Sadly, my ex and I battled for over a year in divorce court. The entire battle was because of our children. She wanted sole custody — with no oversight by me in the rearing of the children — something I would not allow. After the divorce, after the award of child support (33 percent of my net), she wanted me to pay her bills, as well as buy her clothing and such. I was floored, but managed to ask in a civil manner: Why would I buy you clothing? You know, that was something I did during our marriage. Now, though, you want to be “free” (her words, and those of her friends who convinced her single parenting was an easy “scheme” to “pull off” — words taken direct from an email two of her friends sent her, telling her to “con me into feeling guilty”) of me and marital union, but you want the benefits of marriage?”

Yes, she went back to school after we divorced. While we were married, I encouraged her to go to school, earn her degree, but she wanted to be a stay-at-home-mother. The only thing: the children were all in school. The house was never kept up, and she often got home from running around after our children got in from school. Yes, I know what she was up to during the day, as I often came home, sat with the children, started their homework with them, and slipped out, heading back to the office just minutes before she arrived home.

It was a sad situation. There was nothing to do to make things better. She wanted everyone to believe I was this monster. Her problem was that she had issues she refused to address. When she had the checkbook, she’d bounce checks all over town. I tried for several years to get her to go to marital counseling with me, but, after she cheated on me, then lied about it when I confronted her — telling her I knew — I washed my hands of her. I stayed at the house, only because of the children. I slept on the couch for five years, never going near her again. Initially, yes, I could have forgiven her. I think. After she lied — then continued to lie to me, even when confronted with proof — that’s something I tolerate from no one.

Yes, parenting, as you say, is something that is important. Nay, it is critically important. Parenting — from a mother, a father or even a grandparent or guardian — a person who commits their life to loving and rearing a child from birth through adulthood. It’s more than important, actually.

I look around, at the friends my oldest has made. She came to live with me just before starting high school. After graduating, she came to me, cried, and told me how she never felt she’d accomplish anything. Before the divorce between her mother and I, she was pulling in A’s and perhaps a B or two on her report cards. In the time following the divorce, until she came to live with me, her grades dropped. She was lucky to pull in Cs and Ds, actually. Why? Because her mother was never at home, and when she was, she was sleeping. My daughter said she felt like Cinderella.

When she came to live with me, the focus was on school. She hated me for the first month or so of high school. I enforced a deadline for her to be home each day, and she argued, “But Dad, I am in high school. I have a social life.” I laughed, telling her I would determine her social life.

Inside, yes, it hurt me. I also knew that to get her grades up and her mind focused back on her academic career, she needed someone strong.

Before the middle of her sophomore year, she was listed on the Honor Roll twice. While seeking colleges and universities, she chose “safe” or “fall back” schools, you know, the ones that were “okay,” but not really the ones she wanted to attend. She chose three “fall back” schools. She applied to six schools, in all.

Before April during her senior year, all the schools responded. She had been accepted to all except one. The three she wanted to attend — all Ivy League schools — accepted her. One of her “fall back” schools didn’t accept her, and in the rejection, which seems to be a real letter, the dean who wrote the letter said her “heart didn’t seem like it was in it” for applying to that particular school. The comment was based on a statement she had to write about why she wanted to attend that particular school.

For high school graduation, her mother attended. All of my daughter’s friends were floored. They assumed her mother died because my daughter spoke only in past tense of her mother. Once the graduation ceremony was over, the ex made a mark that really hurt our daughter. She said: “Well, your father got your grades up for you. Now you can come home to Mommy, right?”

See, I did not get her grades up. Yes, I worked with her, helped her understand a few things she was unclear of — in her freshman year — but all the work was hers! Not mine. I encouraged her, pushed her, and after a month of enforcing a deadline to be home during her freshman year, let her come and go with a curfew for the evening. Past that, she had her social life. She knew if she missed her homework assignments or if her grades slipped, she had to answer to me.

Your summation, “There is no substiture for a mother to her children” is more appropriately something like:
“There’s no substitute for caring parent(s) to children.”