My daughter’s father left the minute I said I was …

Comment on So you grew up with a dad who didn’t know how to express love? Here’s how it could be affecting you today by Monica.

My daughter’s father left the minute I said I was pregnant. He saw her twice in her life, the last time being when she was 7 mos old. When she was 3, he took me to court to have child support amended. The mediator we met with asked if I had ever kept him from seeing her, and his reply was “No. Her only condition has been that I have to be consistent. We left court that day and he disappeared.

She is now 9 1/2 and is for the first time developing a relationship with a man. It is my fiance. I’ve never allowed her to meet any of the men I have dated for fear that the relationship wouldn’t last and she would have further abandonment issues with someone she related to leaving us. Once my bf and I knew we would be marrying, I let her be the one to broach the subject of meeting him. She is very intelligent and highly emotional. I tread carefully to not force relationships on her.

My fiance and her have bonded very well and she has even asked to start calling him daddy. Well, wouldn’t you know it, this is going so well, her biological father has decided he wants to be a parent after all. He served me with papers to start seeing her.

I want to know what effects this could possibly have on her. She is just now bonding with a male figure in her life, what will the man that abandoned her entering her life do to her?

Should I allow it or fight it? I want what is best for her but I do not want to have to pick up her broken heart if the bio father flakes again.

Please advise me. I want my daughter to continue being the intelligent, self-assured, confident and radiant child she is!