Nothing crushes a child faster than realizing a parent’s love comes with conditions, and it’s only a matter of time before her little girl can understand this.
Already, she notices that the man she calls Dad doesn’t want to be around her simply because she’s not related to him. What’s a mom to do when her husband no longer likes the child they welcomed into their family with open arms?
Three years ago, this 31-year-old woman and her 34-year-old husband adopted a little girl. She thinks their daughter is amazing, but her husband? Not so much.
“She is now six years old and the brightest ball of sunshine, genuinely sweet and lively. Lately, though, my husband has completely changed in the way he treats her and changed his views on what we initially agreed on,” she explained.
“To explain, I have always wanted children, but it was always with adoption in mind. It is not due to infertility; it is just what I wanted to do due to different reasons.”
“I have told my husband as much in the past, and although he didn’t understand why at first, he came around to the idea and seemed excited too. So we decided to adopt, and at first, he seemed genuinely happy and was a loving father to her.”
Over the course of the last year, her husband started to change. At first, he kept talking about wanting to have biological kids, which she found strange.
He eventually stopped bringing it up, but then he began acting cold to their daughter. He no longer wanted to spend time with her or take her anywhere.
When their daughter would ask him to hang out or play with her, he became dismissive. She attempted to speak to her husband about his behavior, and he claimed to be stressed out.
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Her husband’s behavior improved for a bit, but he slipped back into the same ugly pattern, and it’s stayed that way for months now.
She finally sat down with her husband to get to the bottom of what was going on, and what he said really threw her for a loop.
“He told me that although he loved our daughter, as a man, he craved to have his own biological children, and that our daughter is old enough to have a younger sibling now, and that we should try for one,” she added.
“I told him the same thing, I said years ago and several times after that, that I did not want that, and reminded him that back then he was okay with that too.”
“He said that his bond with our daughter would get stronger if we had a biological child, and I was so incredibly angry and heartbroken.”
She’s left feeling hopeless. She has no interest in having more than one child, and she absolutely hates how her husband is acting towards their daughter.
She’s considering therapy, but she’s not convinced that it will change the resentment her husband is showing toward their little girl.
She’s worried, concerned, and prepared to prioritize their daughter over her own marriage. Their daughter is sad and picking up on her husband’s distance, and that is tearing her apart.
“I feel like a complete failure as a mother and would honestly appreciate any insight from people [who] have gone through anything like this,” she concluded.
A little girl should never have to earn her father’s love. If her husband is too caught up in biology to see the child he already has, that says more about him than it ever could about her.
This mom isn’t a failure; she’s the one standing between her daughter and a lifetime of feeling unwanted. I don’t think she should beg her husband to step up. She should focus on protecting her daughter, even if that means walking away from the man who promised to love her.
What advice do you have for her?
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By Bre Avery Zacharski
Hi, I'm Bre, Chip Chick's CEO! I have a degree in Textile/Surface Design from The Fashion Institute of Technology, and... More about Bre Avery Zacharski
