When I first co-authored Stop Struggling with Your Teen, I worked with a dad who said he wanted his son to take more responsibility for himself and in the next moment, he paid his parking tickets, bailed him out of scrapes and protected him from any run-ins with the law.  In fact, when I first met this family, Dad had just traveled across the country to bring back his 15 year old son back after he had stolen his dad’s car and put thousands of miles on it. I just didn’t get it.

Fast forward:   I worked with this father again and I still wanted to understand what kept that father from following-through-especially since his behavior had continued and his son was now in his early thirties.   At this time, I had just started experimenting with what would later become the Hide and Seek questions.

When the dad started complaining about his son, I asked the question, “What do you think would have happened if you stopped paying your son’s tickets and hiring lawyers to keep his out of trouble?  He responded quite simply.

“My son would go to jail and I know what can happen to a person in jail…. (Long pause)  Evonne, many years ago I was that person in jail.”

For a moment, I couldn’t talk.  He had never told me this before.  When I caught my breath, I managed to muster up the following question,

“What would have happened if your son had gone to jail?”

His response cleared up for me all of my past confusion.

“He would have been killed.”

There was no more confusion for me.  I never could understand how he always said he wanted his kid to experience life first hand and in the next breath rescue his son. There had been a very important missing piece- his hidden agenda:

Keep his son out of jail at all costs, all the time, was driving his behavior- not his stated goals of wanting his son to learn to take responsibility.  His emotional fear lodged in his heart, was at war with his head.  There is no question about the outcome.  His hidden agenda won hands down in driving his behavior. According to his logic, he was saving his kid’s life.

Looking at it from this angle, my client’s behavior FINALLY made absolute sense to me.  That day, I became the student and he became the teacher.

No one does things without a reason. There is always a logic that drives our behavior. Sometimes this logic is hard to spot because we keep our fears hidden from ourselves as well as others as his story so poignantly illustrates.

Until next week,

Evonne Weinhaus

Dear Dad.

Now that I decided to write a letter to you, I really don’t know where to begin or what to say. First, I’ll start with the obvious…it feels a bit strange to call you dad, though, undeniably you are my father, but I don’t have any feelings about you that I would call “dear.” In general, I don’t have any feelings about you at all. However, lately since I’ve been talking about and working on relationships with fathers I’ve noticed myself being near tears with the mere thought of you.

I didn’t expect to be un-hinged the way I’ve been lately, and to tell you the truth, it’s made me more than a little uncomfortable. I had sort of locked the thought of you in a safe place in my mind and thrown away the key—or so I thought. I feel really conflicted because at this stage of my life I don’t need a dad, but somehow it feels as if I’m aching for something I never had with you. The best way to describe it is how someone who has lost a leg reports a phantom ache for the leg that is no longer there. That’s how I feel about you.

I have forgiven you, for sure, but lately I have this ache for the person that should be there but isn’t. I have accepted our situation, for sure, but my lips tremble when I talk about fathers and sons. I understand that it can’t be differently than it is, for sure, but I  wonder how my life would’ve been different had you played a prominent role in my life. And mostly, I wonder if you wonder any of these things. Do you miss me? Do you think about me? Do you feel the same ache that I do?

The last time we spoke a few years ago you asked me questions about my life. It seemed odd to me that fundamental information about me were unknown to you. When you asked me if I had ever married, or if I had any children of my own, I laughed (nervously) out loud because my own father had no clue about me. When I told you that not only was I unmarried without children of my own AND the principal reason was because I am a gay man you immediately began explaining how God could deliver me from my lifestyle. Since then the distance that had always been between us widened immeasurably. It is from the other side of that gulf that I to you this letter.

For years I’ve worked on forgiving you, but suddenly I realize that forgiving you isn’t enough. I realize that I also need to forgive your parents for whatever happened to you in your childhood that caused you to make the choices you made. And, while I’m at it, I’m going to forgive my grandparents’ parents, and their parents, and theirs, and theirs. Today I am up for forgiving everybody about everything.

Where does this forgiveness leave you and me? I have no idea, but I know that it’s a start. So, I send this letter to you special delivery in care of the universe. And, I patiently await your response. I have no idea of where in the world you are, but since we are forever connected as father and son I am confident that I will recognize your reply—no matter what form it takes.

And just so you know, I am open to the possibility of someday experiencing the meaning behind the words: DEAR DAD.

Love,

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You’ve heard the old adage: “Girls marry their fathers and boys marry their mothers”. My co-author  Evonne mentioned in her last blog that her father and her husband had similarities. What was she nuts I thought? She married the exact OPPOSITE of her father. Her father was an outgoing salesman and her husband was a quiet lawyer. Her father called her “little s” for stupid and he husband adored her.  Seemed to me like ying and yang!

But then she got me thinking. My father was an accountant. My husband is a cowboy. My father lived for spreadsheets and budgeting.  My husband’s idea of a budget? If you’ve got it, spend it! My father’s idea of risk was driving with only a ¼ of a tank of gas. My husband? Going into a jungle and hunting mountain lions and tigers. As far as I was concerned, they were a testament to “opposites attract.”

THERE WAS NO WAY I MARRIED MY FATHER!

Although I adored my father and miss him terribly on today, Father’s Day (he passed away four years ago), I definitely did not choose a man like him. It wasn’t conscious … it just was.

But the thing I learned from Evonne, is that every time I say “no way” or “never”, I am eating my words within a month.

So I thought hard about it. What similarities did my father and my husband have? At first the paper was  blank. In fact, I had a long column for opposite behaviors.

Then the words that Evonne wrote on our book A New Fearless You struck me – “most people tend to choose a mate who can compensate for their own weaknesses, that have traits they don’t have and vice versa. Or said another way, we look for people who complete us or we cling to what we don’t have.”

And then it hit me. Both my father and mu husband are “protectors”. They make me feel safe, which is something I crave in my life. It was less about their personalities and more about their “behaviors.”

So today, Father’s Day, we all should remember this:  whether it’s your father, husband, or son, learn to respect each other’s differences and relish the qualities you admire.

Answering the question “did I marry my father” is less important than remembering both my father and the father of my children have traits – both similarities and differences – that complete me.

P.S. Okay, okay Evonne … I hate it when you are right

Here’s the deal…after nearly six months of timely blog production, this week I fell notably short. What I mean is, this is the first week where I hadn’t written my weekly blog at least a day or more in advance. Furthermore, I also haven’t performed any of the background steps to set up the upcoming Blogcast on Monday. So, if you are Blogcaster, you have probably noticed that you didn’t receive a BreakThrough Blogcast invitation through Facebook this week.

Now, as I converse with myself, I can justify that the reasons why are related to a series of extraordinary events in the last few days—and believe me, they have been extraordinary. But, if I’m completely honest, that’s not really the reason. Since the beginning of BreakThrough Blog, I’ve had weeks that have been at least as tricky as this one has proven to be. I’ve had weeks were I was either traveling out of town (or out of the country), been ill, or even double-booked on some occasions. So, what then, is different this week from weeks prior?

Hmm…what could it be? I can’t think of a single reason. Oh yeah…today is Father’s Day. Why ever would I have a “block” around this date? I can’t for the life of me imagine why?!

Seriously, this “holiday” is one that typically holds no meaning for me. I didn’t grow up feeling some magical need to express my love for my father (or step-father) through the purchasing of a I Heart Dad coffee mug, Brut cologne, a necktie, or the ever-popular soap-on-a-rope. Over my lifetime, I simply felt…nothing. Nothing. No love. No disappointment. No loss. Just…nothing.

So, I sit here with the dilemma of, “What the heck am I going to do about tomorrow’s Blogcast?” To tell the truth, I really haven’t the foggiest idea. Vaguely, I thought yesterday that instead of yielding to this Hallmark-inspired “holiday,” I might instigate a tradition of my own. A tradition that feels organic and natural to me…and people like me who also feel nothing on this day of dads. Instead of feeling left out of the day’s festivities, I would instead connect with and honor the men I’ve met during my life that have inspired, mentored, and supported me as “surrogate” father figures. Yeah…that feels much better.

In fact, I need I think I’ll bring this blog to a close so that I can make a few phone calls to see if I can secure one of my “mentors” as the guest on tomorrow’s Blogcast…

…oh yeah, Happy Father’s Day everybody!

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Dad. Daddy. Pappa. Step-father.

On Sesame Street, one of my favorite childhood television shows, there used to be a game called: One of These Things…

…so, did you guess which thing doesn’t belong? If you guessed step-father, then, you’re right!

By the time I was 7 or 8 years old, my mother married a man that they told me was to become my step-father. I remember thinking, “Step-father?! What the heck is that?” In my little brain, even then, that phrase just didn’t belong—and, it certainly didn’t roll off the tongue. Looking back, while observing their wedding, that’s when I remember discovering that my life, and my family, was somehow different.

Sitting in the back of the church, I distinctly recall feeling embarrassed by what was happening up front. Who was this guy? Why was he standing so close to my mom? What the heck was going on?! I soon realized that this wasn’t some stage play produced by the young adults’ group of our church, this stranger was coming home with us! Even though I had already met him, I don’t think I understood until the wedding ceremony what was really happening to my life.

For the first 8 years of my life I was an only child, and my relationship with my mother was quite close. I loved my mom. We sang, played games, and laughed all the time. My family consisted of just the two of us. The biggest change in my then young life was the arrival of my baby brother, and I had barely gotten used to him, and suddenly, I have to deal with this new guy who just seemed to blow into our lives. And, needless to say, I didn’t like it one bit. I was confused. Where was my dad? Who was this guy? And, why did everyone insist that he was my dad?

Fast forward nearly 35 years, and the biggest breakthrough I can recall relating to my father (or step-father) was finally being able to forgive them for not being who I wanted them to be. My father is a man who was blessed with musical talent who never reached his full potential. My step-father is a man who stepped in when my own father wasn’t there, and, for all practical purposes, was a very young man himself dealing with his own demons. As I look back, I see that I never had a healthy, black male role model…which probably means neither did they. However, I have been fortunate enough to find father figures in teachers, team leaders, and various mentors I’ve met along the way.

So, perhaps my breakthrough is to accept that neither my father nor my step-father were perfect—that they were once someone’s little boy…just like me. Makes me wonder, when was the moment that their lives changed? Makes me wonder, who disappointed them? Makes me wonder, when, exactly, did their world come crashing down?!

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All right, all right, I take the challenge!  After last week’s blog, What! I Married Whom? Cindy, my co-author  couldn’t help but “share”:

“Evonne,  I absolutely don’t see any similarities between your husband and your dad or my husband and my dad. And,  I don’t plan on eating these words…like I have so many times in the past!”

What about you?  Do you see the positive and negative characteristics of your caretakers in your partner?  Or, are you convinced you are the exception?  Like Cindy, you say loudly and clearly, “There is no way I married my father.

I’m willing to explore this question more?  Are you?  If so, read on.

First, I tried to figure out why they were similar, and truthfully, I couldn’t come up with one similarity.  Not a good sign.  But, like all “good wives”, I knew where to start- with complaints:

What really gets to me about my husband? Oh yeah, it is so coming back to me.  As many of you know, I went through, for a lack of a better word, a “dry time” after my brain surgery and post 911.   Giving speeches, writing and seeing clients didn’t what we call, “flow in”.  And I definitely could feel my childhood history repeating itself.

As a kid, I had learned to get “attention” and “applause” by performing and doing.  To me, I internalized the equation, “Love = performing and doing” (Makes sense, doesn’t it, why I love to speak?)  Well, I realized I had picked someone, like my dad, who is very proud of my accomplishments- the positive characteristic seen in all of its glory.

Like all positives- carry that quality to the extreme- you get the negative aspects.  When I didn’t accomplish, I didn’t feel loved for who I was and am, just for what I do.

Not an easy concept for me or for my husband to own.  However, looking at it from a more distant perspective, I own it and just as important, Shel and I have been able to discuss it- sometimes with consciousness and other times- like most couples- with lots of denials and rationalizations .

But that is the beauty of a relationship- it has ebbs and flows.  With consciousness, you can see the good, bad, and the ugly in yourself, your partner and your caretakers.

OMG, I just  wrote that last statement and something else just popped up for me.     I inherited many of my dad’s traits and found a partner who is very similar to my mom.  There I said it.    What about you?   What patterns do you own-up to?

Just for the record, you just saw in action how Cindy and I worked together to write “A New Fearless You”.  Thank you, Cindy.  I would have never written this without your challenge!

Until next time,

Evonne Weinhaus

What do you mean I married my father?  As far as I’m concerned, I married the exact opposite of my dad.  My dad was competitive by nature, very extraverted and had a quick and unpredictable temper.  When my husband and I were dating, I remember how well I checked it out that he was different than my dad. Competitive?  I don’t think so.  When I challenged my husband to ping-pong game, he just made jokes and played extra badly.  Anyone who knows him will agree that he is a gentle, kind man.

Fast forward and fast forward again until around year 2007.  I needed continuing Education Credits to keep my LCSW and LPC licensing as a relationship therapist.  And, I needed a lot of them and I had less than three months before the deadline. Bingo.  There was a two day course offered that was all about Imago therapy, taught by Harville Hendrix and Rebecca Sears.  Perfect! I had heard of Harville Hendrix and figured I might as well see the famous author of Getting the Love You Want.

So, it is an honest statement to say- I went for one reason- to gain CEU credits.  I remember almost slipping a pocketbook novel in my purse so I would have something else to do if I was bored.

That never happened!

I do think if I had to pick a snapshot moment, I know the moment.  I felt a visceral shift in my being.   Harville and Rebecca gave us a questionnaire to fill out during lunch-no less- all about our childhood.  Then unbeknownst to me, I was to take these answers and fill in the blanks with some questions about my current life with my husband.  As my friend Jan would say, “Such a coincidence.”  There was a perfect match.

That was the first day of a new life that I began.  That was the day I learned I hadn’t married the opposite of my father.  I had married Shel, my partner of more than 40 years who had both the positive and negative characteristics of my parents.

What about you?  Do you see some similar patterns in your life?  If you would like to uncover more about patterns in your relationships that do and don’t work for you, please contact me.  I would love to work with you either in person or by phone.

Until next week,

Evonne Weinhaus

This month’s blogcast discussion topic: Breakthrough in Relationship with Your Father has, for the last several weeks, created a great deal of worry and anxiety in me. If you’ve been following my blog, then you know that I also had difficulty with last month’s topic: Breakthrough in Relationship with Your Mother—however, this month’s difficulty is wholly different.

First, the topic implies that there is already some relationship (or connection) to speak of regarding one’s father (i.e. experiences and memories versus the obvious one…that he was, in fact, your father) in order to create breakthrough—and that’s where my problem (worry and anxiety) has always lain. The fact of the matter is I don’t have a “relationship” with my father.  Now, I don’t mean to imply that I don’t know who he is, or that I don’t have some primary memories and experiences with him, it’s just that over the course of my life in the psychic space where “father” goes…I have a blank. I say there is a blank even though by the time I turned 8 years old, another man stepped into the role of “step-father”—which brings about an entirely different set of issues.

When I reflect on my childhood, I can easily recall numerous moments of knee-jerk reactions in response to some friend or other’s mention of an activity they’d had with their father over a weekend, how much they loved (or hated) spending time with him, or any number of father/son sponsored events—my face would fix itself so that I didn’t reveal that I had no idea of what they were talking. Why? Because I hadn’t spent the weekend with my dad. And, on my calendar, there were no scout meetings or fishing trips. I felt isolated from what seemed to be the  ”common experience”— or in other words, I felt cheated and left out on the whole “father” deal.

A year ago I read a study that sought to demonstrate the probability of a grandchild receiving financial and emotional support from their maternal grandmother versus their paternal grandparents—and even their maternal grandfather. The study’s work was based on the evolutionary premise that humans are biologically programmed to care for their offspring. And, from the grandparent’s branch of the family tree, the phenomenon of biological programming could be dramatically observed from the maternal grandmother’s perspective—since she is biologically programmed to care for her child, she is therefore, by extension, also biologically programmed to care for her child’s child. Simple idea, no?

The study goes on to argue that there is always a possibility, however slight, that even though two people might indeed be in a committed relationship, the child the woman is carrying came from some other man. So, in other words, from an evolutionary standpoint one is always certain of the mother’s identity, while the father’s true identity is a question of biology. The findings are further discussed through the notion that from a scientific point of view, there is a built-in suspicion and separation between fathers and their children—or at least, that’s how I remember it. However, when I examine my own relationship with my father, this scientific viewpoint certainly seems not only relevant, but to me completely accurate.

There even seems to be some anecdotal evidence readily available on television, in movies, and in society in general that supports the study’s assertion (e.g. girl announces to guy that she’s unexpectedly pregnant, and the first thing out of guy’s mouth is…”Are you sure it’s mine?”) The implication? The relationship between fathers and their children is a biological conundrum.

To be perfectly clear, I certainly don’t mean to imply that every new father reacts through denial, or that everyone’s relationship with their father is pre-disposed to a state of estrangement—I just mean to communicate that perhaps the gap between fathers and their children has little to do with issues such as my father tries to control me, doesn’t approve of my choices, or favored my sibling over me, and more to do with a “glitch” in how we interpret our biological program.

Yup, you guessed it…June’s going to be one hell of a month! Stay tuned…

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