My parents got divorced when I was about 6 years old. My father had problems with alcohol and because of that he was court ordered to only be able to see us under supervision (my Grandmother) and only if he was sober. We went to my Grandparents house every Friday after school and most of the time spent the night. This was the only time I usually saw anyone from my Father's side of the family aside from holidays. Unfortunately, we would be there and my Dad usually never showed up. Very rarely would I hear from him on my birthday or Christmas. He never got a handle on his drinking and knew he wouldn't be allowed into my Grandmother's home so he just never bothered to come. When I turned 13 my Mom had a family birthday party for me and surprised me with my Dad showing up. He told me he met a woman and that she helped him to stop drinking and turn everything around and to this day he is still sober. Things were still a little shaky for a few years mainly because I was so hurt from all of the years prior and angry that I wasn't enough for him to help himself but he started showing up to my Grandmother's on Fridays and we started rebuilding our relationship from there.
A little before my Dad came back into my life my Mom started dating as well. They have been together since I was about 12, so 16 years now. They are not married but he did propose to her with a ring, they have just chosen to not get married. I do call him my stepfather and I do consider him to be important in my life. He has done a lot for my Mother and my family and he worked hard for us. He cosigned my student loans with me and calls his me his daughter to his friends and things like that.
Over the last few years I have forgiven my Father and I have become much closer with him. When I started planning my wedding I decided I wanted to honor both of them. My stepdad is going to walk my down the aisle halfway and my Dad will meet me there and walk me the rest of the way. I told my Mom about the idea and she was so thrilled I was going to this for my stepdad.
Now she is driving me insane with father/daughter dances!! She is insisting I need to do a dance with each of them!!! I do not want to do a dance with each of them. I was planning on dancing with my Dad for the father/daughter dance and that is it. Everytime she asks me about it I tell her I only want to do one dance. She gets so mad at me or she'll try to convince me to share the dance with both of them! I already shared the walk down the aisle with both of them and I thought that was enough. I don't want to hurt my Dad's feelings by cutting his dance short. I don't want to have a second dance because I feel like it would be awkward and unessecary to have people sit through 2 father/daughter dances. I don't think my stepdad would be upset if we didn't do a dance, he really doesn't like attention anyway, but my Mother is making me feel guilty for not doing it! I thought maybe I can do something with him and invite all other father/daughter pairs to join us for the dance but I don't know. She is making me crazy!
