Social Question

Dutchess_III's avatar

How is it that some people can beg and beg for a second chance, and when you give it to them they promptly screw things up again?

Asked by Dutchess_III (46813points) September 12th, 2013

When they talk to you they admit to their failings, promise to change, talk about how much they HAVE changed, but then when you take them back they promptly resume the behavior that destroyed the relationship in the first place.

My ex begged for a year to be allowed a second chance. I finally let him come home…and the first night he went out for a pack of smokes and disappeared for hours, having gone to his girlfriend’s house.

The father of my daughter’s twins keeps begging to let him see the babies AND to take him back. She doesn’t want him back, but she does want him to be in the kid’s life so she had generous visits all set up. He was consistently late coming to get them,by 30, 45 minutes, an hour, whatever, and he wouldn’t call. Just leave her sitting in the parking lot of a neutral exchange place, like a convenience store, for an hour!

Then he said that he’d pick them up, but Corrie had to go to Wellington (30 miles away where he chose to move to about 6 months ago) to pick them up. She doesn’t have a vehicle that can make that drive, and he damn well knows it. He said “Then you just don’t get them back.” Of course, she didn’t allow him to pick them up after that, until he agreed to drive both ways (He doesn’t have to live in Wellington, BTW,)

Then, after about a month, at one point he said he couldn’t take them to his house because the rugs were dirty (it was a lie. He had some insane stalker woman who kept coming over.) Very, VERY reluctantly Corrie let him stay at her place with the twins, and she left for the day. When she got home, her place was a wreck and he had eaten just about everything in the house (he’s a fat slob.) When she got home he was asleep on the floor while the babies were crawling around him.

And in the middle of all of this he’s begging her to take him back!

WTF is wrong with him, and others like him?

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10 Answers

RealEyesRealizeRealLies's avatar

Things don’t change for folks like this because everyone around them sees their actions as screwing up. Things only change for folks like this when they see their own actions as screwed up.

They don’t care how others perceive them. They don’t even fully realize how others perceive them. They only care how they perceive themselves, which is often quite delusional from reality. Nothing changes until a disaster forces them to take a long look in the mirror. And even then, they rarely change instantly. Realizing you’re messed up is a very difficult and hard fought first step. But actually manifesting a change from that realization is even more difficult, decades in the process.

Dutchess_III's avatar

But if you REALLY wanted someone back, wouldn’t you at least try to fake it?

LuckyGuy's avatar

I’ve got to know… You wrote: “he’s a fat slob.”
Why did she go out with him in the first place? And why on earth did she mate with him?!

Why did she wait more than 10 minutes after the first time he came late? Is she enabling this behavior?

Dutchess_III's avatar

They actually dated for several years. After she got pg he really radically changed. I don’t know what happened.

She’s not any more @LuckyGuy. She shut the whole thing down.

jca's avatar

It’s her responsibility as the normal, and custodial parent, not to let this behavior continue. I would notify the court, if I were her, that his sleeping with the twins unsupervised (a CPS report, by the way) is unacceptable and dangerous. Also his lateness and comments like “you just don’t get them back” is also not acceptable.

I would stop the visits and let all else go through court, and keep track of his lateness and stuff like that.

If she continues to enable him, she looks like the idiot and a bad parent, as well.

As far as what is wrong with people who beg for forgiveness and then continue to screw up, who knows what people’s motives are – they don’t care, whatever.

KNOWITALL's avatar

Everyone deserves a second chance, but not a third and fourth. At some point, you tell yourself “I tried and it didn’t work, so I’m moving on. Good luck to you.”

Dutchess_III's avatar

No money for a lawyer @jca. But she has stopped the visits. She has cut off all communication with him, as far as she can.

flutherother's avatar

Knowing what these people are like how can you give them a second chance. Dissociate yourself from them, they are messing with your mind and they aren’t interested in second chances.

YARNLADY's avatar

My sister was like that. I honestly think she was sincere at the time she made promises, but her mind just let her make up excuses after the fact.

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