And walk away from them totally, never wondering how they are, where they are or even what they look like?
I think it's really hard to understand how anyone could happily do this. My youngest daughter has never met her father. He ran off when I was pregnant and refused to even talk to me about her. He denies that she's his to his family and anyone else. Strangely his family do believe that she's his and contact me now and then to see how she is.
When dd was a baby I thought, naively perhaps, that it would be ok that she won't ever know her real dad. But now she's nearly 4 she's started saying things like 'I want to have a dad' and I feel bad because I made the choice to have a relationship with him in the first place iyswim. I hope she doesn't try to look for him when she grows up as I fear she'll be disappointed with what she finds.
Use our Single Parent forum to speak to other parents raising a child alone.
Lone parents
Do you ever wonder how a parent can deny the existence of their own child?
lottieandmia · 28/03/2013 11:27
i often wonder especially now im a mum, my dad left me at 10 weeks and ignored ny existence in favour of his older children from a previous relationship and the younger ones he had whilst cheating on my mum. But know what it is his loss i am happy and pretty normal my mum did just great on her own, so dont worry one brilliant mum is more than enough x
Gosh sorry for the essay it's all a bit raw for me at the moment. 
Yes fergoose I totally agree.
I stopped allowing ex to visit baby after he smashed my window, emotional abuse is one thing, smashing up my house is another.
He has bail conditions not to approach me so I cannot supervise contact and he cannot be trusted to have unsupervised contact (having 3 times endangered dds life and being a heavy pot smoker)
I contacted family mediation (the day after smashed window) and passed on details to him via family. They contacted him, no response. He spent weeks trying to intimidate and manipulate me (through my mum 
) and after 13 weeks finally contacted family mediation. He then tried to guilt me into arranging contact for her 1st birthday as he had left it too late for Fmc to organise in time.
I didn't and my justification was
If I was in his position I would have been standing outside the office of Fmc when they opened and would have done literally anything to get back to her.
He had since had 5 sessions of contact (2hrs once a week) been twenty mins late for 2 and ended on 15 mins early.
Yes, I also wonder how often/if they ever really think about their kids. I can't imagine they can with any clarity as they don't know what they are missing. Ex hasn't seen DD since she was 6mo and has only asked for one pic of her since moving in with his new g.f. I do always think he has no idea how much he is missing out on, but I doubt he ever will to be honest. These people just don't think like that.
DD is only 19mo and calls my dad Papa which is a bit embarrassing - he looks pretty young and I have given up explaining to people in restaurants etc that we are not a couple 
Any advice on how to sort that out She also gets very upset when he walks out of the room, which she used to do to me as well, and I worry this is some attachment to males thing (he visits about once a month).
perplex of course, thats totally up to you.
i jsut think sometimes people may say that as they long to have known/know someone as a parent.
eg- id love to have a husband, and say, Im MRS Husbandsname, i have ahUsband. (if that makes any sense).
.
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Pleased to help
Your dc can't have different fathers and be who they are don't feel guilty for giving them life.
We all have our crosses to bear in life, it makes us strong and gives us depth of character, every one (including our precious kids) must suffer sometimes or become an insufferable brat!
Stop looking at other families and thinking you've failed because your doing it by yourself, it's not as cut and dried as that.
I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I would manage as a single mum,
I didn't feel cowed into staying in an abusive relationship (and teaching my dd to expect that from future partners)
I had seen my mum do a better job as a single mum than the majority of couples bother to do
I'm waffling now but I think what I'm trying to get to is being a single parent is harder on you than on the kids.
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