Situation as follows:

My ex (we never married) ignored me most of my pregnancy, had little to do with my son, was emotionally and verbally abusive, and I finally left. In the nasty custody battle that ensued, he actually got violent, threatening, and abducted our son when he was 15 months old and wouldn't even let me see him for almost a month. At the time, we didn't have a custody order.

So now, he is 26 months old, I have full custody, he has been ordered to have supervised visitation, and undergo psychiatric care. He has some kind of personality disorder, from what I can tell, it's a narcisistic personality disorder.

So a few weeks ago, he called my son (He goes through spurts of calling several times a day, to not calling for weeks, in this instance he had not called for 2 weeks)

My son was actually engaging him in conversation when his father abruptly said "Daddy has to go, daddy has another call" and promptly hung up on him.

My two year old stared at the phone, got the saddest little look in his eyes, turned to me and said "Daddy went bye-bye." then paused, then got a heartwrenching look on his face and with a very sad voice said "Daddy hung up on me?" I've never seen him respond like this, and truly believe his feelings were hurt.

Not knowing what else to do, we immediately called my brother (a prominent male fugure in his life) knowing my brother was home and would talk to my son until he was done talking.

So, now that you have the history, help me handle this. It's clear that my son knows everyone has a mommy and a daddy, he knows his daddy is gone and lives somewhere else, and know it seems he knows his daddy has other things more important than him to attend to. How do you handle a situation like this? I don't want his self-esteem to suffer because of it. He has my father, his uncle, and also my fiancée in his life as promienent male role models that love him consistently.

I was going to wait until my son decided to call my fiancée daddy on his own, but in light of this situation, I had a talk with him and just asked him if it would be okay if my fiancée became his daddy when we got married. Is this appropriate? I felt like he needed to know two daddies was an option, and that he was going to have a daddy that loved him and was consistently part of his life like he sees in other people, in books, and in TV shows. He's very excited by this, and will proudly tell people "He be my daddy!"

Does anyone have any advice on how best to handle situations like this? I don't want to lie to my son about his real father and tell him he's a wonderful man and father, when he's not, and have him resent me for lying to him. I certainly can't put his biological father down in front of my son. How are you supposed to handle situations with fathers like this so it all comes out best for the child? How do you walk the line between the truth, and tact?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. This is very far out of my leaugue, I didn't think this sort of thing would come up for a few years yet.

He sounds like a great boy.

As with the phone calls, one way you could perhaps deal with them being irregular for the time being is by saying why his daddy has to leave - talk to him about it. Perhaps because he has important work or something like that. Don't make anything up though, this could be thrown back in your face.

I think it is great that you told your son early that you were planning on marring your fiancée and his delight and happiness at this shows!

I should like to say that it is hard that his biological father is on and of with his son, but you have to be thankful that he does at least want something to do with him.

The best way to deal with this is day by day, your son is still quite young will forget little things at this age and has trouble understanding some things too. Make sure that he understands, and try to make this so in a good way.

Good luck with the future and I hope I helped

I have been in a very similar situation. His father abandoned him before birth though. The difference was we also have a daughter and he did see her from time to time. So it was particularly hard because the questions were more "why does my dad want to see her and not me". Well, eventually he quit seeing either one of them.

My son is now 16 years and always wanted nothing more than to have a daddy. I told my son growing up simply that daddy didn't know how to love. It had nothing to do with him (my son). I made no lies for him, nor did I paint him in any great light. I did not make any excuses for him. My son deserved to know he was important. Not that he was less of a priority for my ex. I never said he was a loser, or told him to hate him, just told him that my ex wasn't capable of being a loving person and my son was his loss. I told this to my son. I told him that he is loved and worthy of being loved and that so many people loved him. I told him every chance I got that he was good, that he was loved.

I surrounded my son with men who did love him, just as you are doing. Grandpa, uncle etc. I was with a man for 6 years who I have another child with and that was who he called Daddy. That was who was Daddy. Even though we didn't stay together in the long run my son thinks of him as Daddy. More importantly, he doesn't feel it's his fault or less worthy because his bio dad couldn't be who he should have been as a decent person.

I have to say that when my son hit about 15 he wanted to "know" who that guy was that left him in a ditch so to speak. He looked him up and found him but to this day has still not talked to him. It was enough I guess to just see what he looked like (he saw pics). He talked to his brothers and step mom but not dad. His desire to seek him out any further has stopped. He has good relationships with male figures and has not seemed to suffer any devastating damage from not having him around. I hope that is because I was there for him and so were others. I do know he knows he is loved and worthy.

I would never tell your son if your ex is "planning" to call, so that when he doesn't it isn't a huge let down for him. When the "jerk" does call I would tell your son that dad only has a minute so he will expect it to be a short call. Find an activity immediately after the call to distract him. Calling your brother like you did was a great way to help.

Maybe you could tell your ex he must call at a certain time each week. If he misses his window then he doesn't get to talk to your son. When you are expecting the call have your son engaged in an activity he can easily go right back to. Your son doesn't need to know the appointed time, but it might help in getting rid of the erratic calls and emotional disruptions your son has to suffer now.

Do keep doing what you are doing by having the people that are in his life be the stability. Loving him. It won't replace but will fill the void.

I hope you found something helpful. It is such a tough position to be in. My prayers are with you and your family.

I also wanted to add that if your ex truly is NPD it won't go away and you will need to learn how to manage the relationship for your son. You will need to set boundaries big time. It would help you immensely if you could find a child psychologist or a good counselor that has a specialty in personality disorders to help you do this and help your son as he grows up with a NPD parent. They wreak havoc on their children and your son will eventually need to learn how to mange his own relationship with him or he will be mentally abused for the rest of his life.

If nothing else maybe you could start with a great book that will help in defining good boundaries. It is called "Boundaries: When to say Yes, When to Say No, To Take Control of Your Life" by Henry Cloud.

Log everything that happens regarding your ex. It can be really helpful in court if you need to go back or get a chance to, to keep his interactions with your son to a very minimum or even have them taken away from him.

Your ex may have NPD alone but it is also possible that it could be mixed with something else. Check out this site, it is more about BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder) and commonly goes with NPD but has great related links to NPD: BPD Central - borderline personality disorder resources - links