I supposed to view you as some kind of hero now? A poor bloke at the mercy of his daughter's moods?

Sorry, I'll save my sympathies for someone who didn't skip out of their child's life. It's absolutely amazing she communicates with you at all.

Ahwhatthehell · 20/10/2023 00:47

I really hope you answer her text explaining that you too love her dearly and that you apologise profusely for letting her down when she was younger.

The language you use - ‘we have tried to mend our relationship’ - is a little odd, considering it should be you making all the effort.

Yet here she is sending a lovely text, I hope you can prove yourself worthy of it now. Even if you didn’t in the past.

HaroldMeaker · 20/10/2023 00:51

Let's face it you were are crap dad.

Fionaville · 20/10/2023 01:00

You did an awful thing. One of the worst things a father could do (bar physically hurt her)
So, yes be grateful that she has found within herself the ability to forgive you. Give her all that love back, more so. I hope you've apologised and told her how grateful you are that she loves you!

FloofCloud · 20/10/2023 01:11

Well you literally walked away from her as a child so you e got a lot to do to engage and apologise / rebuild trust for her.
Give her time, understanding and take responsibility for this , 100% your fault, 0% hers so you've got to be committed to u set stand in g s as s forgiveness

SwingTheMonkey · 20/10/2023 01:13

I sincerely hope you told her that she absolutely hasn’t been a bad daughter and that the only person to blame for your poor relationship is you…

L1ttledrummergirl · 20/10/2023 01:17

Why is she apologising for your bad parenting?

You haven't repaired your relationship, you have compounded your desertion of your daughter by trying to make it her fault and making her feel guilty.

Your an arsehole in my opinion who has got a fuck ton of work to do to get anywhere near the starting line of mending your relationship.

Lavender14 · 20/10/2023 01:19

To me it reads as a lingering bit of her that feels she did something wrong to make you leave that she needs to apologise for. So even now as an adult she's apologising for behaviours she's having in reaction to your behaviour as if it's her fault in the hope of gaining your affection back. I'm sure that's how she felt at 11. Rejected and like she did something that meant she wasn't worth staying for but at the same time wanting to be better so her dad would love her more.

It might also be hope because this is your opportunity to lift that off her completely and own that it was entirely your poor choices and selfish behaviour that got you both to this place. (I'm not saying that harshly just truthfully). It's your job to repair this, it's your job to do the chasing and rebuilding and to accept that whatever you get in return is a privilege many other absent fathers wouldn't get.

Catsmere · 20/10/2023 05:44

Aquamarine1029 · 19/10/2023 23:44

Interesting. Why would she need to extend and olive branch to you? You are the one who abandoned her. You were the adult who made the choice to flounce out of your 11 year old child's life to live your best life, not giving a shit about the lifelong impact that would have on her. Parent of the Year, eh?

Am I supposed to view you as some kind of hero now? A poor bloke at the mercy of his daughter's moods?

Sorry, I'll save my sympathies for someone who didn't skip out of their child's life. It's absolutely amazing she communicates with you at all.

Exactly. This sounds like the sort of crap my father would have come out with. He tried to pull the "want to get to know you" shit with me in my thirties, when he'd waltzed off when I was eight. Hadn't even the courage to write direct, but asked my mother - the one he'd deserted - to facilitate it! I reminded him he'd had his chance and had never been interested when I was a child, and btw did his second wife know he was writing, or was this all behind her back? Never heard from him again, mercifully.

SBHon · 20/10/2023 06:00

But AIBU to think this may be her giving an olive branch?
She owes you none and you owe her a whole fucking forest‘s worth.

WhatNoRaisins · 20/10/2023 06:48

It sounds like she loves you but doesn't trust that you'll stick around. She's trying to protect herself from being abandoned again.

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