I’m Jude, and my world was turned upside down three weeks ago when my ex-wife died in a car accident. My 14-year-old son, Jake, was incredibly close to her and has been absolutely devastated. Last week, he started having violent nightmares—waking up screaming and shaking. To help him feel safe, I started sleeping in his room. Just knowing I was there helped him fall back asleep.
My current wife, Sarah, was supportive for the first few nights, but then she snapped. She called it “sick” that a 14-year-old needed his father like that. A few hours later, I woke up to find Jake’s door open. I walked closer and heard Sarah whispering to him in the dark. She was telling my grieving son that his mother “wasn’t even around that much anyway” and that he was “making his dad choose” between him and our marriage. She told him “men your age don’t act like this.”
I was horrified. When I confronted her, she claimed she was just “helping him grow up” and that I was being emotionally manipulated. She ended up leaving to stay at her sister’s until I “stopped coddling him.” But after hearing her tell my son his grief is a burden and insulting his late mother, I don’t think I want her to come back. My son needs a father, not a stepmother who views his trauma as a competition.
