The Wicked Father

While women traditionally get a rough ride in fairy tales - you are either the beautiful, vulnerable heroine or the wicked stepmother or a witch - men become the archetypal hero. Prince Charming rescues Cinderella from her life of drudgery, The Huntsman kills the Granny-devouring wolf and saves Little Red Riding Hood, and the Seven Dwarves allow Snow White to live in their care and protection (albeit in returning for doing all the domestic work in the house...which she can't really complain about as most of it seems to be done by the various woodland creatures who visit! However, in my house that would result in a telephone call to Pest Control...but I digress!).

Even Aladdin (a thief and a vagabond) turns out to be an all-round good guy, whilst it turns out that the Beast was just simply misunderstood.

So why do separated fathers suddenly become the devil in disguise?!

These are the same men that the Evil Queens fell in love with - the men who they married, had children with and spent a significant proportion of their lives with. These are the same men who held their hand and mopped their brows whilst they were in the throes of labour, the same men who got up in the middle of the night (despite having to get up themselves for work in the morning) to share the night feeds and give them a break when they were totally exhausted, and the same men who changed the dirty nappies (while trying not to heave!) and rolled around on the floor, like idiots, to entertain the kids.

Then what happens? A weird phenomenon seems to occur when the handsome prince leaves the Evil Queen. Following the separation, it seems that all fathers undergo drastic personality changes. Overnight they go from the loving, caring partner, husband and father to emotionally and physically abusive beasts (who have ruined the Evil Queens' entire lives!), misogynists who were never there for their wives and kids and who never raised a hand to help around the house...and, as in many cases, they also suddenly become drug-taking alcoholics!

So just how does this transformation occur? William Congreve (an English playwright and poet) perhaps summed this up the best in his play, The Mourning Bride, with the line:

"Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned."

To start with, friends and family will be regaled with tales of all of your shortcomings as a husband and a father. You will discover that you were simply a lodger in the house, and expected to be waited on hand and foot. You will be reminded of arguments that you don't remember ever happening (and most of them probably didn't!). You will realise that your own children don't actually know who you are, as you were never there for them and never spent any time with them (even though you spent hours at the hospital with your son following a game of Lego in which one of the bricks 'accidentally' found its way up his nose!). Your controlling side will be revealed - the one which refused to allow the Evil Queen any time to herself and stopped her from ever leaving the house. And you will be introduced to the Mr Hyde side of your personality which appeared, without your knowledge, to emotionally, verbally and physically abuse the Evil Queen whilst indulging in various immoral pursuits such as snorting cocaine and drinking to excess. Perhaps it's time for you to call the Psychologist at this point!

If you're lucky, this might be as far as it goes...however, if you are unlucky enough to have to go to the Courts to fight for the right to see your children, expect more revelations!

There will be further claims of domestic abuse and the neglect of your own children. You will be forced to defend yourself against the hearsay evidence of the Evil Queen (who will probably have spent thousands of pounds employing her evil minion to support her in Court), but unfortunately we still live in a society in which the judicial service is inherently biased against fathers and your defence will fall upon deaf ears. You will hear allegation after allegation against yourself, to the point where you begin to actually wonder if you did actually commit the heinous crimes you are being accused of!

 And her?! Well, she is just perfect in every way...that's why you married her after all! She turns on the waterworks so clearly she MUST be telling the truth.

But it's not all bad....right?! In most situations now, the Judge will award some sort of contact with the father. It might start off with some (unjustified) supervised contact as it did in our case. Surely no harm can come of that? Well, the Evil Queen announced to the Court that she still had concerns following the 'supervised' contact (which was incidentally supervised by herself and/or her family members). And the concerns?...The other half was "five minutes late" to one session and made an untoward comment in another session (which was a joking "Who's been beating you up?!" when he noticed a bruise on the step-girlchild's face). Fortunately, the Judge saw sense and awarded us staying contact.

And so that's the end of it...No! This simply gives the Evil Queen more ammunition. Whilst the kids are here, she sits in front of her Magic Mirror, which apparently allows her to see and hear everything that happens in our home, with her notebook and pen to record her 'evidence' to present to anyone else who will listen. And our crimes?! Not having the same dummy for the step-girlchild as the one at her house, not taking the children to church because the road outside our home was a sheet of ice, not putting clothes on the children that were in line with her style...the list goes on! Every email received is a diatribe of the other half's failings as a father.

You will also be accused of not providing adequately for the Munchkins, and will hear how she is never going to afford to keep a roof over her head - despite her significant Spousal Maintenance!

Eventually people get bored of hearing the same trivial things, be it friends and family or the Courts, and the Evil Queen runs out of things to complain about. So that's the end of it...right?! No! She needs to find a new audience so she writes to both of our employers to complain about our "interference" in the lives of her children. Luckily, we both have reasonable employers so her letters are "filed" in the appropriate places!

But she still won't give up, and this is where we end up at the mercy of Children's Services due to more allegations of a far more serious nature...but that's for a separate blog post!

Ex-husbands and partners do not simply turn into monsters and villains when they walk out of the door, leaving the Evil Queens behind, nor do they become useless and incompetent fathers. They are still the same men. Maybe some of them do have Beast-like moments, brought on by the constant battles with the Evil Queen (which would take their toll on any reasonable human being), but underneath there is still the Prince Charming - a loving, caring man and, most importantly, father!

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