One of the trickiest things about being in a relationship with a single father is feeling left out. There are two ways this occurs. First, I am not a part of the family. I am very close to them, but I don’t live with them and I am not related to them in any way. So I am “on the outside”. And sometimes I am literally excluded. This is a very important topic and I will address it in another post. The second way that leads to me feeling left out is a little more subtle. Up until recently, I was actually protecting myself from getting too close to them and felt disconnected from them as a result.
The truth is that as dating a single father goes, I think I have it pretty easy. I’ve worked through a lot of difficult stuff over the past year but now things are going really well. I have a great relationship with my boyfriend, his two daughters adore me and I adore them. A couple of months ago, I realized that the three of them had been inviting me to be more a part of their lives and I wasn’t accepting the invitation. The girls had been asking me, begging even, to spend the night. Tim has said that he wants me there “pretty much all the time”. They’d invite me to join them at birthday parties and other various activities but I would decline.
I think one of the most important things about having a successful relationship with a single dad is to keep my own life and not give all of my time and energy to him and his kids. I need to take care of myself and stay connected outside of the relationship. At the same time, I would justify my distance because I didn’t want to get too close to the girls because I didn’t want to hurt them if things didn’t work out. I was gently reminded by a friend that it was not my responsibility to protect them from getting hurt. If Tim was okay with risking it, then I should be too. I admitted that it was actually myself that I was protecting. I continued to keep my distance. I would spend time with them on the weekends but I always went home at the end of the day. I felt separate from them and it made me sad. But I was too scared to do it any differently.
Recently, as things have begun to move forward bit by bit, I have started to spend the night. I was so afraid to stay over because I didn’t want to get attached and I wasn’t ready. Now that I am doing it, I love it! On the weekends when Tim has the kids, I usually spend Saturday night and all day Sunday with them. My favorite part is Sunday morning. They get up early, as kids do, and I get up at about 8:00. Tim sleeps in until about 10:00 and we have two hours together. We do art projects and play games and read stories. It is really sweet time and I feel so much closer to them as a result. So much for not getting attached.
The moral of this story is that we all have ways of keeping our distance and protecting ourselves. That can serve a purpose and there may come a time when you realize that it is not really necessary. I was protecting myself and perpetuating the feeling of being left out. I eventually realized that it was me who was keeping myself on the outside and I needed to take a risk. And I’m so glad that I did.
This is not always the case because, as I said above, I am literally on the outside and that can be extremely painful. Even if I move in with them and become a part of the family, I anticipate that there will be this insider-outsider gap that I will face. This is a vital topic to the success of a relationship with a single dad and his family. Being aware of it is the most important thing because then I can take action to do something about it! More on this soon…
