My S (14) has done some cutting. He acknowledges that it is a result of what has gone on with his father. He assures me that he is past it now and I have not seen any further evidence of it.
When I told my H, a physician, he said he would see S in two weeks (his lives 50 min away). He ended up having to come that night because of a medical emergency I had. He did not look at S's arm or talk to him about it. During the only discussion of note we've had since he left I challenged him on this when he claimed he was a good father and should have S full time (ha ha). He said that it didn't seem like S wanted him to look at it or talk to him about it.
In my experience, my H cannot deal with any conversation in which problems the kids are having is raised. I believe he knows he is responsible for these things but can't deal with it and pushes it as far away from himself as he can, usually hiding behind rage and monster. I have stopped trying to communicate with him about anything concerning the children. It simply isn't worth it. He will not help, he becomes nasty to me, he retreats further from the children, and obviously it causes him some kind of psychic trauma.
It is awful to have to go through this, but it does get better with time. I can see the life returning to my children and can see them rebounding. I sent my S to a wolf tracking camp this summer that did wonders for him emotionally. Next summer I'm sending him on a program designed for people dealing with trust issues where he will learn to sail for more than 20 days.
The children's counselor told me on day 1 that how they did would largely be determined by how well I did. I wasn't ready to hear that because I was such a mess. A little over a year later, I fully accept it and see that the greatest gift I can give my children is to be happy, fulfilled, to live in the moment, to focus on the things I have in my life rather than the things I don't, and to let the damage this man has done be something that lives only in the past.
