Carolyn Hax: Husband throws away bond with daughter over pointless blame

Q: My husband has a terrible relationship with our college-age daughter, “Sarah.” It goes back to the rapid collapse of her closest friendship three years ago, followed by most of the larger friend group shunning her. It was devastating to Sarah.

My husband’s response was terrible. He jumped right to criticizing her for not taking his advice on how to handle the simmering friendship issues. He blamed her in a way that was not fair, kind or accurate, but even if it had been, Sarah was still extremely distraught and he made it worse by piling on.

He has never apologized and is baffled by how cold she now is toward him. I have told him on multiple occasions that he hurt her, badly, and owes her an apology. He is usually a gentle, thoughtful person who is able to imagine others’ point of view, but for some reason he can’t — or won’t — when it comes to what happened.

I have urged them both to go to counseling together to sort this out. He wants to do it, but she doesn’t. She did end up in solo counseling after the friendship collapse, so it’s not that she’s opposed to counseling on principle.

I don’t even know what I’m asking other than what can I do to help them mend fences besides saying again: “Apologize, dude!” It’s stressful for all of us.

— Anonymous

A: I bet it is.

As presented, the obstacle is your husband, not Sarah, who learned at a crucial, formative point in her emotional life that she cannot trust her father to have her back. She learned, instead, that if it came down to a choice between his ego and her well-being, he would choose his ego.

Since then, he has spent three years doubling, tripling down on his ego. That’s what any refusal to apologize is, in its DNA: “Nope, I was right.” In this case specifically, it’s your husband’s silent, frankly, bizarre insistence that her suffering was her own fault and he was right not to comfort her because she should have taken his advice. Whoa.

If this were my dad turning his back on me and then refusing to budge just as I was placing my first sneakered toe on the tightrope to adulthood, then, yeah, I might have nothing but protective ice on my heart. And his presuming to be baffled by my response would only deepen the freeze.

Again, I have nothing to go on but what you gave me. “As presented.” But for you to see it this way and then to treat it as a both sides, you-two-sort-this-out-in-counseling issue is yet another parental disservice to Sarah.

She does technically have a share since “yes” to counseling would end the standoff without ceding the high ground, but jeez. That’s asking for advanced function of a wounded kid.

Not only was her dad the one in the wrong, but he also was the adult at the time — so he owns this. He goes.

And since he is either obtuse or stubborn enough to be waiting for Sarah to take some fictional equal share of the responsibility, you go with him. Not to represent Sarah or triangulate, though, because that is not appropriate or healthy. Go to represent your own interests.

You are in an untenable position. You witnessed your husband’s thoughtlessness. You have since witnessed the fallout. Then, baffled, he rejects YOUR counsel. What made him choose this island?

That’s the marriage component of the father-daughter problem. Take it to counseling before any more ice can form.

• E-mail Carolyn at tellme@washpost.com, or chat with her online at 11 a.m. Central time each Friday at washingtonpost.com.

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