Seventeen years ago, my partner and I split up, and my ex moved to the US to be with her new partner, taking my gorgeous daughter with her. For a few years, there was shared access and frequent visits, but after I was unemployed for a period and unable to make any financial contributions, this access evaporated. As a result, I have not seen or spoken to my daughter since she was seven. Twelve years later, I’ve discovered that she’s now at university here in the UK. It would be very easy to contact her via social media, but would it be fair to suddenly complicate her life in this way? Or should I just accept that, after so long, my relationship with her was in the past and belongs there?
Speaking as a parent and a daughter, I feel that there is everything to be gained from trying to reconnect. There’s little doubt that she will have complicated feelings towards you, having grown up under the influence of a mother who probably resented the hell out of you for not sharing the financial burden.
You say you were unemployed for a time and were unable to make financial contributions, but what did you do after that time? Did you try to make amends? Some sort of contribution would go a long way towards showing your daughter that you are serious about being a father. Additionally, there are laws that protect against one parent preventing the other from having contact, so there should have been ways for you to stay in touch. If you didn’t fully explore them at the time, you need to accept your share of responsibility in the estrangement before you can move on and repair your relationship.
If having your daughter in your life matters to you, you need to make a serious, prolonged effort to have any kind of lasting effect. Be prepared for some rejection, and know that a strong foundation of trust takes years to build; you have a lot of making up to do.
If you can, it wouldn’t hurt to have some counselling to guide you through this process. Your daughter might harbour some pretty strong feelings of anger and abandonment towards you. Ultimately, the decision whether to have you in her life rests with her, and you will have to respect her wishes. But it’s worth trying everything you can to reconnect.
• Send your dilemmas about love, family or life in general to askmolly@theguardian.com.
