I desperately want my stepdaughter to stop cheerleading, but my husband says she can continue.
I need your advice on what kids really need, and what I need to do for my daughter. I’m the mom and primary parent of a fantastic 6½-year old. I adore her. Her dad, not so much. The marriage isn’t intolerable—there’s no abuse, no addiction, little conflict that spills over into our parenting. But we have truly substantial problems. I don’t love him and I want to leave. As much grief as it causes me to think of being without my daughter half the time, I’m a grown-up and I could manage.
As parents, we say we’d do anything for our kids—that we’d jump in front of a bus—and I truly feel that way.
She and her ex are good friends now, she says. She and her current, longtime husband are, too. As for me, as a woman who’s been married for 27 years and once thought seriously about leaving it and then decided to stay, I want to tell you that I’ve never had a moment’s regret about my decision. Many years ago I wondered if once our daughter was grown, our marriage—which was certainly held together by our shared love for her—would collapse.
I’m not promising you that if you stick out your marriage long enough, it will magically transform into something better. It might, though . And I don’t think there’s anything mystically important about marriage per se: I think couples who aren’t happy but don’t have children together should feel as free to split up as any unmarried couple . And if “not intolerable” starts sliding toward and then sticks at “totally intolerable,” then I’d reconsider.
But now I’m trying to figure out how to talk to my kids about it in a way that doesn’t put T on the spot. My kids have known about different genders and sexualities for a long time, and we have several trans friends who are great about answering my kids’ basic questions. But those friends are adults! Being 14 is awful and awkward at the best of times. I want my kids to call T by the name and pronoun T prefers, but I don’t want T to be interrogated.
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