poor relationship with adult son

[Notsossuperdad]

I would appreciate some advice as to what to do about the estranged relationship with my adult son. He is 25 years of age.

Four years ago I left his Mum, my wife of 28 years, for my now wife of 2 years. We had a six month affair which I am not proud of. My affair shocked everyone including myself my exwife and my son. He was in his last year of university when I left. I purposely waiting until then to leave to protect him from witnessing it.

From the moment he knew about the affair he has refused to talk to me other than when I first left and that was to tell me how disgusting I am to treat any woman let alone his mother with such disrespect and our family like old furniture to throw on the bonfire. At first I was angry. at his reaction and betrayal. I was so happy in my new relationship that I could not imagine he would not come round and reallythought he would so stood my ground. I had stayed in a marriage where felt unappreciated for years and felt this was my time now after sacrificing staying for him. I tried to tell him that but he accused me of blaming him for not being man enough to try and sort things out or leave in a decent way. My exwife also refused to speak to me other than on the unavoidable logistics needed to separate a life of 30 years. That left me heartbroken. I know that sounds a ridiculous thing to say but I really dont think I realised that deep down I still loved her deeply. She was my childhood sweetheart and I still remember the first time I saw her. I could never have feelings that profound for anyone else and we have a bond that can never be broken or replaced. I have only just come to that realisation after 2 years of therapy. I should of spoken up sooner and tried to change things but I was too distracted by having something new and exciting and a person that made me feel special. I see now through therapy that validation is a key need for me. Instead I let that upset turn to anger and we entered the usual vicious divorce battle.

My now wife treats me how I wanted my exwife to. She is affectionate and shows every day that she appreciates me and is always making an effort. I lam trying to be to her what I should have been to my exwife. Maybe if I had been different to her we would still be together and I do not want another divorce.

As to my son I have tried to reach out by sending cards and the odd text. At first he would reply to my texts to tell me to respect his decision and leave him alone and he will contact me if he changes his mind. Now he just point blank ignores them. I am so upset by his continued rejection I find it hard to carry on. I do not know what is going on in his life which is so difficult. I reached out recently to my exwife a few months ago for help. She was actually civil and said that she understands my sadness but that this is something he and I need to sort out and whatever I think she has not encouraged him to not speak to me. I believe her I think. At first I thought she was behind him not or at least encouraging it but my brother sees my son still and says its very clear it is his choice. He will not tell me anything as my son has asked him not to and he feels he must respect that. My current wife and her family are not so sure and think my exwife is behind it and that my brother is being disloyal. For a long time I became embroiled in that and almost found comfort in sessions where we would demonise and critique my exwife. Some days I feel ashamed at doing that and have a need to hug her and just say I am sorry. Others I still blame her. I think my exwife and son think I have just ran off without a care in the world. that is so far from the truth.

I would appreciate some advice and especially from those of you that have been left having to support a child that feels let down on what to do next. I do not think my son will ever accept my new life and I would settle for just the two of us having contact. My wife is not happy that he looks down on her so I am always in conflict as if I show too much sympathy for his view it upsets her. To avoid that I do a lot of my grieving privately. She is very clear that she would welcome my son if he wanted to be a part of her life but i think deep down him not being suits her because of his views about her. For me it is not his say what i do. My brother said my son told him he cannot see how my wife and I think it is okay to openly celebrate our relationship and put it on a pedestal even though it has wrecked his and mine. I see his point but what can I do? I generally try and keep things quiet as I am more introvert and I do not want to do anything to make things worse. But my wife is very active on social media and makes lots of posts about our life like our holidays, engagement party, wedding, honeymoon etc. her view is that my son is an adult and needs to either not look or get a grip. I see her point too which makes this very tricky. I feel like I am walking a tightrope.

My wife and i are also trying for a baby. She is a fair bit younger than me and understandably wants a child. I fear that if I cannot build sone form of bridge with my son before that happens it will definitely never be repaired so am keen to try and do so as soon as possible.

This may be the case it may not.
As it is it is your view is pure speculation

@Notsossuperdad You can't just 'fix' the relationship with your son. Try to look at it from his perspective - you were a family unit until you suddenly left - his whole life has been destroyed. He's loyalty has been split into two and its natural that he would side with his mother who is, in most peoples eyes, the injured party. You can't expect or force him to understand why you had an affair and/or why you left. He needs time to reassess his situation, adjust to how his perception of you as part of the solid unit has changed, to adjust to no longer being the most important person in your life etc etc. He's probably realised that he has no respect for you anymore and doesn't know how to or even if he wants to get it back. You can't force this to happen or make it happen more quickly. Whatever your reasons, however justified they are, you broke up your family and started a new one.

My ex and I had a very amicable divorce with no one else involved but our three older teenaged children still struggled with the split. They really struggled with him introducing new girlfriends to them and when he remarried 3 years after the split they were very reluctant to go to the wedding but did, as a team of 3, to support their dad. They would rather spend time with him alone rather than him and his new wife although they are pleasant to her and buy her birthday and christmas gifts. They really are not happy when she introduces them as her step children!

If this is the result of an amicable split, imagine what your poor son is going through!

Instead he stayed on in the marriage for the sake of the son who is 25, a grown man not an infant.

In some ways, I think it’s even harder when you are an adult and can see and judge the behaviour if your parent. That man cheated in his dwife, his childhood sweetheart. And you’d like his ds to ignore that? To see him just as dad, perfect in every way (because that’s how young children see their parents) and take no notice if the disrespect?
im nit surprised the ds reacted in that way. Separating can be part of life. Cheating doesn’t have to be accepted ‘because it’s dad’.

As fir staying fir the sake if his child…. Hmm… I agree with the ds, that’s telling the ds is responsible. Responsible fir his dad unhappiness for years (even though the OP admits he didn’t treat his ex well, Wo talking about the affair). Responsible for the affair (it was too hard) etc…
When actually it simply worked better for him to stay rather than live on his own and take 59/50 responsibility of his own child.

Reverse

It sound like your ex-wife has done an amazing job of bringing up your son for him to have such great respect for women. Unfortunately for you it seems he doesn’t have your lack of morals, so I think you will never rebuild your relationship with him. He is a better man than you. Men like you never think of the consequences of their actions. You haven’t left an unhappy marriage, you have cheated. That is unforgivable. You have made a fool of your son and your ex-wife (but mainly yourself). Parents having affairs also creates toe-curling embarrassment for young adult children, as well as shaking their reality and perceptions to the core. As a young man your son sees you for what you are - a lying cheat. He obviously respects and loves his mum more than he does you because no one becomes as self-absorbed as you sound overnight. A lot of adult children cut their parents off in situations like this. Your new wife sounds like she’s claiming you as a prize by splashing it all over social media, and now you are trying for a baby. Your wife sounds very immature. Wonder how long it will take for you to get bored of her? Your wife believes your son should just accept things. I think the reality is you need to accept your son wants nothing to do with you or your new wife. Let him get on with his life without your self-absorbed drama, you have ruined his life enough.

When my father left home my brother and I would have been thrilled to receive a card or phone call.
There is no one size fits all. Some children love their parent so much they will move on from horrible cruel behaviour while others will bear a grudge to the end of time.

@GreekDogRescue sadly it’s a common theme. Many of the threads on here follow a very predictable pattern of the blame being placed on the woman for not making enough ‘effort’ in the marriage when an affair is uncovered. ‘Effort’ is typically code for sex.

When this is unpicked, it is sadly often about the woman being too physically and mentally exhausted to sleep with their husbands regularly because of the mans lack of initiative and weaponised incompetence. I have had friends who have been cheated on in their pregnancies and the first year of their children being born because they weren’t intimate enough with their partners. Oddly enough, this was usually not raised by the man in the relationship or even a point of discussion. The solution was typically the man turning passive aggressive and not addressing their feelings whilst shagging someone else.

This may well not be the case and I could be wrong, but the tone the OP writes with stinks of entitlement.

Telling him that you stayed as long as you did, FOR HIM, that you sacrificed god knows what FOR HIM, that you let things drag on way past the point where you could have either saved your marriage or exited with kindness and dignity - FOR HIM?

That's the big mistake here.

Putting this on him is so massively unfair because he never knew you were apparently just miserably existing until you could scarper and he was always powerless to do anything about it either way. That's a horrendous burden to put on him. He didn't know, he wasn't one of the two parties to the marriage and yet it's on him that you stayed too long and then burned everything to the ground?

You don't seem to acknowledge that you haven't just initiated a separation when your son was an adult and out of the home - you have pulled the rug out from under his happy family and stable childhood and youth, telling him all that was a lie, you were miserably enduring until you could get the hell out of Dodge.

Your son is the youngest person in this constellation and should get the most slack for any potential lack of maturity in his response. Is your new wife closer in age to your son than to you/your ex-wife's age? Are you really surprised he finds that unrelatable?

You think you didn't leave your son but it was inevitable that he was left to pick up the pieces with his mother. Who else was going to? And yes, the timing wasn't great when he was torn between that and focussing on his finals, but it's not really about the timing, it's your narrative for the reasons.

If you are to have any contact it should be to listen to HIS narrative, his interpretation of events and how it affected him - over and over if necessary, without interjecting, just letting him have his say. But not until he is ready.

Nonsense.

He had an affair and now blames everyone else when the chickens have come home to roost.

You can't blow up somebody's life, causing immense hurt, and expect there to be no consequences. Especially when you then start blaming the people you've hurt for not being able to just get over it. 🙄

@Notsossuperdad I understand your desire to reconnect with your son because you still love and like him....however it isn't the same for him.

I suspect he doesn't like, respect or love YOU anymore because of your behaviour. That's really hard for you but the cost of your new life and unhappiness is the loss of your son. You may need to grieve for what you have lost...overtime the pain will decrease.

Also remember, Adults have a choice who they have in their lives. Parents don't have God given right to have a relationship, you have to earn it and quite simply you destroyed his trust and revealed a side to your character which was deeply unappealing.

Perhaps he is afraid to associate with you because he doesn't want your character traits to rub off on him. Perhaps he is wisely choosing to only associate with people he respects.

I imagine your son can't relate to you anymore which is why he doesn't feel the need for you to be in his life. Your new wife really needs to mature and try to imagine how she would feel should the same situation happen to her.

You say you left your wife at a good time for your son, I dont think you did as leaving in his final year at university would have messed him up big time. He could have dropped out of university but you did it anyway. I dont want to pile on here but if you really cared about him you would have waited until his exams were finished

Definitely its not a reverse- too self absorbed and long. Sorry @Notsossuperdad - this is the consequence of what you did, the choice is your sons as to what happens next. You see yourself as a martyr who stuck with a relationship for his sake- he sees you as the man who cheated on his mum, blindsided her and left her for greener pastures. What happens now is his choice- you made yours.

@Notsossuperdad
You have no idea how devastated children- yes, even adult children- can be when their father leaves for another woman.

Of course your son isn't going to ''Like'' your new wife!

He has seen the devastation your leaving has had on his Mum.

You were thinking with your dick, and the new woman made herself available, probably knowing you were a married man. She's just as bad in my opinion.

She's frantically trying to get pregnant, and then what?

Hoping {Probably} that her baby will take your mind off your son?

Your son is obviously hurt and betrayed and angry.

In a divorce, it's always the kids that hurt the most.

In short, you acted like a complete arsehole to the people you were supposed to love and cherish, but now you're upset that they're treating you like you're a complete arsehole (despite your behaviour dictating that you are one?)

Can you honestly not see how ridiculous you're being?

If you want people to treat you like a loving, respectful human being, you need to BE a loving and respectful human being.

The end.

Of course it isn't!

Your poor son. Not only have you betrayed him and his mother, you're now gaslighting them both (as well as your brother, who has actually stepped up for his nephew).

Instead of trying to understand his feelings, you're accusing him of betrayal and attacking the people closest to him. And you really can't work out why he wants nothing to do with you?

OP, this is the consequence of your actions 🤷🏻‍♀️ ‘what am I meant to do, whatever I do is wrong, what can I do, what can I do?’ - that angst is the price you pay for your choice. Fine to make your choice, but accept the payoff. You can’t have it both ways and expect everyone to just nod their heads and react how you want them to.

Ooooh tempted to say the same to my FIL (except we don’t speak). You sound just like him!

I think the crux of it for your son is that the ‘right thing’ is not doable at this point. The right thing was to either not leave his mum, or to leave her THEN start a new relationship. So indeed, you can’t do the right thing now.

Have you tried to see it from his point of view? Maybe what your son would say might go something like this:

I don't talk to my Dad anymore, I have gone no contact. Four years ago he threw a grenade into our lives because we found out he had been having an affair. How could be to that to Mum? How could a man I loved and looked up to be such a liar and cheat? I thought he had some honour. I wouldn't have liked my parents splitting up but, if he was truly that unhappy, why not arrange counselling or just start divorce proceedings if their marriage was that intolerable? Instead his head was turned by a woman far younger than him and he threw us away for a woman who no doubt flattered his ego and he enjoys having her on his arm showing off to his mates. Now he keeps trying to talk to be and 'build a relationship' I am too hurt and angry. He thinks he can have the same relationship with me as he had before he cheated, but he can't.

He's clearly happy with his new life, his new wife posts a lot on social media. Neither of them can have any emotional intelligence if they cannot see how hurtful that is.

Surely you should have thought of your son BEFORE you got into bed with a much younger women. It might have been different if you'd have decency to leave your wife if you were not happy with her. Then start to look for a new relationship. You didn't pay your wife that basic courtesy instead you cheated on her. I doubt your son will ever forget that and if you have another child you will lose your eldest son forever, so be prepared for that. My exh did what you did too. My eldest son refuses to speak to his father over 15 years later. He gets on very well with his stepdad though. He sends father's Day cards and gifts to his stepdad.

Definitely a reverse.

Or a total berk.

I’m short - you reap what you sow.

In long - have seen so (SO!) many men do this. Affair. Younger woman. Irreparably damage the family unit (kids don’t want anything to do with them etc). The go on to marry. Have more children.

Honestly ? These men are some of the most unhappy specimens of humanity I ve ever known. Two (one my own father) died alone and depressed.

What is new and shiny does not stay that way. New wife won’t treat you like you are the star of her life forever….

You must have done something right (even if it was just marrying a good woman), because your son seems to have the integrity that you sorely lack.

I’m your son in this scenario, with my father. There’s some more to it in my case and I maintained a very shallow level of contact until last year when something trivial blew up.

You speak a lot about how you feel, what you want and what you deserve. What about what your son feels, wants and deserves? Have you considered that for a single moment? Without then reflecting it back to you?

Whether you agree or not, he has made his decision and all you can do is respect that, or not. My father doesn’t respect it and sends me and my children cards. I feel harassed, bullied and like he’s trying to manipulate me. They may not be sent with those intentions but it’s how they’re received.

You need to back off him. If he’s ready one day and wants a relationship he will let you know. In the mean time leave him alone.

You can want a relationship with him as much as you like, he doesn’t have to want the same. It is very sad for both you and him, but he doesn’t owe you anything, nor does your ex wife. You might want a conversation with her but she absolutely does not have to give you that.