Some find me odd or different! Not by my looks but by the way I act! You tell me how someone is raised by their mother that constantly thinks about others and does not follow suit! I was not ruffed up like alot of fathers do to their sons! Honestly many times before my father left I wasn't even an existing child! How would u react to everyday life! A father that seemed not to care and a mother that cared to much!! Since then I have gotten married and my father seems to think that he suddenly needs to be a part of my life!! It is kinda hard to let someone in even in family after they have nearly deserted you after many years. I know he means well but of course i get those father son sermons about how I don't need to spend my money on airplanes! Trust me that sermon flew in one ear and right out the other! No pun intended!! I don't know if that is why i always try to find the bad things in people I meet and not the good things!!
I guess really it all comes down to the fact of most people now a days just enjoy seeing how far they can push people before they go of the edge!! I know their are many people out there like that and I don't want to be around a person with negative energy!! everyone says I already portray enough of my own!!
Positive reinforcement is what i am looking for in friends!! Is this possible or is this just wrong of me to think this!! I have always wondered does this make me a bad person!! I know i always have my hobby to fall back on!!

That main topic kinda strayed!! opps!!

I know that it is hard to try to mend fences with family after a situation like yours. Let me give you a little perspective from the other side of the fence.

My first wife and I got divorced when my daughter was 5. At that time I was still a large part of my daughters life. When my daughter was 9, I got remarried. Very soon after the wedding I saw that things were not good. To keep my daughter out of the problems in my second marriage, I didn't have her come visit very often, and wasn't able to spend as much time with her as I wanted. When I divorced my second wife 18 months later there was a distance between my daughter and myself.

That distance was increased due to stories my ex was telling my daughter. Most of the stories that the ex was telling was 180 degrees from the truth. I tried to explain to my daughter that the stories she heard were not the truth without telling her the true story that would make her mother look bad. By the time my daughter was a senior in high school she would only talk to me when she needed something from me. It was very hard on me because she means the world to me.

While my daughter was a senior she became pregnant. She called me one day while I was at work and said that she needed to talk to me. I told her to come in and we could find a private place to talk (I had a feeling of what she was going to tell me). She told me that she was going to make me a grandfather. We talked for a long time that night and things have been better since. We are still not as close as I would like but they are getting better all the time.

Things are to the point now that she is even going to be getting married at the end of next month, and the wedding is going to be at my house.

I guess my point in telling my story is to show that the relationship with your father can get better in time. But it takes work from both sides. It is worth the effort, and does require some give and take. Take the time to talk with your father and let him know your feeling. Good luck, I hope that you can start to mend the fences and not wait until it is too late.

My only question would be how can you rebuild what is damaged when he shows no intrest in what i do and I show no intrest in what he does! My stepmothers whole family is a bunch of people that i definetly don't fit in with but of course being the husband(my dad to her he goes their on many occasions! Also, many times he has asked us to came and ride the boat at the lake, i really could care less about the boat. I hav e tried to take time out of my schedule to talk with him. if it is a weekend or such he always has somwhere to go! I have streched my neck! it just seems like i don't belong! it makes me wonder! He states that he is proud of my accomplishments at times but he is never there to witness any! if i was to enter any imac contest or rc contest and actually when i can depend on him NOT being their to witness my enjoyment! it is definetly something worth fighting for but the battle i am fighting for which would be a stronger relationship with him is a battle I am losing everyday!

It is never a quick or easy thing to repair the damage that time and events have done. It might never be possible to have things perfect, but they can always get better. It has taken years to get over the problems that exist between my daughter an myself, and they is still some tension in the relationship.

I'm sorry that you haven't been able to get your father interested in the things you do. That is something that difficult. When my daughter was in high school she was a member of the dance team and band. I didn't get to many of her performances, one reason was my work schedule, another reason I wasn't there for many is because they were at football games. I would rather chew glass than have to sit through a high school football game. However I did attend a few just so that I could watch her perform.

The stepmother and her family, wow, that is never easy. I was lucky, I was in by late 20s by the time I had to deal with that one. My parents got divorced the year I graduated college. My mother has never remarried, but my father got remarried when I was 29. I will not refer to my father's wife as a stepmother, only as "My father's wife". I try to spend as little time around her or her two sons as possible. I do, however, make the effort to appear friendly and will sometimes go places with them.

Just keep working at it and in time it will get better. As you get older, it might get easier to bridge the gap between the two of you. It will never be "easy" but it can get better.

thanks for the input!

Hey Double-a .. just some advice.

people do not change. My father, now 80+, is still the same person he was when I was 7 (43 years ago). I went to visit him for the first time in 25 years last November, for Thanksgiving. The stories were still the same, the attitudes were no different, and the things that had moved us apart still existed. It was supposed to be a 5 day visit. . I left the morning of the 3rd day. The reasons are not important, but his attitudes and judgementalism left no room for reconciliation.

Stand by your principles!! You cannot MAKE someone else like you .. you can only be yourself and if you compromise that in order to get along, then what does it say about your principles?

As life moves on, people move apart unless BOTH parties take an interest in keeping the relationship close and personal. Chasing after someone in order to get along with them is a fruitless endeavor, and will only make it harder on yourself. Sometimes you have to just walk away. . disappear. . get on with YOUR life. . in order to solve the problem. Enjoy your hobbies and passions. . do what is best for yourself. That is the only way to grow and prosper in this world.

I guess the question you have to ask yourself is. . Am I my own Man, or the lackey of someone else? When you have answered that question, you will know your path.

Best of luck.