Quote:

I don't want that role and I'm no good at it anyway. At another point in the weekend, I flew off the handle at him because I was talking to him and D2 would scream every time I opened my mouth. She was standing right next to him. He did nothing.
I spewed out a bunch of stuff about him not being a man and allowing her to treat me that way..it was despicable, blah blah. I really was horrible, I'm telling you.
He does NOT make our children treat me with respect. OTOH, I am very firm with them that they respect their Dad and would never tolerate them doing that...screaming every time he opened his mouth so that they can monopolize the scene. I realize that I wasn't teaching them to respect him this weekend, with the way I was treating him either.




Just a quick segue onto this single issue (and not wanting to take the focus off the point of your post).

However:

Daughters go through a period of time (at incredibly early ages) where they push really hard to cut mom out of the relationship. I was a daddy's girl, and my dad was amused by it and allowed me to run roughshod over my mom. It was "me and him" and mom was the third person out. There was never any sexual connotations to this at all, but my dad failed to address it and that failure reverberated for years in my relationship with mom. Lo and behold many years later I had a daughter. And history began to repeat itself. One vivid example comes to mind, NOP and D were in the floor drawing on a chalkboard together. I merely came in to say "hi", see how they were doing and attempt to be a part. (Please note, I loved to see the two of them interacting and didn't try to include myself in their activities on a regular basis). D took one look at me when I entered, ignore me and very obviously moved so that her back was to me and physically/visually put herself between me and NOP. She was about 3 at the time. It was a very effective snub. These little occurances had been going on for sometime, but this one nailed my heart and I left the room in tears. NOP let her know in no uncertain terms that what she did was unacceptable. And you know what? That sort of behavior never arose again.

Of course this was the same child who told us that when she grew up she was going too marry daddy. I wasn't inclined to inform her of the morality/legality of such. A few years later she decided that when she got married, she & hubby would live with us. A couple of years later, the plan was to live in the house next to us. The point is, that it is a very natural thing for little girls to adore their dad.

Hubby needs to deal with daughter. He may be getting caught up in the pleasant glow of being so much admired by daughter, BUT for daughter's own sake and health as well as her relationship with you, he must (and it has to come from him) nip that in the bud. Period.

MrsNOP -