{"id":24790,"date":"2025-03-27T08:01:38","date_gmt":"2025-03-27T09:01:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=24790"},"modified":"2025-03-27T09:28:42","modified_gmt":"2025-03-27T09:28:42","slug":"my-daughter-doesnt-want-me-to-walk-her-down-the-aisle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=24790","title":{"rendered":"My Daughter Doesn\u2019t Want Me to Walk Her Down The Aisle"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I\u2019m heartbroken that she chose him over me.<\/p>\n

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My 37-year-old daughter is getting married for a second time. It\u2019s a church wedding and traditions are in play.<\/em><\/p>\n

Her mother divorced me 36 years ago. I was an active and present dad, and we have a good relationship. I never missed a weekend. I went to her functions, and she vacationed with my new wife and me.<\/em><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the problem: My daughter asked her stepfather to give her away. I\u2019m assuming he will also be the one to have a father-daughter dance. This has crushed me. I didn\u2019t say anything to her other than, \u201cOh, OK.\u201d But I was devastated.<\/em><\/p>\n

Now I don\u2019t want to go and watch this other man (my ex and I had a foul divorce with much anger) walk my daughter down the aisle or dance with her. I know it\u2019s not about me, but I\u2019m hurt. I also don\u2019t think it\u2019ll be that crushing to her if I\u2019m a no-show.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Am I being childish, or are my feelings justified?<\/em><\/p>\n

From the Therapist: <\/strong>What I hear in your letter is the voice of a father who has worked hard to maintain a strong relationship with his daughter after a difficult divorce, and who now feels both hurt and invisible as her wedding approaches.<\/p>\n

These traditional fatherly roles \u2014 walking the bride down the aisle, sharing a dance \u2014 can carry enormous emotional significance for some people. Perhaps for you, having your daughter\u2019s stepfather perform these rituals feels like an erasure of your parental identity and all the years you\u2019ve invested in being present for your daughter, as well as a referendum on your daughter\u2019s love for you compared with her love for her stepfather.<\/p>\n

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I\u2019m heartbroken that she chose him over me.My 37-year-old daughter is getting married for a second time. It\u2019s a church wedding and traditions are in play.Her mother divorced me 36 years ago. I was an active and present dad, and we have a good relationship. I never missed a weekend. I went to her functions, and she vacationed with my new wife and me.Here\u2019s the problem: My daughter asked her stepfather to give her away. I\u2019m assuming he will also be the one to have a father-daughter dance. This has crushed me. I didn\u2019t say anything to her other than, \u201cOh, OK.\u201d But I was devastated.Now I don\u2019t want to go and watch this other man (my ex and I had a foul divorce with much anger) walk my daughter down the aisle or dance with her. I know it\u2019s not about me, but I\u2019m hurt. I also don\u2019t think it\u2019ll be that crushing to her if I\u2019m a no-show.Am I being childish, or are my feelings justified?From the Therapist: What I hear in your letter is the voice of a father who has worked hard to maintain a strong relationship with his daughter after a difficult divorce, and who now feels both hurt and invisible as her wedding approaches.These traditional fatherly roles \u2014 walking the bride down the aisle, sharing a dance \u2014 can carry enormous emotional significance for some people. Perhaps for you, having your daughter\u2019s stepfather perform these rituals feels like an erasure of your parental identity and all the years you\u2019ve invested in being present for your daughter, as well as a referendum on your daughter\u2019s love for you compared with her love for her stepfather.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24792,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24790"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24790\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24793,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24790\/revisions\/24793"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}