Have you ever wondered who your child would have been if you had not gotten divorced? There are so many arguments about nature versus nurture that I can’t help but wonder how Hailey would be different if I had stayed married.
Don’t get me wrong, I am very proud of the young lady my daughter has become, it was rough for a while, but she really is a wonderful human being. When we were going through those dark, dark teenage years I wasn’t sure we would come out on the other side intact, but we did, and I think we are both better and stronger people for it.
Today I was just thinking about who Hailey would be if I hadn’t gotten divorced. Would those teenage years have been as hard with her father in the home? Or would they have been even harder because she had to endure the strained, tumultuous marriage that her father and I had? When we were going through those teenage years I couldn’t imagine it being harder but now that we are through it I know it could have been much, much worse.
Hailey is strongly anti-drug, her father was a drug abuser during our marriage. He is clean now but wasn’t when we were married so now Hailey sees the effects that drugs had on her childhood and wants nothing to do with them. Would her conviction be as strong if she had not known any other way to live? Would she herself have turned to drugs as an escape from her home life?
I will never know the answers to those questions and while there have been times that I questioned whether or not I did the right thing, there is one thing I know. My daughter is healthy and whole. She may have been that way regardless, it may just be who she was born to be, but as it is, I wouldn’t change a thing.