It’s common for a grieving child to deify a parent who dies and blame the surviving parent, says Mariella
The dilemma My husband and I separated. I left him because of anger issues that he couldn’t control. A few months after we parted he died from a heart attack. I have three kids and my daughter, who is 11, believes that if I had never left, her daddy would still be alive. I loved him and refuse to tell her in full why we couldn’t live together. All the kids know is that he punched the glass door out before they went to school on the last day we were there. I don’t want her to hate me. But I feel like she does. I love my kids and I want them to remember how good their daddy was, not the bad. What do I do?
Mariella replies You’re damned every way. It’s a tricky situation and one I know all too well having deified my own father from the age of 15, when he died. Now when I look back on the struggles my poor mother had, not only in raising us alone but in doing so entirely overshadowed by her ex-husband’s canonised status in our lives, I understand how tough it must have been for her. The moment my father died his far from heroic lifestyle choices, including his alcoholism, were swept into the grave he was lowered into and buried with him.
Your task is made so much harder by the anger and resentment you no doubt harbour towards him
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