[Podcast] How to Get Over Daddy Issues

Samantha Gregory
Hi, everyone, welcome to single mama TV. I’m your host, Samantha Gregory, the founder of RichSingleMomma.com. And I’m so excited today that our show is going to be featuring a guest that I know you never forget. As a matter of fact, our show today is going to be dealing with daddy issues. And our guest is therapist, Natalie Alexander. Welcome, Natalie, thank you so much for being with us today.

Natalie Alexander
Thank you, Samantha for inviting me. I really appreciate it. This is exciting.

Samantha Gregory
Yes, absolutely. I am always excited to talk about really deep issues. And hopefully this conversation is going to be eye opening for all of our listeners and if they are dealing with these same issues or they’ll find the help and start seeking the healing that they need in order to live a full life. So I’m just going to kind of just do my normal So tell me about You Who are you? So I we already know your Nelly Natalie Alexander, but tell us more about who you are, where you from and what you specialize in as a therapist.

Natalie Alexander
All right. Natalie Alexander, I am a licensed professional counselor here in Georgia, recently moved from Madison, Alabama. License over there as well. However, I moved from Toronto, Canada to Huntsville, Alabama, and my counseling career and officially started when I was in my early 20s. And just kind of pondering life pod pondering the issues that my family were my family was experiencing at the time. And really, that was unofficial. And then during that time, people would come to me and just kind of pour their hearts out to me and I would somehow have the answers that would kind of quell their quell their fears. And provide some kind of direction for a lot of people. And it really wasn’t until
just over 10 years ago, that it occurred to me that I should probably look into counseling and I went into it and realized that I do have a gift and I, my heart is to help people heal, and to to start them on their journey to work life in healing.

Samantha Gregory
That’s wonderful. I totally get it being somebody who because obviously you’re great listener, and that’s what most people need when they’re seeking advice and healing. And that’s so I really appreciate you I’m glad you are walking in your calling, because it truly is is truly a calling to be able to help people. Yes.

Natalie Alexander
Yes, thank you. Awesome. So

Samantha Gregory
the topic today is daddy issues. And so I want to find out from you. Why, why this topic because I know we’ve we’ve had some conversations in the past. As for our listeners who don’t know, we’ve had some issues in the past and Natalie shared with me that she is focusing on daddy issues because this is such a profound topic that’s affecting so many people. So tell me about why, in your own words you chose to get into this specific niche or area of focus in your counseling.

Natalie Alexander
So that was the part of the question that the first my introduction that I didn’t expound on at this time in my career, relationships, couples, marriage, relationships, and not even marriage, but just relationships in general is my niche right now my specialty where I’m finding the most successes that were where people are actually learning how to communicate with one another, and learning how to one another in a healthy way. All right.

So how daddy issues plays in is that a lot of the problem that people are facing these days is connected to the lack of the father figure in the home, emotionally and or physically. So a lot of times, I get couples where the African American male, it loves his wife and wants to be with his wife, but he perpetually feel disrespected, and just and feel like he’s doing what he’s doing. He’s doing his best and what is her problem?

And inevitably, we get back to, you know, tell me about your father or where was your father and then either he will try to be defensive and wall up with us myself and and and his wife or you’ll allow himself to be a little bit more transparent and share with us that his father was not there and his mother raised him and did her best and there is we can get some understanding and insight on his perspective and why he often feels disrespected or why he feels like his wife can never be satisfied or or things of that nature and but the thing is Samantha, this daddy issue thing this Daddy will say is so deep. I came across some individuals whose fathers were not present and it contributed to this need for comfort.

This need, this drive for acceptance or validation was if they are not aware of To look for in their marriage relationship, they’ll go outside of the marriage relationship and try to find it somewhere else, which is infidelity, cheating, that core thing, and it causes a much larger problem. It’s so low. It’s so deep and vast and complex, the study issue

Samantha Gregory
I can imagine and of course, I think, oh, maybe almost all people deal with that issues in some shape or form. But can you tell me what are some of the, for lack of a better word symptoms that show up in a relationship? Or even with someone who’s trying to just go through life, but I think most times it shows up in relationship. So what are some of the symptoms that they may not be aware of, but it’s almost like presenting itself in a relationship from from a woman’s perspective,

Natalie Alexander
she finds herself overwhelmed She finds herself feeling like she has to do everything all the time. She feels like life, you know, life has to be a certain way. And just often feeling lonely, often feeling insecure about her beauty and about her self worth, and seeks to find self worth in relationship that she would not, you know, would rather not choose to be in just kind of making sacrifices to her own self worth just to gain that sense of being wanted and being and or being needed. Because what’s common as you know, we are socialized to take care of other people we’re socialized to be nurtured. And so the other thing is, you know, we may find a man who, you know, on the other side of the coin has money issues, and because we’re socialized to be normal Because we want to be needed because we want to have a value, which we did not get from our Father, we find the man who has mommy issues and be fulfilled through that. The catches, if he had money issues, he’s still looking for his mom. And he’ll go outside the marriage and keep searching, which is, you know, how a whole other situation to be addressed.

Samantha Gregory
Right. And I think you even already talked about some of the symptoms that show up with men in there in the relationship, not feeling respected, etc. Are there any other symptoms that kind of show up as well?

Natalie Alexander
Yes, for men. It’s a deep, it’s a profound sense of a lack of identity. I remember Oh, try to remember what it was I read or I saw it was it was a red table. Talk. With the gentleman, the comedian from in living color, and I wish I could forgive me I can’t remember his name. I want to say Davidson is his last name. And he talked about growing up, having been adopted by a white family and his mother, adoptive mother moved him to a predominantly black area so that he can connect to his black community. And he said he was walking down the street. And he, somebody was trying to pick on him somebody trying to bully him. And this big black man came out the house and said, leave him alone and stuck up for him and he said it was that day that he was comfortable in his skin. And I like him that experience to when another man validates another man or a boy there and he feels comfortable in his skin. He can now spend in his maleness and in his manhood. Do what needs to be done in life. But if a boy or an adolescent does not get that validation, he is lost. And he is winging it, in relationships and in life. Now, there are things that in North America, men are socialized to do, what is that worked? Yeah, have sex, make children and that’s about it. We are not socialized to communicate verbally. They are allowed to control with their anger. They are not allowed to cry. You know, in certain communities, they are also socialized to be academic intellectually inclined, pragmatic and other communities we’ve got, you know, in church, religious communities, they are allowed to be religious. However, and and there and they find their sense of value and worth in the other males in that particular community. So, one more thing that I’ve observed with men as it pertains to daddy issues. We have communities that are growing gangs that are growing in the in the Georgia area as I understand it, they grow because if the man the Father is not in the house, our young boys are finding men in the street, and where they these boys get a chance to prove themselves. They prove their manhood they prove their strength, by any means necessary to get the validation from the old D. And I said it, I deleted it. It’s not old G and o d, right? But by any means, right? by any means necessary. They will take bullet wounds to go to go to jail, so that when they’re in prison, they get the validation that they crave from from other men for doing this kind of thing. Because the Father has not been in the home,

Samantha Gregory
Wow, that is that is so deep and I was just even as you were talking I was thinking about the whole word validation and how without that validation you and you have no kind of identity your last and then going back thinking about how there are certain cultures that have rites of passage that help their their the adolescence become men or move into manhood. Can you kind of talk about that and how just that juxtaposition of cultures that do have these rites of passages versus those that don’t in and just the difference in it.

Natalie Alexander
There is a book by the name of fire in the belly. And once again, my memory to me I don’t remember the name of the author, but If you’re able to just look for the book fire in the belly, it’s written by a man for men. And this rites of passage, and he talks in detail about I’m just going to touch on it. This rites of passage that happens in certain cultures is where, at a certain age, the boy is taken from his mother, by his father, out into the wilderness, to become a man as it works. manhood, masculinity is conferred on him, and he comes back this boy to his mother, a man having done whatever, whatever the ceremony entails, if it’s circumcision, or it’s walking on hot coals or killing an animal or something of that nature. He comes back, but the process that I want you to Focus, what I want to focus on is that he has taken from his mother, by his father, away from his mother, and after a time brought back, but check this out. Because there is no man in the house, this young boy has to stay with his mother all of the time because she’s a parent. She has to take care, she has to work job. So she ends up being the person holding him accountable and trying to make him a man and trying to make him responsible, which is confusing and stressful for our boys. Because developmentally speaking, what I’ve learned is that from adolescence, up to young adulthood, boys need their father. They don’t need their mother, nor do they want their mothers. Okay. If during this timeframe, you know, moms feel like we have to start yelling We have to start cussing, or we have to get really aggressive with. Imagine how stressful that is for this poor young boy who had learned mother to be nurturing, and playful and fun, all up until that time. And so now, she’s fussing, I mean, she’s cussing me, and I don’t want to hear it. And now I am.

Now I as a boy, I’m mad, and I’m getting aggressive. And but I don’t know what to do with this. Because this lady’s acting like she doesn’t like me. And right now I don’t like her. So I’m going to go to the street where somebody likes me or to school, or to the wrong crowd where people like me and are going to accept me for where they are for who I am, as opposed to a father staying in the home and being in the home where mom can say, Honey, take this here, your boy child, and you know, he’s not listening to me where he can learn, son. This is not how you treat your mother. And this is also can be a rites of passage in North America, in our culture. What that could say, son, let me pull you away out of this room, out of your mother’s release. And we can talk now, I need to tell you that you don’t disrespect your mother, this is my wife, or my girlfriend, or, and this is not how you speak to the woman that I love. And this is not how you speak to the woman that you love, the woman you love, even if she’s asking you do something you don’t want to do, and ABCD and so on and so forth. He is taught and mentor on how to interact with a woman. Unfortunately, the reality is they are taught, like I said before, sex, like babies, and and sex has become a vehicle through which men express their emotions, rather than verbalizing their anger or being productive with it, you know, in several instances, not across the board, obviously, because we have angry football players to take it out on the field. And we have angry musicians who will take it to the, you know, to the drum kit or whatever. But rather than doing that, you know, I Heard, I’ve interacted with males, who’ve told me that when they are angry, they find a girl, they mind a woman or a female, and they and they smash for lack of a better word. But, and that’s how they get it. That’s how they release. pornography is another another symptom or outcome of a lack of a father. Why? Because this relationship between mother and son sometimes become so enmeshed and confusing that they have this pent up resentment or negative emotions, they don’t know what to do with it. So that when they see on a screen two people acting like they love each other, or acting like they’re having sex or even having sex in this pornography video, there’s an opportunity for an erection if I may speak candidly and, and released from ejaculation release and so so And then then follows is the guilt I shouldn’t be doing this what kind of boiling up what kind of man am I? I’ve got to give you the secret. And but this is how that helps my brain because you know, it releases endorphins and so on and so forth.

Samantha Gregory
Yeah. Well, that’s fantastic. I mean, just the explanation of what’s kind of what’s happening in the mind what’s happening even in the heart. Because you know, without that release that male, healthy male, specify healthy male in their life. It’s very hard to know what to do with all these thoughts and feelings and and not build up resentment toward the mother, which translate into resentment for pretty much all women and, you know, it just becomes a vicious cycle. So even with that being said, I’m not gonna I don’t want to give all of this away because I know you’re writing a book

I do want to kind of touch on what happens? I have two questions? How can a single mother such as myself, who has a son, help their fathers children deal with absent father and move into a space of just good mental health, despite the fact of the Father so they don’t have the daddy issues that leads to more pervasive problems.

Natalie Alexander
So, this, I’m glad that’s a good question you want to provide, you want to provide first of all your son with a male mentor, and show him and teach him that there is somebody who can reflect his masculinity. Who can reflect his maleness in a relational way, oftentimes we like to, we like to encourage, you know, coach, football coach basketball coach, which is good to a certain degree. But we want to find somebody that is relational, that will actually serve as a mentor, a life mentor. But here’s the other part of it. As a single mom, a single moms, we have to deal with our own resentment towards the father of our children. We have to be able to take a deep breath, do our own work and accept the fact that this relationship with our child’s father did not work for whatever reason and make peace with that. I meet single women who are angry with the Father. Their children, because he wants him to be a father to the child and he’s not any fathering other people’s children and look what he’s doing. Look what he’s not doing with, you know, your children feel they feel their energy, they feel their energy and so, so doing your own work with your own therapist, making peace with that. And then providing a male mentor who is relational to your son is, is the first step. If your father if your son’s father is living, and close by and emotionally capable of such interactions, you know, make contact with the Father and ask, you know, I’d like for you to still have some kind of contact. If the father is not willing, then the father is not willing. It’s another point of acceptance, and then I had to kind of processing that with your son. And that would definitely be a loss that your son would never Truly grieve and allowing yourself the space to grieve it to go through the stages of grief and make meaning out of his daddy daddy absence and heal from feel from that he’ll from that absence and make meaning from his own life as connected to the male mentor, mentor mentors, that she’s connected with

Samantha Gregory
Great advice. I love that. And I’ve done tried to do a lot of that and this is also even another point of that is having a really good support system in your extended family, you know, with people who are emotionally capable, accepting that’s a key word. And then been able to them being willing to actually be a mentor as well. I mean, whether their uncle or whether their grandfather, whether they’re your cousin, that’s older or Have you think that those may be smart, but again, keyword emotionally capable?

Natalie Alexander
Right? And thank you for emphasizing that because what comes to mind when I talk about emotionally capable, I’m talking about a man that’s able to be angry and show what it looks like in a healthy way. And the man that is able to see the tears of a woman and not panic and freeze or hard enough, but cry with her or move into her space and offer comfort for her. A man is able to say to be okay, if a woman says no, I don’t need your help, I can do this by myself and not feel crushed or rejected because she has refused his help. That kind of wholeness is important, that will help contribute to a healthy boy healthy adolescence, and a healthy man. Awesome.

Unknown Speaker
So at what when Let’s say a man or even a woman reaches a crisis point. And they because a lot of times people aren’t aware that all the chaos in their life and the things that are happening in their life is stems from daddy issues. So when they finally get to that place of Okay, maybe I maybe there’s some issues they finally seek counseling and the counselor like you there pices you know, you might need to process some daddy issues you might be having.

Samantha Gregory
How does he or she go through that process? What what are some of the steps cuz I know you have some steps. What are some of those steps?

Natalie Alexander
Yes, I do ask. I do ask my client. So, you know, tell me more about your father and you know, he’s not here. He was Dr. And they I lambs. Other story. And after this story, depending on how emotionally available Her father is, or his father is, I asked what the client thinks about reaching out to their father, let’s reaching out to her father. And if she if it’s possible, we’ll talk writing a letter first. Because if she’s gone this long without addressing the issue, we’re going to write a letter. First we’re going to write it. And if she’s willing, we’ll talk about the letter in the count in the next counseling session. If she feels like she has a stable enough relationship with her father, where she can send it to him through the mail, then I’ll have her send it and we wait for the response. In our counseling session. I also talked about best case scenario and worst case scenario, what’s what’s the best case scenario in his response? What’s the worst case scenario in his response? And we hash that out that we were prepared for both responses if you know what happens or the other happens. So far, I’ve had more best case scenario outcomes than worst case scenario. I’ve had a couple of worst case scenario outcomes. But I’ve had more best case scenario outcome. So we do that and some women are just not willing. Some willing, some women are not willing, because naturally, children want their parents they want their biological parents. And if biological father is not emotionally mature enough to own his absence, and to take responsibility for the pain that he has caused his child that I will not ask them to reach out and make contact. That’s just a no go and we will begin the grief process. And the space to grieve that loss and make meaning of his loss and begin to look at moving forward and healing that wound and just living life with the tools that that she has to live her best life without her father.

Samantha Gregory
Awesome. I love that, um, you do give them options because I you know, and not try to force anything because people only ready for what they’re ready for. And even in the dealing with the best case scenario and the worst case scenario, I think a lot of times we do well as humans on the worst case scenario.

Natalie Alexander
And I think, familiar with the worst case scenario Like that.

Now what that looks like going to probably let him realize that he didn’t know and he was a waiter.

Next step, what other steps and I talked about I clients here for fathers or fathers, listen to your story, because there’s a reason why not to be in the home or not.

And listen to it and see if you can gain some understanding so that I have the opportunity to create a new bond me
now that she understand where he’s coming from, and see if they both are willing to start today and move forward into a different kind of relationship. I tell you, though, that sometimes the hurt is still beat. And sometimes the hurt is so deep because mom has been toxic. And mom has fueled a lot of negativity into the child. And it’s created a space where dad can do no, right. And we have to discuss that at time.

Samantha Gregory
Wow, that’s so true. I mean, I see it every day. I hear every day in like a lot of forums where moms are conversation conversating and there’s so much negativity and rich we’re all and and just read and not just even in it. These real life forms but in the media and television in so many different outlets where the mother has poisoned, for lack of a better word, the Father, the child against the father, some of it is intentional. Some of it is unintentional, someone’s because they are dealing with their own pain and haven’t resolved. And it’s Yes, this is sad. And I know for me, I decided when things didn’t work out with my child’s father that I would not. And I told him this, I said, I will not speak ill of you, I won’t even celebrate you. But I will have her and him come to their own conclusion about who you are as a person. And I felt like that was, at the time the right thing to do because I didn’t want to plant seeds in my children’s minds about their father, right? Anything because it wouldn’t it would be, I think more detrimental for them. Because let’s say he turned out not to be the What I said, you know, you know that will backfire on me, but also just any chance of a relationship.

Natalie Alexander
Keep in mind that this man that you broke up with is their father, not your father. So your experience, your seeds that you’re afraid of not planting are valid, they’re real. It was not a good mate. It was not a good boyfriend, good husband, he was repairable and treated you horribly. And so that’s why I talk about finding a professional or finding some good friends with whom you can actually share this stuff with and throw those seeds out somewhere and just get it out of your system. So that when you are having when they ask about their father, that you can give them some kind of information in a way that they understand that, you know, your dad’s not here. You know, he he wanted to be a dad or didn’t or whatever it is, that is conducive to their language into their Age, but to say nothing at all still perpetuates the absence because they don’t they don’t know why he left. They don’t know who he is. They just know he’s gone. Hmm. So so there’s that perspective. He doesn’t stop being their father even though he stopped being your, your mate, your husband, your boyfriend? Got it.

Samantha Gregory
Okay. Very good. Good to know. I mean much later on. Good to know. And unfortunately, there was still some, you know, communication between them and so wasn’t completely absent. Just not in the home. Yeah. So from from there, I know you talked about the grieving process and I know that that’s a whole nother I mean, there’s steps to grieving and so can you kind of briefly talk about your why is important to grieve? Because I think people are afraid of that word. But it only think of death. So, explain like, why is important to grieve a relationship or person even though they may still be living?

Natalie Alexander
Right? Because grief. Yes, it’s primarily known as connected to death. But when we think about grieving the absence of your father, that’s the death of a relationship, that that is the death of that relationship when he leaves or when he was just not available. That just never happened. And then it’s perpetuated when you go to school, and there’s daddy daughter dance, or daddy son, football game or all of that, and you don’t have that, that is law. And it speaks to and it’s interpreted, in many ways, in many people as rejection, which feels anger. It’s interpreted as abandonment, it’s interpreted as just just, you know, not being wanted rejection. And so the portents of grieving is to allow yourself and allow your children the space to navigate the stages. So navigate the the denial of it. A lot of times I come across little children who say, Well, my daddy, my daddy went to the store, and my daddy bought me this big truck. Well, we know that your dad’s not in the house. And so what are you talking about? So he’s in denial. He wants to be like the rest of the kids in his class and have a daddy. So then there’s the anger about the realization that Oh, my mom is always in my face about something and it makes me mad and was there where’s this guy that can stick up for me in these in these situations? Not that mom is being mean and abusive, but that this is what these the our children feel. And so there’s the anger then there’s the sadness over it. And then there’s the the bargaining if I was a better kid, if I was good All the time, if I got good grades, then maybe he wouldn’t leave. And I’ll say this, that I’ve come across adults who are perfectionist, who have to do everything perfectly, who have developed anxiety because of this need to be perfect, which is connected to the asset of their father because again, I was good, he would not have left if I was beautiful, then he would stay he would want me and, you know, translates into the way some of our women dress with the you know, just showing a lot and everything else. So the importance to grieve is to come to the place of acceptance, coming to the place of meaning, where, okay, he’s not here. I’m still a beautiful woman. I’m still intelligent. I’m still in Cape I’m still capable, and I can meet a man that will treat me well. And I am sad about it sometimes with this stuff. This doesn’t control how I live my life. And I can now raise a son and raise a boy and know that he is a reflection of them. The man has chosen me and whom I have chosen to create a life with and move forward in life. Separate from who my father wasn’t, and and who and where my father was or was not.

Samantha Gregory
Excellent, excellent. Thank you for explaining that. Because I, I think that our listeners, you know, really get some cooking, get some clarity from that process. And like you said, the grieving leads you to acceptance and then maybe the acceptance can also lead you to, like you said, living your best life and that because a key to a good life is accepting what happened, what didn’t happened, and being able to move forward despite all the thing all the disappointments and pain and agony stress and being able to release all of the perfectionist, perfectionist behavior in the feeling of invalidation and everything. So, the release talked about release for a second.

Natalie Alexander
I’m glad you said that. I’m so glad. Because to release it means to let it go to let it go. Let it go, let go of the anger, let go of that resentment, let go of that bitterness, let go of the belief that all men are no good. All men are selfish. All men are narcissistic, all men only think about themselves, let it go. Because it was only your dad. It was only your dad that was thinking about himself. And maybe he was just trying to do life with the best tools that he had or did not have. Once again, just hearing his story, but let it go. But let it go also means like the word we use just now, releasing it, releasing it in a way that is therapeutic for you. If it’s a hard cry like that snotty, ugly cry in a safe place, right? Because here’s the other thing about the daddy absence. We have learned as women, that we have to be strong. Because if I’m a mom whose father was not available, let me let me back up a little bit. Little girls. Well, we all cry, right? But little girls have been socialized to be allowed to cry. And so when we cry, we need comfort. And if I’m a mom, who did not have a father to comfort me, and I have a daughter, well, I’m not going to offer any comfort to her. I’m gonna say it’s all right. Hush your mouth. What you’re crying for you strong. You got this. Get back out there. So she’s gonna learn because mom didn’t cry and nobody was ever around to comfort me or mom. She’s gonna learn that I have to be strong, and I have to take care of everything and not myself because nobody took care of me. So then then we get to a point of a mental illness, you know, suppressed, suppressed, depressed, right? depression or the what is like what is okay? So what if this happens? What if that happens? What if we get robbed? What if, what what if we don’t have enough food, you know and all of that. So then a more says anxiety and several other illnesses that are connected this kind of mentality. So to release it and to cry and to scream at the event is to just allow yourself to make it through those emotions. And onto the other side where some clarity will come about your life and who you are and what you mean to yourself and what you mean to the people that love you. In which case Yes, there is sunshine. There is rainbow On the other side of all of that, yeah,

Samantha Gregory
I think that takes an extraordinary amount of courage to get to that place where you’re willing to look at the data issues, you willing to look at how it impacted your life, are you willing to look to open up all of those, boom, you know, take off all those dirty bandages and stuff. And just, just, I mean, that’s like the scariest thing for a lot of people. I know for me it was and it it just makes it makes you so vulnerable, where like you just mentioned, you’re taught as a woman, or a little girls. At some point, when the daddy’s not there, you have no one to convert you then you either learn on your own or your mother tells you to be strong. And so you put this shell over you, and so you never really get to that place of vulnerability and being able to look at the issue but And then some people get so used to this state of being it’s even harder to even though life is just completely chaotic I can’t you know nothing is happening for you You just just like in this total space of nothing ever goes right for me. But we want to get to that other side of I need to find out why. And daddy issues have play a huge role and I’m willing to look at this and really examine this right and ignore people say just get over it. Get it like you said get through it because and that is this examination process that’s creating all those things is like oh my god, how am I gonna get what you do and like you said, when you get to the other side of that it’s just like my whole life opens up for me. And there is the opportunity for so much love and so much joy and so much connectedness with healthy people.

Natalie Alexander
Yes, yes, yes, yes. And what I want to emphasize here with that is that you don’t have, you don’t have to grieve by yourself. And you don’t have to do like by yourself. Matter of fact, we were not meant to grieve alone. We were not meant to do life alone. A lot of us do life alone, or we’ve learned that this is how to do life. Because the people that were charged with teaching us how to do life, just didn’t have the tool did not have the wherewithal.

And I’ve seen, you know, mothers who don’t have it and often get irritated and frustrated with their children who are who need who need them to just be present, to be emotionally present, and they just don’t have it. I’m reading a book called making meaning and it’s the six stages of grief by David Kessler and he talks about his own experience of the death of His mother, and how his father he tried to he tried to grieve in the presence of his father the assets father of question, and his father, but I go to bed I leave me alone, and and just shut it down. And that’s a great example of, of the absence of a father, the emotional absence of his father. And of course, that generation, we’re talking in the 70s, I want to say 70s 80s, early 80s. In that generation, nobody was emotionally battling.

That was just not a thing that was encouraged or known. So the point that I’m making is, we want to be good parents. We want to teach our children to work hard, do good in school, treat everybody with love and kindness. But we don’t have the tools to teach them to be present, or to be or to experience our negative emotions, without judging ourselves as being bad. People for being angry, or in some religious communities being sinful or angry. Note late is not central to experience anger at a situation or at an individual. Be at your father or not. It’s totally, totally make sense. I had a conversation. This reminds me of a conversation that I had with a church member several years ago, where he was he was an older gentleman, and he was trying to get to me today as why tell me about it. I was just, I was I was so angry. Why are you angry? Well, cuz I was at my mom’s house and my dad wasn’t there. And there’s a limit. You’re the devil was nowhere near that situation. You should be angry. You should be angry that your father was not there. Because your father was there. And so you know that to say that we want to be careful that we don’t spiritualize our negative emotions as it pertains to the assets of our fathers. We should be upset. And it is very upsetting. It’s distressing. And so to encourage you to feel it, but don’t feel it by yourself. There are some there is somebody out there that you can trust to express that and share that with that will hear you and that will empathize with you and walk that road with you. Be it me, therapist or another therapist, or grandma or somebody in your world that can come alongside of us. Very, very important in the healing process.

Samantha Gregory
Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you so much for that. I I know that for this show. You have been so gracious and focus on daddy issues for women, but I know that That, in your upcoming book, you’re going to be focusing on data issues for men specifically. So I’m excited about that. So I don’t want to give the whole book away but I will love just kind of, you know, explaining you kind of through the rest through this entire interview talked about a little touch on the male side of things. But in your book, who was this specifically for even though it was written for men, but who is it specifically for and can single moms glean some wisdom from this book when it comes out?

Natalie Alexander
Absolutely single moms can glean it’s for everybody. It’s for everybody. It’s for the people who recognize the daddy wound, and that there is something missing. If for people who find themselves at a wall in their relationships, and just can’t understand why they’re not able to interact with their loved one in a way that is nurturing and loving. And if they’re willing to heal and to walk the journey, then my book would be a wonderful resource for that. So definitely for women definitely for men, I provide metaphors and and cases of situations that the reader will make will be able to resonate with and see themselves also to attach themselves to that to that situation, and to the process of healing. Healing the daddy world where the wound is no longer so sensitive, but maybe it’ll be like a spot or a dark spot, you know, where you have a scar sometimes, right and you see that Oh, that’s where my daddy was. Was but I’m healed and it’s not so sensitive anymore. I don’t jump back and I don’t recoil when I hear him when I see him or when I see a girl with her dad or when I you know, I go to a wedding and her dad is walking her down the aisle, but mine didn’t you know, doesn’t hurt so deeply anymore. I it’s a wound is healed and I’m okay. And because I’ve heard his story, because I’ve grieved the pain because I’ve made meaning of of my life now. I can live now and I can enjoy a healthier relationship as disconnected from my daddy world and connected to my significant other.

Samantha Gregory
Oh, that’s wonderful. I can’t wait. I cannot wait for the book to come out. And I know that just our listeners when it comes out because I know it’s coming out probably in the spring toward late spring. Summer so I will definitely have a link to the book when it comes out. And Natalie I am so appreciative of you being here and for you sharing about daddy issues and how it impacts our lives, but how it can also improve our lives once we get through the process of healing. So thank you again for being with us today.

Natalie Alexander
Thank you, Samantha, so much for inviting me and for giving me this chance to share my heart and, and my passion with you. I appreciate it. And I’m thanking all the viewers and the listeners. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. This is exciting.

Samantha Gregory
Absolutely. And everyone thank you again for listening to every single mama TV and podcast. I will have a show notes on the website. You’ll be able to see it in the link below. And I hope that you kind of take these nuggets of information that you’ve learned from the show today. If you’re dealing with daddy issues if you have not even thought about having that you might have them might think about it and start developing A plan and from building up the courage to face them. That’s really, really important. So take care until next time, I hope that you have a wonderful day and we will see you again next time.

Natalie Alexander
Bye. Thank you. Bye