Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Adult Daughter Jumps To Conclusions About Young Step-Mother

Dear Tazi:

I am in my mid-twenties. I own my own home and have a wonderful relationship with my life partner. I am financially independent of my parents and live within my means so as to live debt free. I made these choices after seeing how screwed up money can make people! My family is not Paris Hilton wealthy, but I would be a liar if I said I did not grow up among the upper class, country club set. I am not ashamed of where I come from, it’s just as I said; money makes life a lot more complicated – which is why I am writing to you. Money is once again complicating my life.

Last year, my father married his gold-digging girlfriend “Daisy”. She is half his age, and only a few years older than me. Dad refused to see her for the person she is, even though she had no problem with revealing her true colors to my sister and me. I won’t get into the details, but the woman is evil. She is also pregnant, even though Dad was adamant about not having more children.

I discovered Daisy’s condition when I stopped by after work to see my father. Daisy was in the parlor with one of her friends commenting on how a baby will “cement the relationship, especially if it is a boy”. Daisy saw me there, smiled an evil grin, and told me that she was going to give my father what my mother could not! Tazi, I felt sick to my stomach. My father has always told my sister and me that he loves us and never regretted having daughters. Daisy and I got into it, and some unpleasant things were said; including how she planned on “taking care of things” to make sure she only gave my father boys. I wasn't sure what she meant by that, but now I might.

It has been two months since that conversation with Daisy, and she has not yet told my father she is expecting. I feel as though she is betraying him by telling her friends before telling him, but obviously I do not believe it is my news to break to him. However, I have a bad feeling that she is planning on having an abortion if she is carrying a girl, which would explain why she is keeping her pregnancy from my Dad. Do you think I should tell my Dad what’s going on?

Signed,
Gatsby Girl

Dear Gatsby Girl:

I admire your maturity and your efforts to earn your own way in the world, rather than depend upon your family’s income to support a lavish lifestyle. I also admire your loyalty to your father, and can understand your bitterness towards Daisy, especially if she is as bad as you describe. Please remember, though, that your father chose to marry her and you need to learn to respect his choice even if you cannot bring yourself to accept her.

Regarding your conversation with Daisy: Are you certain that she is pregnant? Remember, you walked in on a private conversation and only heard one part of it – how a baby “will” cement her relationship with your father, but not that is already has. When the two of you “got into it”, did Daisy actually say she was expecting? There are medical means that allow a couple to choose the sex of their baby; could this be what Daisy meant when she said she would “take care of things” to ensure a boy? I realize that you do not think highly of Daisy, but to assume she would abort a child because it is female is quite a stretch, notwithstanding things like cost and recovery (both physical and emotional). None of this would be easy to hide.

My advice to you is to sit down with your father and have a heart-to-heart talk with him. If Daisy feels that her marriage needs cementing it could be that all is not as your father expected. As his daughter, I believe that your father would appreciate you taking an interest in his life – period – so I suggest you start by asking him to coffee just to catch up on each other’s lives. If all goes well, make it a weekly thing – father-daughter time does not have to stop just because you are both adults; spending time together can help to adjust the dynamic between the two of you to a more equal footing. Once communication between the two of you has been reestablished you, you can consider bringing up what you overheard Daisy saying, so long as you do not use an accusatory tone. In the immortal words of Marvin Gaye, believe half of what you see and none of what you hear (especially if you heard it through the grapevine!)..

Snuggles,
Tazi


Ask Tazi! is ghostwritten by a human with a Bachelors of Arts in Communications. Tazi-Kat is not really a talking feline.

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