Issue:

8,Sept.1999

Page:

10

Abstract:

A fathers personal experiences of going through separation.

Keywords:

Fathers, families, separation.

If you’ve separated, you may be in pain. You may feel like a failure. You may feel desperate. You may feel lonely.

To me, there is nothing worse than loneliness. So I offer a bit of advice to those of you suffering right now. Remember, no matter how down you feel, there are millions of men around the world who are in a similar situation. You are not alone. And there is hope, you just have to find it.

When I  separated from my wife, I felt relieved at the start. But as the first few days passed, the relief turned to worry and the worry to a powerful sense of loss.

I was a man who prided himself on keeping his cool and maintaining an emotional balance. But more and more, I began to feel like a rudderless boat on a very stormy sea. My family was no longer together.  Days passed when I didn’t see my two boys. I felt I had lost much of the meaning of my life. I felt ashamed. I also felt like giving up.

It all seemed impossibly hard. And I had no game plan, no strategy for mounting a recovery.  It felt like the biggest defeat of my life, and turning my back on the whole thing seemed a very tempting option. But I didn’t. Instead, I fell back on the oldest instinct I have: trying.

Each morning I summoned my strength and focused my energy, not to achieve some lofty goal, but just to give each day a reasonable go. In fathering terms, that meant  staying in contact with my children, even when I felt like hiding, even when having the simplest conversation with their mother was excruciatingly difficult.

It sometimes felt like Mission Impossible. But instead of focusing of what I could achieve -- which often wasn’t much --, I focused on the simple act of trying.  I knew I wanted to spend time with my kids. I knew that in order to do that I had to negotiate with their mother. In those negotiations, I knew there would be no easy answers, that I wouldn’t get just what I wanted. I knew the pain of our separation would intrude on our attempt to share parenting and make the process challenging if not downright daunting. But I also knew there was one thing in my complete control: whether I tried to see my kids or I gave up.

When I thought of it that way, the answer was easy. Even as I grieved for the loss of my relationship, and felt gutted over the loss of my family, I had found something to hang on to, to move forward with. I had found a way of starting to cope.

Here’s how I would describe my approach to coping with separation.

Patience + Determination + Flexibility = Trying

Trying = Hope

Not exactly Einstein-like mathematics, but it worked for me. Here’s why: Every time I tried instead of giving up, it was like a statement of faith in myself:  a statement that I mattered,  that my life mattered, that my fathering mattered. Trying meant I believed that one day, I would recover my balance, my prowess, my joy. Trying was my way of saying: I am strong enough to cope with this.

And  three and a half years later,  I can report a happy ending. I was strong enough. And I have coped with separation. By never giving up in my effort to stay in contact with my kids, by using  a combination of patience, determination and flexibility, I have seen them regularly. And I wouldn’t  trade my time with them for anything in the world.

My separation was the toughest challenge I ever faced. But I met it with the simplest of philosophies. So if you’re hurting, I say to you: Don’t give up. Life changes. And courage now will reap huge benefits later on.

Keep trying. For yourself. And for your kids.