by Brandy Fee

Created on: May 05, 2008

Life after divorce is a complicated thing - not only for "weekend fathers" but for the children who have been left with nothing but those precious weekends they get to spend with their fathers.

I am not naieve enough to believe that there are fathers out there who do not enjoy the weekend fatherhood the court has granted them, and yet, as the wife of a father who only sees his children every other weekend, I can tell you that there is another side to the story.

My husband has been an "every other weekend father" for eight years. Before the divorce, he was a stay-at-home father and a working father. But no matter what, he was the sole caretaker of his children. He fixed his daughters hair before school every day. He drove his son to daycare. He fixed their dinners, did their laundry, bathed them. He was, in every sense of the word, a doting father.

Shocked by his divorce, unwilling to uproot the kids, he signed off on the papers giving her full custody. Eight years later, numerous weekends later, the struggle to "become" a weekend father is still strong in him.

There is never enough time. There is no balance between the guilt of leaving and the joy of having them here when they are. He is friend, father and confidante.

We try to squeeze two weeks into every visit. Baseball, tennis, fishing, board games, movies, cooking, talking, snowball fights, homework.

As an outsider looking in, as stepparent who has been a step child, as wife and friend, I have learned, in the last eight years, that there are too many things to do, and not enough time. But there are essentials, things that matter more than any other when you are parenting only on the weekends:

1) Talk to your children. Their lives are important. Ask the questions you would ask every night at the table. "How was school?" "Anything new going on?" But don't forget the small things like "what's your favorite color?" Talking is the best way to keep sight of your children. Open communication is vital to making weekends work.

2) Don't treat your weekends as if they are weekend getaways. Remember that as hard as it is for your child to adjust to having two homes, stability and consistency are key to providing your children with a happy second home. Lay out the rules, and stick with them. Though you don't want to spend those precious hours disciplining your children, remember that you are still a vital part of the adult they will become. Children often remember things that happen in the blink of an eye - they will remember

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