HOW TO BE A FATHER...?

Hi ! I am a widowed father of a teenage daughter, yes I have a daughter who is in her 18th year . I love my daughter very much and if there is anything I could do to make her happy I am willing to do that but I do not know why of all the things I do I feel I am not a good father ,

I try my best to take care of her and advise her in the most possible ways but , my daughter has become very arrogant an irresponsible now ..

Sometimes I think maybe its because she grew up without A mother .
My wife passed away when my daughter was 3 yrs old . Since then I have always tried my best to be both a dad and a mom for my daughter , because i never wanted my daughter to feel the loss of her mom , I have taken care of her in every possible way I could , i did all the work at home ( now I have a maid ) but back then I did everything , including cooking , and preparing lunch , washing dishes and clothes , getting her ready for school , and I also went to drop her school until she got onto fourth std .

I always brought her everything she asked for , celebrated every birthday with her . And all the things I could possibly do .

But now my daughter has grown up , she has grown up so much that she feels ashamed of her own dad , she feels ashamed of me around her friends .. Maybe because I am growing old or maybe I am not good enough dad.

I still remember when I took her to places like zoo , park , movies , and other places , the best part was when her school books arrived and we both went to the book store and bought them together , she would be so happy to see all the colourful pictured contents .. I still remember carrying her in my shoulders and running around on the way to her school , I still remember braiding her hair and tying those colourful ribbons around her little head , I still remember how it was like preparing her lunchbox carefully ..

But now my daughter is different, she doesn't like my lunch , she wants money for lunch , Although money is not an issue , I earn enough !!

I am not blaming my daughter, but there are little things that matter ,

Now she likes to have her food alone in her room , and she doesn't need me anymore, she is always busy in her cellphone she doesn't even have time to ask " how are you feeling today dad ", she goes to her friends places to stay for days, and if I say anything, she gets very angry , and breaks things .. sometimes she even comes home acting as if she is drunk . I can say this because of the smell of alcohol from her breath !!

Her room always smells of cigarettes , and a few weeks back I also found marijuana ( ganja ) while cleaning her room .

Nowadays she has become very very angry, she never talks to me properly .

I know that she hangs around with her male friends, I know this because my office staff have found her in bars and restaurant .

She has become so reckless, last month she forced me to buy her a 23000 /- rs cell phone, when I disagreed she broke her old phone and left home to stay with her friends, I am not against spending money on my daughter, I totally don't feel bad about spending money on her , but all I am asking her is to understand how her father feels , I want her to understand that earning isn't as easy as it seems, I have never laid a finger on my daughter since my wife passed away, so there is nothing I can do !!

There is one more thing,

I really dislike her friends , because of the way they dress up , I hope their parents don't have problem with their daughter dressing up in that manner .. I do know my daughter is in a bad company and I really fear that she will ruin her future .

Her conduct in school isn't so good as well.

I do not blame my daughter, but I blame myself , maybe I have not been a very good parent...

I miss my wife very much these days , I wonder if things would have been different if she was still here with me ??

I feel I have failed myself, I have failed my wife, I may be lacking somewhere to have not understood my daughter somewhere .

I lost my wife about 15 years back , and now I do not want to loose my daughter as well , she is the only thing I have , and I love her very much !!

So please can anyone tell me " how to be a father"?

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[Shared by one of our readers, who wants to remain anonymous and says this is based on a true story]

TheDC