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[quote=Anonymous]My parents divorced when I was about 2.5 or 3 and my mom remarried when I was 4. My dad never remarried and died when I was 14.

I have zero pictures of them together and until your post I had never really thought about it--though I had thought about the fact I don't have any pictures of me with either of my parents. As the youngest, I just don't have a lot of pictures, period.

Number one thing I wish they had done differently (I'm pointing the finger primarily at my mom since she was the driver of the communication) is communicate at all, and to do so respectably. My mom regularly trashed talked my dad and then sent me to his house every other weekend. It created a lot of conflicting feelings and made it extremely hard to build a relationship with him until I was 14 (and then he died a couple of months later.)

If they could have been in the same room together and spoken civilly to each other, it would have gone a very long way toward helping me to navigate my difficult family life, and it would have gone a long way toward making me feel loved and cared for.

Even after my sister died when I was 8, and my mom and stepdad adopted her infant, my dad wouldn't go into our house to see the baby. We just had to watch out the window to see when he arrived and if I thought about it (at 8-9 yrs old) I'd take the baby out and hold her up for him to see--his own grandchild! Of his dead daughter!

I know the dinner thing is painful for you, but if you get to a point where it doesn't hurt so much, even if it's only once a month, I think it would be a good thing for your kids. Maybe you could go out to eat or in nice weather on a picnic instead of each others homes? That way you're on neutral ground.

Whether or not you feel able to do the dinner thing (I completely understand why you wouldn't want to, especially at first) keep not trash talking your ex. Half his DNA is your kids and it really hurts to have someone you love and resemble maligned. Help your kids to give gifts for birthday and Christmas and keep your ex in the loop about school functions. If my parents had even been mature enough to attend parent night at school, or a softball game or something, it would have been great.[/quote]

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