Child - You can't MAKE them, you can only BREAK them!

After a time, Nikque’ fear of telling her father how she felt seemed more disturbing than anything and the stories she relayed sounded like a sort of emotional torture for a child. If Nikque is to be believed, then her father made her go and tell her step-mother every negative feeling she had about her, and then she was ridiculed, told that wasn’t nice and basically humiliated into not saying anything at all. Nikque has NEVER been allowed to develop that relationship at her own pace. Had she been allowed that dignity, things might well be very different today. It seems to me that Rodney sent Nikque a clear message, don’t accept Ursula, don’t get me and any complaints Nikque has made over the years, Rodney has refused to stand up for her. Nikque confided in my mother most of the same complaints she made to me during the early months of kindergarten when I wasn’t home and that removed any doubt (what very, very little that remained) that the things Nikque had to say about Ursula were a reflective of a misplaced loyalty to me. Since Rodney and I were never married, Nikque didn’t have the typical issues surrounding divorce or ideas that Ursula had replaced or mis-placed me, but Nikque became aware that I was not allowed in “their” house and it made her uncomfortable. When she was there, she was cut off from mommy and she knew it. When she wanted to call me, she was told “no” or “later”, but later never came. Today, she plainly states that she doesn’t even ask anymore because she know the answer will be no. According to Nikque she was told it’s “our time” to have you. Things I taught her or allowed her to do were branded as wrong or bad and without my knowledge she began taking sides. Rarely did I try to justify myself when Nikque brought conflicts between households to me. I didn’t know how to do it peacefully, so I generally told her that daddy and I did things different and if it was something that really bothered her, I would tell her to talk to her daddy and tell him how much it bothered her. Otherwise, I was secure enough as a parent to feel no need to defend myself. I gave and continue to give parenting my best and I am content to allow her to develop her own opinion as to whether or not she grew up appreciating that. She is free to criticize my decisions, my style or my methods but also understands that I am the boss. I remind her that everything I do is either for her safety, best interest or enrichment even is she can’t see it or understand it and when I can’t support a decision I’ve made by that standard, I always remind myself that I must at least reconsider the decision even if I don’t change it. Nikque and I have negotiated many a dispute this way, and it has given me more credibility with her than I thought was possible because now, when I tell her something she doesn’t want to hear, she trust’s that I have a good reason even when she doesn’t understand it. She knows that if she can’t question it right at that moment, I will always make time for her questions as soon as I can.