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Would you feel offended/uncomfortable in this situation?


benpom

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My ex-husband came over to my place and spent some time with children and me together. In the middle of playing, I left for two minutes (maybe even less) to get water for everyone. When I got back, my daughter was in tears, saying: daddy, why would you say mommy is going to die? That's so mean.

 

I did not ask right away what happened. I guess what happened was: my daughter asked him why is mommy not back yet, he replied: relax, she is not going to die.

 

Would you feel offended in this situation?

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Do you benpom think he just said "Mommy is going to die." without context? If not, how ever the subject came up, it could be that your daughter has the unrealistic expectation that you live forever?

 

I think it's best to talk to your xH and find out what exactly happened before pondering whether or not to be offended.

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Not sure why you'd feel offended. Concern for my child would have been more likely where my feelings layed.

 

How did your ex respond to your daughter? Did he reassure her and explain what he truly meant?

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Not sure why you'd feel offended. Concern for my child would have been more likely where my feelings layed.

 

How did your ex respond to your daughter? Did he reassure her and explain what he truly meant?

 

Thank you guys for the advice.

 

Concerned? Yes and no. He is taking his fatherly duty pretty seriously. I know he wants to do good things for the children. He is paying good attention to their health and daily activities. On the other hand, he was talking bad things in front our children about me for some time, even after we just took a parenting class which emphasized about not doing so. For example, he told my daughter once that 'mommy has an evil heart'. My daughter told me about this and concluded that 'evil' must mean 'good'. He denied this ever happening though.

 

This used to be a concern, but not so much now. I know the breakup was quite hard on him too. Instead of dragging each other down and criticizing him about what he did wrong, I remind myself to keep my integrity and try to encourage him to do more right things. A few days ago, my daughter told me that: daddy said daddy and mommy have made mistakes in the past, but we are all better and happier now.

 

I am seeking opinion and advice here because I have some self-doubt. I am not sure whether I am being overly sensitive about something trivial. I know he is a highly defensive person and my daughter is a quite sensitive person. As for myself, I am not sure how I would rate my sensitivity. Considering the fragile state of our relationship (divorced less than a month ago), I always examine my side of issues before I confront him about anything.

 

Thank you guys for your input. This confirms my concern. I need to have a conversation with him about this.

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If you are seeing a therapist maybe you should mention this 'feeling offended'.

 

To me you are not experiencing the right feelings under certain circumstances.

 

People should feel sad when something sad happens, people should feel anger when something unfair happens. When people feel anger in moments they should feel sad, or when people feel offended in moments they should feel frustrated it's because they need help managing their feelings.

 

In your story 'feeling offended' seems off to me. It's not the feeling you should have been experiencing.

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How old are your kids ?

 

If you think about it, no wonder you guys are divorced?

 

You need to tell him to be polite to kids and not use words that are directed towards you in a mean way.Its going to get worse if you dont stop it now.

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If you are seeing a therapist maybe you should mention this 'feeling offended'.

 

To me you are not experiencing the right feelings under certain circumstances.

 

People should feel sad when something sad happens, people should feel anger when something unfair happens. When people feel anger in moments they should feel sad, or when people feel offended in moments they should feel frustrated it's because they need help managing their feelings.

 

In your story 'feeling offended' seems off to me. It's not the feeling you should have been experiencing.

 

I agree even my feelings are kind of chaotic right now. Feeling concerned has been the new norm for a while. Feeling offended is kind of new.

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How old are your kids ?

 

If you think about it, no wonder you guys are divorced?

 

You need to tell him to be polite to kids and not use words that are directed towards you in a mean way.Its going to get worse if you dont stop it now.

 

Kids are very little, pre-schoolers.

 

Yes, his insensitive actions and words were what caused lots of troubles in our relationship.

 

I was also responsible for half of our problems in our relationship.

 

I used to hold grudge secretly against offensive things he did or said, while he was clueless. I know that was not the right thing for me to do.

 

About the incident with my daughter, I think he was apologizing to her when I came in, but he was also trying to end the topic quickly because of my appearance. I did not ask what happened. I was trying to soothe my daughter and did not want to make my ex uncomfortable considering our fragile relationship. So I was just guessing and trying to figure out whether I was being overly sensitive.

 

In general, he is a nice person, hard-working, smart and willing to improve.

 

By the way, I am trying to get us back together. I am working on improving myself and also evaluating him. On his side, he knows I want to get back together. He has said no. But that does not bother me too much. For one thing, if we don't back together, there are still other ways of life. For another thing, people change minds. I just have a gut feeling that we will get back together. (Although I might be wrong. If I can predict future, I would be buying stocks right now.)

 

Anyway, thank you guys for insight and advice. I am going through a tough time emotionally, in general, fully of self-doubt and confusion. Any advice is highly appreciated.

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If you feel that he's generally a good person then the best course of action is to get off his back for a while. Only step in when it's absolutely necessary. If he feels that you respect him, by not monitoring everything he does, he might look more favorably at the idea of getting back together. But from your other thread i take that you're only divorced for a month, so I'd not hold my breath for any quick developments.

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