This weekend, Xitter user @Hairweavekilla posted a picture of the first time he met his 10-year-old daughter as some feel-good story about a dad finally being…a dad, and he has not known peace since. This was not a case of him not knowing that the child was alive; this was not even a case of him living far from the child; in fact, he only lived about a three-and-a-half-hour drive away from her and had been paying child support the entire time, he simply allowed a grievance with the child’s mother to keep them separated.
This is quite unexplainable & a little sociopathic knowing you had a daughter this whole time. This is crazy ???? https://t.co/AxdJWpuz45
— Gucci Youn Luv Me (@BitchEyeMiteBe) November 11, 2024
He wanted some applause for finally putting his child before his childishness.
What makes matters worse is that he tweeted numerous times about wanting a daughter, and she was already born when those tweets were made. While some have been defending him and saying at least he is doing the right thing now, some question whether coming into her life after all this time may have been more damaging than him not being present at all. People are human; we are all fragmented in some place deep inside ourselves that we have not healed from, but if a disagreement allowed you to spend a decade not loving your child, that child might be better off not having you finally decide that your disagreement is less important than they are.
This brings me to my next point. I recently spoke to a friend about a situation she was having with the father of her children, and how even though she has not put any barriers in the way of him communicating with his children, his ire for her has affected this once-dotting father’s desire to see his children. During the conversation, she lamented how women, in general, allow too much grace when they have been repeatedly disrespected in their romantic relationships, which led her to question whether that type of grace should be given from a daughter to her father.
If she wouldn’t want a man coming in and out of her daughter’s life romantically, then why is that acceptable for her father to do?
Xitter user @margee227 brought up a point about how women maintain toxic and sometimes abusive relationships in order for their children to have access and a relationship with their fathers. Still, men use not getting along with the mother of their child as an excuse for why they are not in their daughters’ lives. After my parents split up, we moved several states away. Still, me having a relationship with my father was sometimes more important to her than it was to him, that includes buying my plane tickets, while not really receiving much financial assistance from him. My father always kept in touch; he always called, but sometimes I wish he hadn’t. She stayed with my father longer than she wanted to because she knew he and I had a close bond, but that bond was broken by his inability to accept that she left because of his actions and not another man he dreamed up to help him cope with the loss. My father was an engaging dad. He put a hammer in my hand at the age of seven and had me climbing 10-foot tall ladders.
Women will sacrifice themselves and maintain relationships with their literal abusers so they kids can have relationships with their fathers but men be like “me and my bm ain’t get along so I just neglected my kid” https://t.co/G4VAGSF81j
— marge ???? (@margee227) November 10, 2024
My father took me on bike rides on top of his shoulders, and my father defied gravity, but my father was a bad spouse and a terrible, angry person who loved hard but not always correctly. We are in the best place we have ever been by far, but a good portion of my childhood visits to my father were filled with sadness. I always cried when the summer ended and I went back home, not because I would miss him, but because at a very young age, I felt tasked with fixing him. I felt emotionally responsible for our relationship once he and my mother no longer had one. I felt emotionally responsible for not triggering his anger, even though I never knew what would make him angry. Even though I later found out my father was depressed, it still was not my responsibility to fix that.
Daughters are not spiritual retribution for your misogyny.
— Dara T. Mathis (@TrulyTafakari) June 2, 2018
My father was a victim of his own lack of accountability, and it subsequently made me chase the men who mirrored his comfort in good ways and bad. I spent too much time not giving up on people who had already given up on me, not because my father gave up on me, but because I felt responsible for not giving up on him. If I could fix where he was broken, I could fix whatever made him angry. I learned to walk on eggshells before my first kiss.
There are so many amazing fathers out there, and at times, mine was too, but there are so many fathers who rely on the care of the mother while still thinking they have access to the legacy of the child; at times, mine was too. A last name is changeable, but how you treat your children is forever. There are no round twos in childhood. When questioned further about why he and the mother of his child no longer were on good terms, Hairweavekilla’s excuse was not that they argued but that she had done something to them before the child was born, so of course, his daughter had to suffer the consequences.
However, he was proud to show off his relationship with his sons.
My bm other bd just called me & said let’s get the kids together & do something. That’s that grown man shit right there
— Jimmy Darmody (@HairWeaveKiilla) August 16, 2024
I guess that’s what type of legacy he needs.
People say daughters are a punishment for bad men or that men learn what misogyny is when they have daughters, but no one sees that a bad man is an undeserving punishment for a daughter. Hairweavekilla even made a disparaging tweet about women without fathers, the absolute nerve to know you are the problem and then blame the victim. Too many men view women as a necessary sacrifice they either endure or give to the world. Having a daughter or being in a relationship is seen as a tax they pay society in order for mankind to continue. Women, on the other hand, are tired of being treated like second-class citizens in and outside the home. If it is a father’s responsibility to show his daughter how men should treat her, there are definite ramifications for having a vacillating parent. Girls with fathers who parent from convenience grow into women who perceive that it is okay for their partners to do the bare minimum, while the boys grow up into entitled men who do the bare minimum and expect the maximum amount of appreciation for the smallest efforts, i.e., expecting applause for washing dishes. Making the decision to be in the child’s life after so much time has passed, on the surface, seems admirable, but what if she’s better off without him? Sending the signal that she is now deserving of a father and that he wants praise for being in his life is the catalyst for seeking love from men who don’t love you, even when it is their responsibility or vow to do so.
Having any man pendulate in your life makes you question your worth. Children are more likely to question why they are not worth their parent’s affection than they are to understand that their parent is not worth theirs.
