There is a particularly horrible bit of, not sure how to title it… Exaggerated social idealism maybe? Going on in the comments and society in general. Which is this, the notion that the emotional well-being of a child is more important than the emotional well-being of the parent. Children depend on adults for everything and as such adults need to act accordingly. But this has been spun to such far extremes that an adults emotional wellbeing is immediately framed as selfish trivial crap if it in anyway affects a child.
Once you have a child of your own you’re striped of identity. You become such and such’s parent and any issues you face become solely about how they relate to the child. Every feeling you have is trivialised put into basic categories of “good for the child” and “selfish bullshit that you have to put aside for the sake of your child.” No matter how impotent or justified the situation is the best you get is a “We know it’s hard but you have to for your child sake.”
Todd was a child, one that faced many of the same abusive hardships Amanda has. And now in adult life he has been betrayed and hurt yet again by someone who had been in a position of trust and family. But he’s not allowed to take negative actions. He’s scolded and shames for being open about his pain. He’s labelled selfish and wrong for not etching that fake smile into every action he takes.
Because Amanda is somehow more important. Or more because a child shouldn’t know the truth. A child shouldn’t have to see adults dealing with pain or anger. They need to be shielded from the reality’s until… they aren’t a child anymore… till the switch is flipped and people stop hiding stuff from them. Till they are a teenagers being shamed and blamed for not appreciating how good they have it. Once the childhood is over it’s “How dare you not appreciate how much we “sacrificed” for you.”
I love my child and do all I can for her. But I draw a line at saying she’s ‘more’ important then myself. I draw a line at saying I owe her more love and affection then I do my partner. I will never lord the effort of raising her over her like some grate deed. You owe your child attendance to there “needs”. But a child doesn’t need the world to be censored and bubble wrapped at every turn. A parent doesn’t owe them a censorship of themselves. They do however owe the child an explanation. And that is what this boils down to, the attitude that a child shouldn’t have to deal with adult issues. That any situation in which they do have to face negative or complicated problems automatically becomes a failure of the parent.
Amanda should be sat down and have the fact her parents are not on good terms explained. Not necessarily the reasons why just the fact that they are at odds and that it does in fact take effort to be calm and civil. Then use the fact they talk civilly and do family activities like the hair dye as examples of how she and Selkie are expected to get along. The acknowledgment of how difficult such a thing is and being a real and honest example of how this thing typically works would go a long way to teaching the two how to get along. Amanda will be better off knowing her parents have grievances and are working together for her sake. She is better off having the answer as to why she has two Christmas celebrations rather than the lack of an answer causing distress or the use of yet another half-truth or lie. Which will become the core of her family life, half-truths and outright lies.
But social idealism dictates this all be swept under the rug and smiles be etched on. That involving the child in any part of their “personal bullshit” is unacceptable and wrong. Because the child’s “innocence” comes first. Because a parents only live to “sacrifice” for the child.
That’s really well said. I was a 90’s child and had to deal with the fact my parents were seperated and would most likely never fall in love again, even if they did have feelings for one another.
For me, I just had to learn to appreciate time spent between my two parents. And that’s something Amanda is going to have to do now.
Frankly, it’s unfair and a little selfish for Andi to just assume she is going to be able to just jump back into the seats of a realtionship. She didn’t just hurt Todd.. Or his family, she even hurt Amanda in the process. To bring this up in front of the children was a terrible move.
The further this comic moves along, the further I feel like Andi adopted Amanda for selfish reasons. It’s also insane that Andi and Todd hadn’t discussed this ahead of time, alone, using adult time to hash out adult problems and differences.
You are absolutely correct. When you are responsible for someone else, you must take care of yourself or you won’t be any good for them.
And since when is it a child’s fault that their parents chose to take on that responsibility?
My parents had it better. They could tell me to go play outside and not come home until dinnertime, without going to jail.
Try that today.
As a parent I view the well-being of my child as a symbiotic relationship with my well being. If I ever broke up or even just had a bad fight with her dad I need to be able to talk to her about it. I need to be able to cry and even be frustrated about the situation. As an adult i’m expected to keep it within a reasonable margin but at the very lease i should be able to say “Your daddy and I are a bit grumpy at each other right now.” and spend the day wearing a frown without the world saying I’m scaring my child be showing that even solid relationships of 8+ years have arguments.
I rarely agree with you. I often think you are flat wrong.
But here, today, with what you wrote, I sing your praises, and shout; KittenKaiba is right, correct, spot-on, nailed it down in words. and I think hat you wrote should be printed on the back of every Marriage License, every Civil-Union Certificate, and on the back of every high school and college diploma. Also: Ditto, what you said!
So what, you did not understand what I wrote… Or you understood and disagree? Or a too long didn’t read situation? Your sarcasm doesn’t really communicate anything.
Kitenkaiba, I don’t think Geneseepaws was being sarcastic. He agreed with you whole heartedly, and praised your words. The last bit there was clarifying a typo he’d made.
Truthfully, if the parents are miserable the child will be, too. The kid may not realize why, but most in those situations grow up into adults that wish their parents had divorced.
As a side note, the Bible prioritizes your husband/wife over your kids.
At least, the way we were taught, via the term “divine laws of establishment”: Volition (free will) before marriage, marriage before family/kids, family before nation.
So like, doing so many optional activities for the kids that you fail to maintain your marriage and the emotional closeness between you and your mate… that’s not right. Also, I once heard a phrasing thusly: “You may think of her as just your mom, but I will not let you kids talk to MY WIFE that way.” You protect your mate, even against your own children.
(But equally, doing so much for your mate that you lose the ability to say no, or to exercise your free will, that’s also wrong. Has to be a marriage of equals, with both sides doing their part to make the relationship work.)
And that works both ways. After I got married, I realized that the family that I chose was far superior to the one that I was issued at my birth. As well as a far greater responsibility for me.
That is a really good point. You’ve convinced me. With this, and a better insight today into where Todd’s coming from, I withdraw what I said yesterday.
So… If Andi has joined Todd’s family all this time… Does Andi’s mom hate Christmas? Not celebrate it? Most go elsewhere that Andi doesn’t wanna go? I suddenly wanna see Andi Christmas-Eveing with her mom and see how that turns out.
That is one thing I would rather Not see.
I do not (IIRC) recall Andi visiting or phoning her Mom since Amanda’s adoption. Does anyone remember any contact at all?
That is one thing I would rather Not see.
I do not (IIRC) recall Andi visiting or phoning her Mom since Amanda’s adoption. Does anyone remember any contact at all? Anyone? Beuller?
Remember that Andi’s mother basically browbeat Andi into having Amanda adopted. I wouldn’t say she bullied or forced Andi into doing it, but she used a great deal of emotional and psychological pressure. I suspect Andi has never really forgiven her for that.
I may be wrong. Just because the comic doesn’t show it doesn’t mean it never happened – but it would wring true with Andi’s regret over giving up Amanda. And, of course, having learnt what Amanda went through, Andi may blame her mother as well as herself.
Andi’s mom basically said she wants nothing to do with Amanda. Day before Andi picked up Amanda, she visited her mom and got “I said my goodbyes eight years ago.” That may get brought up soon. I think she was hoping to have it like old times for Amanda’s sake, but I support Todd’s stance. They broke up, and then she confessed to a very serious lie. Mari and Leo had been understanding of Andi when they broke up even while supporting their son, but she lost everyone’s trust when the truth came out.
What Todd is saying is pretty much the gist of the issue, and something both Andi and Amanda will need to accept for this relationship to work. Guess it still comes down to Andi’s response and reaction to what Todd is saying though.
I give Todd points for leaving the room, but he gets points deducted for not turning on a show both girls really like (distraction and white noise) and going further down the hall. Ideally those kinds of conversations are in a completely different location with kids under someone else’s care (at school or grandparents), but this did need to happen ASAP.
THIS was my concern. We ALL know that Amanda has a tendency to listen in and a history of EXTREME (in other people’s eyes) reactions. My concern was not ANDI’S feels. My big concern was AMANDA grokking the fact that Todd is angry with Andi. While Todd is in the right, AMANDA will not see it that way unless she is told the truth of what happened, and when she is, I worry about what she might do in her upset.
This seems fair to me. My only complaint is in the phrasing(though in Andi’s case that may be intentional) in the fourth and sixth panels. I’m pretty sure Andi hasn’t been spending christmas with Todd’s family in the last 8 or 9 years.
Conversations between them early in the comic’s run suggest that Todd and Andi only broke up a short time before Todd adopted Selkie.
Based on Andi’s line about “trying to salvage something from the last ten years of my freaking life”, when she and Todd were arguing about him avoiding her and her not wanting to accept the breakup, she may well have been part of their Christmas celebrations.
My mistake, it was nine years. But Todd telling Andi during her first appearance that he went through with the adoption and their later conversation mentioning they’d argued about adopting a kid right before the breakup supports the idea that their relationship ended sometime in the last year.
Even if, for whatever reason, Todd were okay with Andi joining the Smiths’ extended family Christmas get-together, it’s entirely possible that she’s not welcome in his parents’ house anymore.
Seems Todd doesn’t understand
that as the mother of his daughter
Whether or not they are in a relationship
Andi is family, and both Todd and his family
are going to have to learn to forgive Andi for her mistakes.
And it is most unfair to ask Andi to abandon her daughter
On christmas, eve or otherwise.
I don’t really see how Todd and Andi’s current situation is much different than a divorced couple. Even married couples who divorce amicably probably don’t continue to personally attend the family functions of the other partner, even if children are involved – unless invited, which as Mersang pointed out above, Andi might not be welcome even if Todd himself didn’t mind her being there. Most of them just drop their child/children off and pick them up later, whether it’s later that day or the next day or at the end of the weekend. I really don’t think asking Andi to part with her daughter for all of a day or two is asking her to ‘abandon’ her.
I also think it’s relevant that Todd points out that his reasoning is based on them being broken up, which happened before the comic even started. I’m sure the additional things that have come to light since then don’t help, but I’d personally find it a reasonable assumption that Andi wouldn’t have been invited this year even if Selkie and Amanada weren’t in the picture.
Basically this. Only issue here is that they aparently didn’t comunicate and sort out holiday plans clearly in advance, and now have to do it within earshot of the kids.
Kind of like: “You are the person who got me pregnant with this child, so you are biologically related to this family. But, you are also the person who raped me, and if you think I’m going to mentally categorize you as “family,” you are sorely mistaken.”
If you want to soften that a bit, try “the person who left me at the altar” or whatever. But I think what Andi did to Todd and his family isn’t significantly less awful than rape, so I think my original version is apt.
And it is NOT unfair to ask Andi to (1) let Amanda’s family enjoy time with Amanda, including on major holidays, and (2) stay the hell away from Todd’s parents, especially during the holidays meant to be the most loving, relaxing, and enjoyable.
Remember, these are the people whose hearts she destroyed with a few lies and a little jar of ashes that they kept on the mantle as a constant reminder of their loss — for eight years. The people who are now dealing with the revelation that the girl they would have given the world for was being tortured by society for all the time they didn’t know she was even alive, and that she has psychological trauma from that experience that may never heal. These people, NOT Andi, are the ones who get to decide when — IF EVER — it is time to mend some of those burnt bridges.
That these two things (Amanda getting to see her family, Andi being ostracized from her former family) would have to happen at the same time is sad, but it is also Andi’s fault. And if someone’s gotta bear the brunt of the fallout, that would be Andi.
I’m glad she’s getting her life back together, and making better decisions now. I hope she goes on doing so. I see her as redeemable (though it’s about the closest to non-redeemable as I have ever seen in a character before). But pretending that the fallout doesn’t exist, or that Andi’s rights (enjoy 100% of the holidays with her daughter) trump the rights of those she has hurt (enjoy some percentage of the holidays with their granddaughter; enjoy the holidays with a minimum of unwelcome discomfort, and zero presence of unwanted people), is being on the wrong side of this debate.
So you are saying that because two adults can’t act like grown ups,
That a child doesn’t have the right to spend her first christmas
With her mom she just barely reunited with?
I gotta be honest here, it really might be better if Andi doesn’t show up. She’s already walking on thin ice at it is and having her be there might make a tense situation even worse.
Besides, after what she did, it is gonna take time before she is forgiven for this. How do you think Todd and his parents feel after being lied to about Amanda? Andi does regret her actions, but after the damage she caused, it is kinda silly to expect her to be forgiven so easily. After all, it is only been a couple of months in the comic that they found out about this.
Yes, I am totally saying that, except that it’s not as dire as that.
They are taking her for PART — not all, but PART — of the holiday celebration. Amanda still gets to enjoy Christmas with her new mom. Nothing is preventing that from happening. (In fact, the setup should also allow a more intimate event when she is with her mom, as they won’t be distracted by all the other relatives at the same time.)
And while you are contrasting “Lack of cohesion” with “Happy family get-together” (or at least “Cordial family get-together”), I am contrasting “Lack of cohesion” with “Shitstorm.” You may think the “Lack of cohesion” option is the better of the two; I do not.
Best Case Scenario (from info I’ve absorbed so far): Andi agrees to sit this one out, Amanda enjoys part of Christmas with most of her family (while possibly feeling a bit bad about her mom), Amanda enjoys the rest of Christmas with her mom, and the Christmas celebration with Todd’s family enjoys relative happiness and forgetting of problems for most of the day, plus allows Selkie some time with her family WITHOUT Amanda being there, while Amanda is with her mom (because if Andi’s invited, there’s no reason to have Selkie-specific holiday time either).
If Andi Tags Along (Your Version): Everyone acts like mature adults and nothing goes wrong. Also the kids either don’t pick up on the seething anger below the surface, or call the adults out on having feelings and the adults somehow discover the magic of Christmas.
It’s entirely too saccharine and implausible for a comic with this level of realistic character dynamics.
If Andi Tags Along (My Version): Everyone attempts to act like mature adults, aware of the stakes should they fail. They fail anyway, as it’s a nigh-impossible task. During the portion that they try, the kids pick up on really negative emotions that just aren’t being voiced. That quickly devolves into snide comments, which devolves into defensiveness, and taking sides (Amanda siding with her mom, obviously), and Todd’s siblings shouting at Andi, and eventually Andi being kicked out of the house (Amanda going too) because having her there is far too disruptive for the group to endure. Regardless of whether her actions during this attempt have been nigh-perfect or not, it’s a powder keg.
I don’t think the memory of her first Christmas would be QUITE as positive as you think it should be.
The thing is, they’ve got enough on their plate with trying to balance two rival children. They don’t need to pair that with trying to also balance a happy get-together against resentment and the emotional turmoil of a recent revelation of this magnitude. It’s not fair to them to have to try right now (the “deadline” style of therapy, rather than slow and easy steps over months if not years), and it’s definitely not fair to Amanda to have her hyper-aware of the family rift during the entire celebration.
Who says she won’t get to spend Christmas Day with her mom. So far I just get the idea this is for Christmas Eve. So it’s perfectly reasonable.
Remember, Andi put the moves on Todd the second she had a chance to, using her daughter as an in to get close to him. He is acting like an adult. But he does not need to torture himself in the process just because of how things used to be. He probably would be completely uncomfortable about things if she hung out the whole time. I say give her some time to herself (Which we cannot forget, is good for her even this soon.) She can have Christmas Day. Christmas Night is Todd’s
Okay, no. Hold the phone. This isn’t a couple who broke up after a lover’s spat and calling it ‘irreconcilable differences’. She TOLD HIM HIS DAUGHTER WAS DEAD. He CAUGHT HER IN THAT LIE. Quite frankly, she’s lucky to be on speaking terms with him, and he had ABSOLUTELY NO OBLIGATION to have her in his family’s celebrations, and, no, he’s not being childish for not wanting her around for Christmas. Childish would be refusing to allow her to be around when Amanda’s over, refusing to do playdates or bonding opportunities when Andi is going to be around.
i must refute a slight quibble… they broke up PRIOR to the comic even starting, by some lengthy amount of time as well (i think the 9 months mentioned here is the current time gap??) and they broke up for, yes, the dreaded “irreconcilable differences” reasons that in all likelihood DID cause MULTIPLE “lovers spat’s”… not just “A” lovers spat like you suggested… and THAT is what he’s basing his “you’re not a part of my family anymore” on. NOT that the lies she told for EIGHT YEARS DIDN’T have a say in his decision at ALL, but that the lies were NOT the over-riding factor in his decision, the reason i say this is because i think, that if in a hypothetical scenario in which neither Selkike NOR Amanda were adopted or even known about, and life just sort of continued as the “prior to the comic starting status quo”… she STILL wouldn’t have been invited to this years x-mas party… because they had ALREADY BROKEN UP, Todd was moving on and actively IGNORING Andi… It wasn’t until his mom found out that he was doing that, and reminded him of the better manners he was taught, that he called her back and the comic got rolling alone like we’ve seen… i am quite sure that if he HAD continued ignoring her long enough for HER to lose interest in HIM, and finally moved on herself, that Todd and family would have lasted to the ends of their lives sadly mourning the lost child that was Amanda… and never would have thought any different to their dying day…
i agree that Todd even inviting Andi over IS extraordinarily lucky for her as you say, as well as NOT being allowed to be around for stuff like play-dates and such would indeed be childish on Todd’s part. i think it’s more of a “WTF is wrong with you?!, WHY can’t you get a CLUE the WE ARE NO LONGER A COUPLE!!!” that is annoying Todd right now about Andi thinking she can STILL hang out with him and his family… regardless of the ADDED burden from the lies that were perpetuated for eight years…
I’d very much like it if we got rid of the toxic notion that anyone has to forgive someone.
You don’t.
Ever.
Forgiveness, when it’s granted, is a concept of beauty and grace, like the first rays of sunlight after a long dark time or the smell of spring after a bleak winter that seemed to have no end. It’s beautiful and heartwarming and magnificent and graces the giver as much as the recipient (Thank you, William Shakespeare), but it cannot be compelled.
The decision to let a wrong go, to bury it and leave it in the past is entirely up to the person wronged, not the one who committed it, and if they don’t feel it’s the right time to let go, that’s up to them as well.
And even if we put that aside, if Todd and his parents choose to forgive Andi for what she did, that still doesn’t mean they have to welcome her back into their family as if she’d never tore them up in the first place. Healing takes time and there hasn’t been nearly enough of it — and Andi’s repeated inability to accept Todd’s boundaries is not helping.
I agree that forgiveness is given freely. It’s right there in the name. However, Andi isn’t seeking forgiveness. She’s seeking atonement.
In Andi’s mind, being there for christmas, at least this year, isn’t about “being a family,” it’s about “making things right.” She knows she made a mistake, and she wants to fix it–that’s basically the whole reason she readopted Amanda. And all her socializing with Todd and fam thus far has centered around that–constant apology, constant attempts to do things for them. I think that before this moment she didn’t think about the family aspect of the scenario.
That said… I’m on the fence with Todd’s statement. Peace On Earth, Goodwill Towards Men… heck, the armies of WW2 literally took a break to play some soccer together on christmas day. I can understand the resentment, but at the same time I do think Todd is making a mistake here. At the very least, he should confirm this with his parents. Maybe not get Andi any gifts, but…
And that’s without factoring Amanda into things. That’s been covered by many other comments.
I agree with you. Also if Amamda is listening i feel she could use his words against him and Selkie some day. Think about it, Amanda being told she has to invite her sister Selkie if she wants her dad someplace, like a birthday party, but Amanda says ‘if you can choose to not see my mom as family I can choose not to see Selkie as family’ phrasing is really important here. Also ut is the first christmas I feel a deal of Todd gets Amanda Christmas and Andi Christmas Eve should be worked. If they want to keep seperate. For Andi the break up was more then loosing Toddit was loosing her only family who treated as more then a mistake like her mom does. This christmas she would have no one if she isnt with Amanda.
i think you’re missing the whole thing… Andi ISN’T seeking “ATONEMENT” she IS seeking “TODD IS STILL MINE”… remember what REALLY spun up Todd at the Aquarium after she told the truth about Amanda… yeah the whole ‘she’s not dead’ thing had it’s part to play, but what was the straw-that-broke-the-camels-back?… yep, it was the intimate way she tried to touch him on the thigh… it was the MANY MANY times that she kept on calling Todd trying to keep the relationship alive, even AFTER he BROKE UP with her, just like here, it was her unconscious thought that “things will go on just like before” in her ASSUMPTION that she will be at the x-mas party with Todd’s family EVEN AFTER ALL THIS has happened… yeah, no…
I would disagree – it looks like Andi is not “making atonement” by wanting to show up for holidays. It seems more of a “let’s pick up like it never stopped” type of thing – an oops I hit a speed bump not an oops i broke the car vibe. And that’s not grown-up of her to do.
In Prison Architect, there’s a bit in the tutorial where a (Catholic?) priest says, “Everyone deserves forgiveness.”
And I didn’t catch that line the first time through, but the second time? Hoo boy. I had to stop playing for a bit just to wrap my head around a thought that tried to mangle the concepts that badly.
No one DESERVES forgiveness. If you’ve done something that’s bad enough to qualify for forgiveness, that’s up to the victim, and if they can’t forgive you, you just have to live with that. (If you haven’t done anything that bad — e.g. if you accidentally started a Rube Goldberg tragedy that harmed people even though your actions were completely understandable — then forgiveness isn’t quite the term for what ought to happen. Like, you don’t “forgive” a baby for spilling milk on your term paper.)
What’s more, the game seemed to be making a connection to religion, and specifically to Christianity, and in Christianity the core concept is we DO NOT deserve forgiveness. We don’t deserve grace, or mercy, or any leniency on God’s part at all. Not counting those who die before the age of accountability, every human being has done enough to disqualify them from ever getting in God’s good graces. Nothing we could ever do could change that.
That’s the whole point of why Jesus had to pay the penalty for our sins — because we couldn’t do it. God is not willing that any should perish, but He can’t set aside his inherently just and righteous nature: He couldn’t just shrug his shoulders at all the ways people hurt each other, He had to actually take steps to make everything right again.
He gives us mercy by not giving us the punishment we deserved — instead redirecting that onto a willing substitute capable of bearing it. He gives us grace by giving us what we don’t deserve, blessing and abundance that we did not earn. We can’t earn His forgiveness, but He found a way to give it to us anyway.
So whoever wrote the priest character there, they failed at both understanding and accurately conveying some core concepts. Which is sad, because in other respects that game has some pretty neat storytelling in the tutorial section.
…also, Rens, I’d like to re-assert that the term “forgive” has been rolled up around several concepts that unfortunately get lumped together when they shouldn’t be.
Like, you can forgive (decide to let go of your anger toward) the one who hurt you, without ever forgiving (deciding to allow them a further relationship with you) that person.
And you can forgive (will yourself to act in goodwill toward) a person even if you can’t forgive (get back to thinking of them as though they’d never hurt you) that person.
And you can forgive (desire positive things for) a person even if you will never forgive (reconcile with and fully trust) them again.
Those aren’t precise, or comprehensive, but they’re a few of the concepts that end up being discussed in a forgiveness debate. And what happens is people go “I can forgive (abc) a rapist” and others go “No one should ever forgive (xyz) a rapist!” and others go “But the rapist has to do jkl before you should forgive (qrs) them!” and so on. Equivocation makes all debates more confusing.
yes, what makes it harder then is here is the example God sets:
repentance = forgivenes. You repent, He forgives, unconditionally.
We are expected to emulate that. Furthermore, God doesn’t “layer” sins. there aren’t “less bad” ones and “horrible ones”. (Unless you’re Catholic, then there’s the whole Purgatory thing) But the point is that a lie, or a murder, either only require repentance. That’s a really hard act to follow, given human nature….
A concept that’s hard to wrap your head around, for sure. My nephew’s mom keeps bringing up the idea of “how could murderers get saved?”
I point out that saying that is basically going “I know I’ve done some bad things in my life, but they weren’t bad enough to keep me from being saved; really, they’re just not as bad as murder or rape or torture, so on some level I deserve entrance into Heaven.”
Not a single one of us meets the perfect standard necessary to spend eternity in the presence of God. God had to meet that standard for us; no one else could. And from that viewpoint, a murderer is not on a different level from the rest of us.
I don’t have any delusions about being good enough to get to Heaven on my own merits. And what I think while discussing this issue with the woman in question is: I have in my head a litany of the many things you’ve done wrong over the years, some of them seriously bad (including screwing up so bad that her kids spent years in foster care, and lying to the cops so that a guy went to jail for months over something he didn’t do, which has permanently tanked his ability to get a job), many of them chronic (like draining the resources of friends and family because she can’t manage to budget her income and prioritizes luxuries over necessities) — and that’s just the ones I KNOW about — and you think somehow a murderer is significantly worse than you are?
To be fair, it may well be that her internal reasoning is more like “I know I’ve done horrible things, and since I think some people (like murderers) can’t be saved, I have trouble believing that *I* can be saved” — which would be a much more reasonable reason to keep asking that same question.
“Repent” by the by means “to change your mind (about God’s offer).” It’s acquired quite a different connotation in modern parlance (“feel sorry for your sins” and “completely change your life” being two big ones that don’t fit into the Gospel).
I think the hardest thing about forgiveness, for me, is when people keep doing the same thing. Like, at what point are you appropriately forgiving them, and at what point are you stupidly being a doormat or remaining in a bad relationship, or enabling them instead of benefiting them?
It is not loving to give a drug addict resources that they can easily trade for drugs, because if the drugs are hurting them and making it impossible for them to live a normal life, then allowing them to buy more off your money is harming them rather than helping. So there’s a question of wisdom as to when to provide resources and when to withhold them or to provide in a different way.
There’s also the fact that your own mental, emotional, and physical well-being needs to factor in. For example, when an abusive guy says “If you leave, I’ll kill myself,” then putting that burden on yourself is wrong. Letting that person continue to sap away at your health because you’re afraid of hurting them, that’s not helpful.
(Also not effective. Abusers who continue to have victims do not change. Abusers who lose access to their victims have a chance of changing — if the lack of access is total, and the victim doesn’t give them any hope of “They’ll come back to me and I can abuse them again if I act nice for a few months” etc. So sticking it out in a bad relationship, hoping the person will change, is not helping either you OR them.)
There is no abandonment. He just wants her to spend time with his family without Andi. Also guys,do you really think they’d forgive Andi so easily? Course not.
I don’t really like the start of this chapter. Having Andi think she’d be invited to Todd’s family’s house for Christmas makes the character look like an idiot. And now it looks like this is leading to Amanda being mad at her dad for being mad at her mom again. We just had that happen.
I thought Andi and Todd moved on to being friendly with each other but still there would be clear boundaries. I kind of wanted the conflict to be about Todd thinking he could have Amanda be with him and not Andi for all of Christmas. Possibly even throw in Amanda bragging about Todd and Andi fighting over spending time with her to Selkie. But Andi thinking she could still be with Todd’s family and Amanda being mad at Todd feels like a rehash or the characters going around in a circle.
I’m sure the greater chapter story will turn out great but the way Andi is acting and Amanda’s response seems kind of forced in order to create conflict and progress the rest of the chapter.
In real life, the same old argument gets rehashed over and over until finally everything falls in place. I get that it’s not good to do that too often in a story, but Andi thinking she could still spend x-mas with Todd’s family is totally in character for her, and Amanda still feeling protective of her mother is also totally in character, even after a month or two of character growth, which is what we have in the story so far.
That is a Very interesting avenue. I don’t know that I have heard that explored. I assume they’ve met, Todd & Andi were dating in high school, so I would assume so.
It would be very hard to imagine they didn’t have some contact with her mother as well as his parents when Andi was pregnant and they were both trying to figure out what to do
Am I wrong in assuming that the last line should have been “We stopped being a family nine *years* ago.”? Because I got the impression that Todd and Andi broke up long before he got his degree, and adopted Selkie…
The breakup was just before he adopted, it was the argument over Todd wanting to adopt while Andi didn’t because it’s “like babysitting” which ultimately triggered their breakup. Todd then went ahead with it and adopted Selkie on his own shortly after.
it’s seems to what Mikael said, in that Andi and Todd were “an item” for most of the intervening years from pregnancy/adoption up to recently. While their relationship WASN’T all hunky-dory happy, and there WERE various other arguments going on off camera, but it wasn’t until the “he wanted to adopt but she said it’s like babysitting” argument happened that the strain to the relationship became the final event that caused them to break up… he moved on and adopted Selkie, and from reading between the lines of what was said early on in the comic, the breakup itself happened relatively recently (9 months-ish ago)
My understanding is that Todd and Andi broke up over Todd’s decision to adopt.
We don’t know yet what the plans for Christmas are, but if Andi was assuming she would spend Christmas with Todd’s family it looks like the schedule was not set up clearly. It’s definitely not clear for us. I would be surprised if Todd and his family were expecting to have Amanda for the entire holiday. More likely is a standard, non-custodial parent gets Christmas Eve-overnight-stockings-Christmas Breakfast and then custodial parent gets all of Christmas Day, church (if any), party dress time, tree and presents, Christmas Turkey Dinner. Some variation on that is pretty standard when the child is loved by two non-integrated households.
It is major tough to change Christmas traditions, but necessary as the generations roll on, and people change. Eventually it is essential to change, because not changing leads to everyone having a loathsome holiday. One of the worst things you can do is put people together on a holiday that are hurt or hostile. How many families have a wrecked Christmas every year because people who have been wounded and misused are supposed to suck it up and endure more abuse, whether it is only having drunk uncle Lester monopolize the party with rants about Mexicans, or spending Christmas with people who should be in prison, but short of that, should definitely have a restraining order barring them from your company? It’s hard call in some cases. I think that Todd’s parents have been shown to be open and loving and accepting. I don’t think they would be planning on excluding Andi if their would did not hurt so very deeply that having her there would change a celebration they could enjoy to forced politeness to someone who had (figuratively) murdered or kidnapped their grandchild.
Kidnapped the kid and then put them in a social torture chamber for eight years, yeah.
“One of the worst things you can do is put people together on a holiday that are hurt or hostile.” That’s a nice, pithy way of saying what I’ve been taking way too many words to say in other posts.
I’ve heard anecdotes of abuse victims being told to just suck it up because the family doesn’t have the balls to eject Uncle Pervert from the gathering — or Grandpa Pervert, or Daddy Pervert, or whatever (even female ones) — because somehow rocking the boat and causing social stress or making a scene is worse than forcing an abuse victim to spend their whole holiday stressed by being near their abuser, or, worse, actually suffering additional abuse during the event!
There’s an episode of Caillou I’ve heard about but haven’t seen. In it, the mom wants to have Caillou spend time with an old man, and Caillou is scared of him. The mom apparently goes “Aw, he’s nothing to be scared of” and leaves them together. I’m sure the episode is very happy and all, but as some comments pointed out, if your kid is uncomfortable with an adult, you don’t leave them alone together — you don’t know how serious the kid’s discomfort might be, or whether they’re picking up on a vibe you somehow missed.
In like vein, you don’t make victims invite their tormentors over for Christmas — or socially berate them if they can’t be nice about the issue.
Well, I for one understand where Todd is coming from, but you KNOW Amanda won’t… She’ll probably blow up in his face right then and there or be fitful about this when they do get to Todd’s parents..
Now I can’t remember, does Amanda know it was Andi who told Todd she’s dead yet? If not that could cause her to blow up too, only against Andi rather than Todd.
Probably for the best, Amanda’s at a very fragile stage right now. What would happen to her outlook on life, nevermind her already poor behavior and social skills, if she was told her Mother told her Father that she was dead so he wouldn’t look for her?
Oy. While I understand that no one in comic wants to break the news to the poor girl, I really question whether its good to keep it from here. It’s such a major thing, and it affected her entire life, and it’s going to come out eventually. It is really wise to let Amanda trust someone who’s obviously untrustworthy?
I agree she should be told sooner or later, but I think erring on the side of ‘later’ to avoid the ‘too soon’ is best. She is going to need years of reprogramming from loving parents, opening up that can of worms before she’s got some kind of stable base could seriously damage her progress. However, if they avoid ‘soon’ for too long it could become ‘too late’, wherein she finds out herself and reacts 100x worse than if she’d been told straight up.
Whenever they do do it, I SERIOUSLY hope that they BOTH enlist the help of a certified therapist to sit down with them while they tell her everything, and help them phrase it in such a way that doesn’t send her plummeting into a major downward spiral.
It has not been directly stated, but it has been inferred, and Amanda is a very bright kid. I’d be very surprised if she doesn’t know at this point. But truthfully, we don’t know yet for sure what she’s deduced.
I still really want to know what Andi and Amanda were talking about that had her in such a huff a few strips ago. Everything about the nails and hair is cute, but c’mon, plot! (You’ve been spoiling us with the amazing storyline)
I believe it was something along the lines of “You *will* be required to act with at least the minimum of civility towards Selkie while we’re visiting”
I wonder how much of that conversation Amanda and Selkie are gonna hear. Amanda seems suspicious of them, so she might hear something she isn’t supposed to.
Also, I am not surprised that Andi isn’t allowed to come over to Todd’s parents house for Christmas. I know she feels really guilty over what she did, but it is going to take a while before Todd and his family are willing to forgive her (assuming that they will forgive her. Dunno for sure or not).
The “nine months ago” comment doesn’t work too well, for me. Because it corresponds with a birth cycle, it feels like he saying “since she got pregnant,” which obviously isn’t right. Feels like it should either be “when I found out you lied to me about losing the baby” or “nine months ago, when you told me the truth.”
Maybe it’s just me.
Todd, Andi might not be a part of YOUR family but she is a part of Amanda’s. Do you ready think you should separate a mother and daughter on the holidays?
Yes? Happens in divorced families all the time. Some families can manage to get together and still be one big happy, but most of the time a separation of that sort gets under the skin and makes it impossible to relax around each other, to keep from thinking about the wrongs and the what-ifs and all that.
And, he’s not separating them for the entire holiday. Just part of it. That’s all.
Heck, in my family, when we popped over to my uncle’s for Christmas dinner, we didn’t even SEE my mom most of the night. She was in the kitchen, chatting with my aunt every year. I only really figured this out when I found out that she had never seen The Princess Bride, a movie we watched almost every year, and it turned out to be because she was never with us in the living room 🙂
Am I think only person recalling a scene from Wayne’s World?
I’m not sure of how the scene went, because the part my brain happily remembers is “I don’t own A gun, let alone MANY guns which would necessitate an entire RACK. What would I do with a gun rack?” But I think the scene ended with something like “That’s what being broken up MEANS!”
I don’t see how you’re getting that impression from this exchange.
Todd’s bending over backwards to make the split-family thing work, but he has the right to maintain SOME boundaries. Especially when it comes to a larger family gathering, where 100% of the family members were directly harmed by Andi’s actions, not just once but repeatedly and over a period of eight years.
Can you imagine your reaction being acceptable for other circumstances?
“Look, Todd, I realize Andi lied about you and sent you to prison for eight years, but c’mon, dude, it’s Christmas and you need to chill. It’s not like the world revolves around YOU.”
“Look, Todd, I realize Andi stole your sperm and created a baby that she failed to mention for eight years, and now she’s only told you about the kid because she needs child support. But dude, chill out. You’ve got a kid now.”
“Look, Todd, I know Andi cheated on you, and then used the court to claim sole custody of your kid and raised her in an abusive family for eight years, and that you’ve only just recently met your daughter for the first time. But seriously, you’re acting like the world revolves around YOU. Just invite Andi over and chill the fuck out.”
What is Todd doing wrong exactly? He took her out of the room and is explaining his viewpoint. Is he angry yes, but he has the right to be angry. His only misstep is not distracting the kids with a tv show.
Personally, Andi is scum and has no right to push herself into the Christmas activities. She get’s Christmas Day, she does not get their time just because they used to.
Andi seems to still be operating under the delusion that Todd is a little miffed, and as soon as he gets over it, they’ll be a couple again. I sincerely feel sorry for her, but she is in the wrong here. Todd has been extremely generous with these joint activities, possibly excessively so, as they have fed into Andi’s delusion. Explaining where the line stands is absolutely necessary.
He was already pretty down on here before this, so while the Amanda reveal definitely didn’t help it’s not like he just needs to forgive her this one mistake and everything will be chill again.
I would not be acting half as nice. I would open the door, let Amanda in, and close it in Andi’s face.
Of course I would have explained to Amanda that the reason me and her mom aren’t together is that mom and dad had an argument and we do not get along. Then answer her questions shy of the most mentally scarring answers, but Andi would not be simply allowed into my domicile.
Oh no. He is just saying one day without Andi to spend time with his daughter and family. It isn’t like she’s been a toxic liar for eight years….oh wait…she has. And she hasn’t actually learned anything from this.
It really does seem like her getting Amanda was in part as a way to get back with Todd, or at least weasel her way back after he told her it’s over. Not the only reason as she obviously does care for Amanda in her own right now, but stuff like this isn’t helping her case.
To me, it came off as Andi not caring until she saw Todd with Selkie the first time. Had Todd not gone through with the adoption, Amanda would very likely still be in the orphanage. Without the breakup and the adoption, Andi unlikely would have ever given it a second thought.
We never did get a glimpse inside her head other than the photo montage, but it is very hard to come to the conclusion that Andi is not using this as a tool to get back together with Todd.
I’m starting to bank on Andy doing this to get back with Todd AND just because she wants to. Even if the only reason she WANTS to is because she knows that Amanda’s been with an abusive family because of her..
You do realize that Andi gave up Amanda up for adoption and lied about it to Todd and his family for YEARS, do you? And that said decision resulted in Amanda getting adopted by the family from hell,which led to her getting behavioral AND trust issues?
Sure Andi is remorseful about this, but you can’t possibly expect her to be forgiven so easily after what she did, can you?
Maybe I’m a bit biased because I believe Amanda is Andi’s child first and foremost, but I seriously think that if Todd really wants to become a good father, he should take Andi’s feelings into consideration. Yes she messed up in a BIG way, but it’s obvious she’s trying to fix things and become a better person. All she wants is to be there for Amanda. I get he is hurt, I understand if he doesn’t want to re-build a romantic relationship with Andi, but I feel as though she should get a second chance at being a friend.
I fully admit this is completely irrational and I’m well aware Todd’s the one who was wronged here but every single interaction between him and Andi that ends like this always leaves me irritated with him and sympathetic towards her. I think it has everything to do with the profound lack of sympathy he has towards her at all. Yes, again, I get why. It still bothers me. And yes I know she fucked up but I still keep going back to all the fear that lead to her doing what she did and the open irritation he had with her before she even made her first appearance (that UGH when he knew she was coming over). I understand she fucked up and this was a pretty terrible break up but I also feel like before the Amanda reveal Todd was already just DONE with her and not even trying that hard to hide it? And they were together since high school? I have to wonder how hard Todd ever really tried to find out why anything that bothered Andi actually bothered her? I don’t want them back together but I’m so tired of this dynamic where she’s constantly being shit all over. Maybe I wouldn’t feel this way if she seemed to have any real emotional support outside of her daughter. She has a terrible mother and it appears no real friends? I wish she could just get a boyfriend or a girlfriend or something because it’s really hard to be mad at someone who I get the impression had no one outside of Todd and his family before the relationship ended and has no one outside of her child now.
She just seems like she’s in very real pain and extremely isolated and extremely lonely. Yeah much of it is her own fault but that’s a dangerous combination especially with a child. I think she’s going to self destruct very soon.
– Amanda will discover the truth about Andi’s deception. High probability she learns via Selkie somehow.
– Amanda will explode at Andi with righteous fury, and either run away TO dad’s place or run away somewhere dad finds her.
– Todd will then be in the position of having to explain to her how sometimes people end up in difficult situations beyond their capacity to handle, yadda yadda, and in the process of trying to explain the situation to Amanda in a way that will allow her a route to forgiveness, will discover one himself.
– Somewhere in all this, there will be sisterly bonding as both girls discover that they were “abandoned” by their mothers for reasons they don’t understand, and share a similar pain.
you forget children love to eavesdrop behind closed doors
and Todd in his anger will probably say something he and Andi will regret
especially after however Amanda reacts to what ever happens.
Oh, Andi. It’s still sinking in to you that yes, you are in fact broken up and staying that way, and bringing Amanda back into Todd’s life doesn’t change that, only burns what was left of an already-broken bridge.
At the same time, I think it’s safe to say that for the last decade, Todd’s family was in fact her family (and as of the Amanda thing, I suspect she and Patricia are more or less estranged) and even with the Meet The Grandparents encounter I don’t think she’s really recognized and accepted that she isn’t welcome with them anymore, either. (And given the way their breakup was caused – the adoption comment – and the circumstances everyone found out after – AMANDA – while I think there may have been potential in some other universe for a truly amicable breakup where Andi was still part of the family, in this universe she completely wrecked those chances.)
(Note that this would have to be an alternate universe where there was an actual miscarriage or stillbirth, and the breakup conversation would be more in line with “I always imagined having biological children even after all this, I understand completely why you’d want to adopt especially with an older kid but I don’t know if it’s for me, but listen when you find your kid let me know so I can take you two out to celebrate with lunch, because you’re still one of my best friends.” Or one where they actually had a Talk during the pregnancy including Andi’s fears and Todd’s family agreed to take custody, and if/when Andi was feeling more capable of Being A Parent she’d be welcome to visit and they could consider the relationship thing again, but Todd’s first priority was gonna be child-rearing and any partner he had would have to be willing to co-parent there. So you know, either AU would be pretty much completely unrecognizable to our universe.)
Every single divorce analogy I see on here has me fuming.
This is not the same!
This is going to be Amanda and Selkies FIRST christmas with the family.
This is nowhere the same as a divorce where things would have been set up ahead of time and the kids are used to being around their family.
Amanda knows NONE of the people that will be there but Todd whos on her shit list right now.
Yes Andi is partially at fault (her mom was the adult who pushed the decision) for that but to kick her out while trying to tell Amanda shes welcome and loved is a bad idea.
Amanda wont see a bunch of loving people, shes going to see them as people who hate her mom. In Amandas world her mom is all she has and she loves her enough to give up her room for Amanda.
This is a great way to ruin the holidays for everyone. Ive see what a little kid with anger issues looks like when they reach righteous fury, its not pretty and no one is happy.
You think forcing Todds parents and siblings to spend Christmas Eve with Andi, a woman lied and told their son/brother his child was DEAD is going to make everyone’s holiday fun and happy times for all? Seriously? Andi needs to get a clue, she is not Todds girlfriend, she’s not going to BE Todds girlfriend, she needs to stop expecting to be part of his family, because she’s not.
Yes they share Amanda now and their lives will be connected because of it, but that does not require, nor would it be healthy to force them to be together for all holidays or even this holiday. A choice has to be made, Amanda either stays with Andi the whole time or she spends some time with Todds family too. Andi and Todds family is the worst scenario at this point.
you seem to be the only one here, besides me,
that actually understands how important it will be to Amanda,
That Todd and his Family, allow Andi to be part of their first christmas with Amanda. and for Todd and his Family to actually act Civil to Andi, despite all the drama that Andi has caused in the past.
Oh,we understand, we just also understand that children are very empathic. Amanda would sense the tension and negativity, and she might blame herself. How will that make it better?
How about how important it will be to Selkie? Its her first Christmas with her new family and *congratulations* she gets to spend it with her bully! Todd’s family gets to spend it with the woman who lied to them about Amanda being DEAD! But yes, by all means lets only care about Amanda.
Its pretty clear you were lucky enough not to grow up in a family full of drama.
Anyone who puts their own feelings before their childs though doesn’t deserve children. They are the priority. A child doesn’t get say about what family they end up in more often than not and if the family cant at least pretend to be adults for a day or two thats very sad.
My aunt tried to kill my mother and we all knew how to be polite around each other. damn.
Todd’s family is pretty childish but I could hope they could be civil.
Selkie is getting the short end of the stick both ways but with Andi there Andi has shown she is better at getting Amanda to behave than Todd.
I was just struck by a thought. What if … Andi’s reaction to Todd’s suggestion that they adopt was brought about by fear of the chance that he might have picked Amanda in the first place?
This doesn’t make anything she’s done any better, but it would at least explain the lengths she went to in order to try discouraging Todd from adoption.
I doubt she ever considered that. She gave up Amanda to have a better life than the one 2 unprepared teenagers could offer. She kept the guilt away because she thought she was better off with her new family. Especially given how much of a shock it was for her to find out how much crap she’d gone through since being given up, she probably thought Amanda had been taken to a loving home a long, long time ago.
I can’t help but think that if everyone went and talked to Andi’s mother about all this, it would take less than fifteen minutes for at least 75% of their collective anger to be diverted to her.
I have to say after reading some of the comment and stewing on my original on the fence thoughts from the last comic; I have to agree that Todd is in the right to tell Andi she shouldn’t expect to be welcomed openly after what’s transpired. I also agree that at some point if just to soften things, Todd and Andi should have a talk with Amanda that her Mom won’t always be allowed at family functions on Todd’s side because they aren’t together anymore and it’d be awkward.
I dread the day the entire truth ever comes out; but maybe when Amanda is getting into her teen years and is more mature she deserves to know if just so she doesn’t find out on her own the wrong way. Right now she’s too young and volatile to be told the truth.
I think the large portion of this interaction comes down to Andi seeking support and stability while trying to provide the same for Amanda. Unfortunately she is also not grasping or refusing to respect that her and Todd’s relationship has separated into one of friends zone only. Todd has tried to put distance between them while still trying to be involved with Amanda and Andi has clearly overstepped, and assumed things that are not.
There is a particularly horrible bit of, not sure how to title it… Exaggerated social idealism maybe? Going on in the comments and society in general. Which is this, the notion that the emotional well-being of a child is more important than the emotional well-being of the parent. Children depend on adults for everything and as such adults need to act accordingly. But this has been spun to such far extremes that an adults emotional wellbeing is immediately framed as selfish trivial crap if it in anyway affects a child.
Once you have a child of your own you’re striped of identity. You become such and such’s parent and any issues you face become solely about how they relate to the child. Every feeling you have is trivialised put into basic categories of “good for the child” and “selfish bullshit that you have to put aside for the sake of your child.” No matter how impotent or justified the situation is the best you get is a “We know it’s hard but you have to for your child sake.”
Todd was a child, one that faced many of the same abusive hardships Amanda has. And now in adult life he has been betrayed and hurt yet again by someone who had been in a position of trust and family. But he’s not allowed to take negative actions. He’s scolded and shames for being open about his pain. He’s labelled selfish and wrong for not etching that fake smile into every action he takes.
Because Amanda is somehow more important. Or more because a child shouldn’t know the truth. A child shouldn’t have to see adults dealing with pain or anger. They need to be shielded from the reality’s until… they aren’t a child anymore… till the switch is flipped and people stop hiding stuff from them. Till they are a teenagers being shamed and blamed for not appreciating how good they have it. Once the childhood is over it’s “How dare you not appreciate how much we “sacrificed” for you.”
I love my child and do all I can for her. But I draw a line at saying she’s ‘more’ important then myself. I draw a line at saying I owe her more love and affection then I do my partner. I will never lord the effort of raising her over her like some grate deed. You owe your child attendance to there “needs”. But a child doesn’t need the world to be censored and bubble wrapped at every turn. A parent doesn’t owe them a censorship of themselves. They do however owe the child an explanation. And that is what this boils down to, the attitude that a child shouldn’t have to deal with adult issues. That any situation in which they do have to face negative or complicated problems automatically becomes a failure of the parent.
Amanda should be sat down and have the fact her parents are not on good terms explained. Not necessarily the reasons why just the fact that they are at odds and that it does in fact take effort to be calm and civil. Then use the fact they talk civilly and do family activities like the hair dye as examples of how she and Selkie are expected to get along. The acknowledgment of how difficult such a thing is and being a real and honest example of how this thing typically works would go a long way to teaching the two how to get along. Amanda will be better off knowing her parents have grievances and are working together for her sake. She is better off having the answer as to why she has two Christmas celebrations rather than the lack of an answer causing distress or the use of yet another half-truth or lie. Which will become the core of her family life, half-truths and outright lies.
But social idealism dictates this all be swept under the rug and smiles be etched on. That involving the child in any part of their “personal bullshit” is unacceptable and wrong. Because the child’s “innocence” comes first. Because a parents only live to “sacrifice” for the child.
That’s really well said. I was a 90’s child and had to deal with the fact my parents were seperated and would most likely never fall in love again, even if they did have feelings for one another.
For me, I just had to learn to appreciate time spent between my two parents. And that’s something Amanda is going to have to do now.
Frankly, it’s unfair and a little selfish for Andi to just assume she is going to be able to just jump back into the seats of a realtionship. She didn’t just hurt Todd.. Or his family, she even hurt Amanda in the process. To bring this up in front of the children was a terrible move.
The further this comic moves along, the further I feel like Andi adopted Amanda for selfish reasons. It’s also insane that Andi and Todd hadn’t discussed this ahead of time, alone, using adult time to hash out adult problems and differences.
You are absolutely correct. When you are responsible for someone else, you must take care of yourself or you won’t be any good for them.
And since when is it a child’s fault that their parents chose to take on that responsibility?
My parents had it better. They could tell me to go play outside and not come home until dinnertime, without going to jail.
Try that today.
As a parent I view the well-being of my child as a symbiotic relationship with my well being. If I ever broke up or even just had a bad fight with her dad I need to be able to talk to her about it. I need to be able to cry and even be frustrated about the situation. As an adult i’m expected to keep it within a reasonable margin but at the very lease i should be able to say “Your daddy and I are a bit grumpy at each other right now.” and spend the day wearing a frown without the world saying I’m scaring my child be showing that even solid relationships of 8+ years have arguments.
I rarely agree with you. I often think you are flat wrong.
But here, today, with what you wrote, I sing your praises, and shout; KittenKaiba is right, correct, spot-on, nailed it down in words. and I think hat you wrote should be printed on the back of every Marriage License, every Civil-Union Certificate, and on the back of every high school and college diploma. Also: Ditto, what you said!
Hat should have been What, as in what you wrote.
Hat you wrote doesn’t make any sense.
So what, you did not understand what I wrote… Or you understood and disagree? Or a too long didn’t read situation? Your sarcasm doesn’t really communicate anything.
They were just correcting a typo in their first post– At one point they wrote “hat” instead of “what.” I don’t think there was any sarcasm involved.
Kitenkaiba, I don’t think Geneseepaws was being sarcastic. He agreed with you whole heartedly, and praised your words. The last bit there was clarifying a typo he’d made.
Oh sorry I actually misses the typo in the first post so it felt like the following post was a “hah hah just kidding” oops.
Truthfully, if the parents are miserable the child will be, too. The kid may not realize why, but most in those situations grow up into adults that wish their parents had divorced.
Louis C.K. put it best, staying married for the kids is like holding in a shit for 18 years. All you do is make everyone around you miserable.
As a side note, the Bible prioritizes your husband/wife over your kids.
At least, the way we were taught, via the term “divine laws of establishment”: Volition (free will) before marriage, marriage before family/kids, family before nation.
So like, doing so many optional activities for the kids that you fail to maintain your marriage and the emotional closeness between you and your mate… that’s not right. Also, I once heard a phrasing thusly: “You may think of her as just your mom, but I will not let you kids talk to MY WIFE that way.” You protect your mate, even against your own children.
(But equally, doing so much for your mate that you lose the ability to say no, or to exercise your free will, that’s also wrong. Has to be a marriage of equals, with both sides doing their part to make the relationship work.)
And that works both ways. After I got married, I realized that the family that I chose was far superior to the one that I was issued at my birth. As well as a far greater responsibility for me.
That is a really good point. You’ve convinced me. With this, and a better insight today into where Todd’s coming from, I withdraw what I said yesterday.
So… If Andi has joined Todd’s family all this time… Does Andi’s mom hate Christmas? Not celebrate it? Most go elsewhere that Andi doesn’t wanna go? I suddenly wanna see Andi Christmas-Eveing with her mom and see how that turns out.
That is one thing I would rather Not see.
I do not (IIRC) recall Andi visiting or phoning her Mom since Amanda’s adoption. Does anyone remember any contact at all?
That is one thing I would rather Not see.
I do not (IIRC) recall Andi visiting or phoning her Mom since Amanda’s adoption. Does anyone remember any contact at all? Anyone? Beuller?
Remember that Andi’s mother basically browbeat Andi into having Amanda adopted. I wouldn’t say she bullied or forced Andi into doing it, but she used a great deal of emotional and psychological pressure. I suspect Andi has never really forgiven her for that.
I may be wrong. Just because the comic doesn’t show it doesn’t mean it never happened – but it would wring true with Andi’s regret over giving up Amanda. And, of course, having learnt what Amanda went through, Andi may blame her mother as well as herself.
How did I write ‘wring’ instead of ‘ring’?! 😀
Andi’s mom basically said she wants nothing to do with Amanda. Day before Andi picked up Amanda, she visited her mom and got “I said my goodbyes eight years ago.” That may get brought up soon. I think she was hoping to have it like old times for Amanda’s sake, but I support Todd’s stance. They broke up, and then she confessed to a very serious lie. Mari and Leo had been understanding of Andi when they broke up even while supporting their son, but she lost everyone’s trust when the truth came out.
Ugh, there goes my hope Amanda won’t catch on and cause trouble…
Please don’t be listening. Please Amanda…
What Todd is saying is pretty much the gist of the issue, and something both Andi and Amanda will need to accept for this relationship to work. Guess it still comes down to Andi’s response and reaction to what Todd is saying though.
She’s totally listening. 7-9 is the age of big ears. Not *all* kids are sneaky like that, but many are.
I give Todd points for leaving the room, but he gets points deducted for not turning on a show both girls really like (distraction and white noise) and going further down the hall. Ideally those kinds of conversations are in a completely different location with kids under someone else’s care (at school or grandparents), but this did need to happen ASAP.
THIS was my concern. We ALL know that Amanda has a tendency to listen in and a history of EXTREME (in other people’s eyes) reactions. My concern was not ANDI’S feels. My big concern was AMANDA grokking the fact that Todd is angry with Andi. While Todd is in the right, AMANDA will not see it that way unless she is told the truth of what happened, and when she is, I worry about what she might do in her upset.
This seems fair to me. My only complaint is in the phrasing(though in Andi’s case that may be intentional) in the fourth and sixth panels. I’m pretty sure Andi hasn’t been spending christmas with Todd’s family in the last 8 or 9 years.
Conversations between them early in the comic’s run suggest that Todd and Andi only broke up a short time before Todd adopted Selkie.
Based on Andi’s line about “trying to salvage something from the last ten years of my freaking life”, when she and Todd were arguing about him avoiding her and her not wanting to accept the breakup, she may well have been part of their Christmas celebrations.
My mistake, it was nine years. But Todd telling Andi during her first appearance that he went through with the adoption and their later conversation mentioning they’d argued about adopting a kid right before the breakup supports the idea that their relationship ended sometime in the last year.
Even if, for whatever reason, Todd were okay with Andi joining the Smiths’ extended family Christmas get-together, it’s entirely possible that she’s not welcome in his parents’ house anymore.
Seems Todd doesn’t understand
that as the mother of his daughter
Whether or not they are in a relationship
Andi is family, and both Todd and his family
are going to have to learn to forgive Andi for her mistakes.
And it is most unfair to ask Andi to abandon her daughter
On christmas, eve or otherwise.
I don’t really see how Todd and Andi’s current situation is much different than a divorced couple. Even married couples who divorce amicably probably don’t continue to personally attend the family functions of the other partner, even if children are involved – unless invited, which as Mersang pointed out above, Andi might not be welcome even if Todd himself didn’t mind her being there. Most of them just drop their child/children off and pick them up later, whether it’s later that day or the next day or at the end of the weekend. I really don’t think asking Andi to part with her daughter for all of a day or two is asking her to ‘abandon’ her.
I also think it’s relevant that Todd points out that his reasoning is based on them being broken up, which happened before the comic even started. I’m sure the additional things that have come to light since then don’t help, but I’d personally find it a reasonable assumption that Andi wouldn’t have been invited this year even if Selkie and Amanada weren’t in the picture.
Basically this. Only issue here is that they aparently didn’t comunicate and sort out holiday plans clearly in advance, and now have to do it within earshot of the kids.
Equivocation. Two meanings of the term “family.”
Kind of like: “You are the person who got me pregnant with this child, so you are biologically related to this family. But, you are also the person who raped me, and if you think I’m going to mentally categorize you as “family,” you are sorely mistaken.”
If you want to soften that a bit, try “the person who left me at the altar” or whatever. But I think what Andi did to Todd and his family isn’t significantly less awful than rape, so I think my original version is apt.
And it is NOT unfair to ask Andi to (1) let Amanda’s family enjoy time with Amanda, including on major holidays, and (2) stay the hell away from Todd’s parents, especially during the holidays meant to be the most loving, relaxing, and enjoyable.
Remember, these are the people whose hearts she destroyed with a few lies and a little jar of ashes that they kept on the mantle as a constant reminder of their loss — for eight years. The people who are now dealing with the revelation that the girl they would have given the world for was being tortured by society for all the time they didn’t know she was even alive, and that she has psychological trauma from that experience that may never heal. These people, NOT Andi, are the ones who get to decide when — IF EVER — it is time to mend some of those burnt bridges.
That these two things (Amanda getting to see her family, Andi being ostracized from her former family) would have to happen at the same time is sad, but it is also Andi’s fault. And if someone’s gotta bear the brunt of the fallout, that would be Andi.
I’m glad she’s getting her life back together, and making better decisions now. I hope she goes on doing so. I see her as redeemable (though it’s about the closest to non-redeemable as I have ever seen in a character before). But pretending that the fallout doesn’t exist, or that Andi’s rights (enjoy 100% of the holidays with her daughter) trump the rights of those she has hurt (enjoy some percentage of the holidays with their granddaughter; enjoy the holidays with a minimum of unwelcome discomfort, and zero presence of unwanted people), is being on the wrong side of this debate.
So you are saying that because two adults can’t act like grown ups,
That a child doesn’t have the right to spend her first christmas
With her mom she just barely reunited with?
I gotta be honest here, it really might be better if Andi doesn’t show up. She’s already walking on thin ice at it is and having her be there might make a tense situation even worse.
Besides, after what she did, it is gonna take time before she is forgiven for this. How do you think Todd and his parents feel after being lied to about Amanda? Andi does regret her actions, but after the damage she caused, it is kinda silly to expect her to be forgiven so easily. After all, it is only been a couple of months in the comic that they found out about this.
Yes, I am totally saying that, except that it’s not as dire as that.
They are taking her for PART — not all, but PART — of the holiday celebration. Amanda still gets to enjoy Christmas with her new mom. Nothing is preventing that from happening. (In fact, the setup should also allow a more intimate event when she is with her mom, as they won’t be distracted by all the other relatives at the same time.)
And while you are contrasting “Lack of cohesion” with “Happy family get-together” (or at least “Cordial family get-together”), I am contrasting “Lack of cohesion” with “Shitstorm.” You may think the “Lack of cohesion” option is the better of the two; I do not.
Best Case Scenario (from info I’ve absorbed so far): Andi agrees to sit this one out, Amanda enjoys part of Christmas with most of her family (while possibly feeling a bit bad about her mom), Amanda enjoys the rest of Christmas with her mom, and the Christmas celebration with Todd’s family enjoys relative happiness and forgetting of problems for most of the day, plus allows Selkie some time with her family WITHOUT Amanda being there, while Amanda is with her mom (because if Andi’s invited, there’s no reason to have Selkie-specific holiday time either).
If Andi Tags Along (Your Version): Everyone acts like mature adults and nothing goes wrong. Also the kids either don’t pick up on the seething anger below the surface, or call the adults out on having feelings and the adults somehow discover the magic of Christmas.
It’s entirely too saccharine and implausible for a comic with this level of realistic character dynamics.
If Andi Tags Along (My Version): Everyone attempts to act like mature adults, aware of the stakes should they fail. They fail anyway, as it’s a nigh-impossible task. During the portion that they try, the kids pick up on really negative emotions that just aren’t being voiced. That quickly devolves into snide comments, which devolves into defensiveness, and taking sides (Amanda siding with her mom, obviously), and Todd’s siblings shouting at Andi, and eventually Andi being kicked out of the house (Amanda going too) because having her there is far too disruptive for the group to endure. Regardless of whether her actions during this attempt have been nigh-perfect or not, it’s a powder keg.
I don’t think the memory of her first Christmas would be QUITE as positive as you think it should be.
The thing is, they’ve got enough on their plate with trying to balance two rival children. They don’t need to pair that with trying to also balance a happy get-together against resentment and the emotional turmoil of a recent revelation of this magnitude. It’s not fair to them to have to try right now (the “deadline” style of therapy, rather than slow and easy steps over months if not years), and it’s definitely not fair to Amanda to have her hyper-aware of the family rift during the entire celebration.
Leave Andi home. Seriously.
Typo: “You may think the ‘lack of cohesion’ option is the WORSE of the two. I think it’s better than the shitstorm.”
Who says she won’t get to spend Christmas Day with her mom. So far I just get the idea this is for Christmas Eve. So it’s perfectly reasonable.
Remember, Andi put the moves on Todd the second she had a chance to, using her daughter as an in to get close to him. He is acting like an adult. But he does not need to torture himself in the process just because of how things used to be. He probably would be completely uncomfortable about things if she hung out the whole time. I say give her some time to herself (Which we cannot forget, is good for her even this soon.) She can have Christmas Day. Christmas Night is Todd’s
Okay, no. Hold the phone. This isn’t a couple who broke up after a lover’s spat and calling it ‘irreconcilable differences’. She TOLD HIM HIS DAUGHTER WAS DEAD. He CAUGHT HER IN THAT LIE. Quite frankly, she’s lucky to be on speaking terms with him, and he had ABSOLUTELY NO OBLIGATION to have her in his family’s celebrations, and, no, he’s not being childish for not wanting her around for Christmas. Childish would be refusing to allow her to be around when Amanda’s over, refusing to do playdates or bonding opportunities when Andi is going to be around.
i must refute a slight quibble… they broke up PRIOR to the comic even starting, by some lengthy amount of time as well (i think the 9 months mentioned here is the current time gap??) and they broke up for, yes, the dreaded “irreconcilable differences” reasons that in all likelihood DID cause MULTIPLE “lovers spat’s”… not just “A” lovers spat like you suggested… and THAT is what he’s basing his “you’re not a part of my family anymore” on. NOT that the lies she told for EIGHT YEARS DIDN’T have a say in his decision at ALL, but that the lies were NOT the over-riding factor in his decision, the reason i say this is because i think, that if in a hypothetical scenario in which neither Selkike NOR Amanda were adopted or even known about, and life just sort of continued as the “prior to the comic starting status quo”… she STILL wouldn’t have been invited to this years x-mas party… because they had ALREADY BROKEN UP, Todd was moving on and actively IGNORING Andi… It wasn’t until his mom found out that he was doing that, and reminded him of the better manners he was taught, that he called her back and the comic got rolling alone like we’ve seen… i am quite sure that if he HAD continued ignoring her long enough for HER to lose interest in HIM, and finally moved on herself, that Todd and family would have lasted to the ends of their lives sadly mourning the lost child that was Amanda… and never would have thought any different to their dying day…
i agree that Todd even inviting Andi over IS extraordinarily lucky for her as you say, as well as NOT being allowed to be around for stuff like play-dates and such would indeed be childish on Todd’s part. i think it’s more of a “WTF is wrong with you?!, WHY can’t you get a CLUE the WE ARE NO LONGER A COUPLE!!!” that is annoying Todd right now about Andi thinking she can STILL hang out with him and his family… regardless of the ADDED burden from the lies that were perpetuated for eight years…
I’d very much like it if we got rid of the toxic notion that anyone has to forgive someone.
You don’t.
Ever.
Forgiveness, when it’s granted, is a concept of beauty and grace, like the first rays of sunlight after a long dark time or the smell of spring after a bleak winter that seemed to have no end. It’s beautiful and heartwarming and magnificent and graces the giver as much as the recipient (Thank you, William Shakespeare), but it cannot be compelled.
The decision to let a wrong go, to bury it and leave it in the past is entirely up to the person wronged, not the one who committed it, and if they don’t feel it’s the right time to let go, that’s up to them as well.
And even if we put that aside, if Todd and his parents choose to forgive Andi for what she did, that still doesn’t mean they have to welcome her back into their family as if she’d never tore them up in the first place. Healing takes time and there hasn’t been nearly enough of it — and Andi’s repeated inability to accept Todd’s boundaries is not helping.
I agree that forgiveness is given freely. It’s right there in the name. However, Andi isn’t seeking forgiveness. She’s seeking atonement.
In Andi’s mind, being there for christmas, at least this year, isn’t about “being a family,” it’s about “making things right.” She knows she made a mistake, and she wants to fix it–that’s basically the whole reason she readopted Amanda. And all her socializing with Todd and fam thus far has centered around that–constant apology, constant attempts to do things for them. I think that before this moment she didn’t think about the family aspect of the scenario.
That said… I’m on the fence with Todd’s statement. Peace On Earth, Goodwill Towards Men… heck, the armies of WW2 literally took a break to play some soccer together on christmas day. I can understand the resentment, but at the same time I do think Todd is making a mistake here. At the very least, he should confirm this with his parents. Maybe not get Andi any gifts, but…
And that’s without factoring Amanda into things. That’s been covered by many other comments.
I agree with you. Also if Amamda is listening i feel she could use his words against him and Selkie some day. Think about it, Amanda being told she has to invite her sister Selkie if she wants her dad someplace, like a birthday party, but Amanda says ‘if you can choose to not see my mom as family I can choose not to see Selkie as family’ phrasing is really important here. Also ut is the first christmas I feel a deal of Todd gets Amanda Christmas and Andi Christmas Eve should be worked. If they want to keep seperate. For Andi the break up was more then loosing Toddit was loosing her only family who treated as more then a mistake like her mom does. This christmas she would have no one if she isnt with Amanda.
i think you’re missing the whole thing… Andi ISN’T seeking “ATONEMENT” she IS seeking “TODD IS STILL MINE”… remember what REALLY spun up Todd at the Aquarium after she told the truth about Amanda… yeah the whole ‘she’s not dead’ thing had it’s part to play, but what was the straw-that-broke-the-camels-back?… yep, it was the intimate way she tried to touch him on the thigh… it was the MANY MANY times that she kept on calling Todd trying to keep the relationship alive, even AFTER he BROKE UP with her, just like here, it was her unconscious thought that “things will go on just like before” in her ASSUMPTION that she will be at the x-mas party with Todd’s family EVEN AFTER ALL THIS has happened… yeah, no…
I would disagree – it looks like Andi is not “making atonement” by wanting to show up for holidays. It seems more of a “let’s pick up like it never stopped” type of thing – an oops I hit a speed bump not an oops i broke the car vibe. And that’s not grown-up of her to do.
In Prison Architect, there’s a bit in the tutorial where a (Catholic?) priest says, “Everyone deserves forgiveness.”
And I didn’t catch that line the first time through, but the second time? Hoo boy. I had to stop playing for a bit just to wrap my head around a thought that tried to mangle the concepts that badly.
No one DESERVES forgiveness. If you’ve done something that’s bad enough to qualify for forgiveness, that’s up to the victim, and if they can’t forgive you, you just have to live with that. (If you haven’t done anything that bad — e.g. if you accidentally started a Rube Goldberg tragedy that harmed people even though your actions were completely understandable — then forgiveness isn’t quite the term for what ought to happen. Like, you don’t “forgive” a baby for spilling milk on your term paper.)
What’s more, the game seemed to be making a connection to religion, and specifically to Christianity, and in Christianity the core concept is we DO NOT deserve forgiveness. We don’t deserve grace, or mercy, or any leniency on God’s part at all. Not counting those who die before the age of accountability, every human being has done enough to disqualify them from ever getting in God’s good graces. Nothing we could ever do could change that.
That’s the whole point of why Jesus had to pay the penalty for our sins — because we couldn’t do it. God is not willing that any should perish, but He can’t set aside his inherently just and righteous nature: He couldn’t just shrug his shoulders at all the ways people hurt each other, He had to actually take steps to make everything right again.
He gives us mercy by not giving us the punishment we deserved — instead redirecting that onto a willing substitute capable of bearing it. He gives us grace by giving us what we don’t deserve, blessing and abundance that we did not earn. We can’t earn His forgiveness, but He found a way to give it to us anyway.
So whoever wrote the priest character there, they failed at both understanding and accurately conveying some core concepts. Which is sad, because in other respects that game has some pretty neat storytelling in the tutorial section.
…also, Rens, I’d like to re-assert that the term “forgive” has been rolled up around several concepts that unfortunately get lumped together when they shouldn’t be.
Like, you can forgive (decide to let go of your anger toward) the one who hurt you, without ever forgiving (deciding to allow them a further relationship with you) that person.
And you can forgive (will yourself to act in goodwill toward) a person even if you can’t forgive (get back to thinking of them as though they’d never hurt you) that person.
And you can forgive (desire positive things for) a person even if you will never forgive (reconcile with and fully trust) them again.
Those aren’t precise, or comprehensive, but they’re a few of the concepts that end up being discussed in a forgiveness debate. And what happens is people go “I can forgive (abc) a rapist” and others go “No one should ever forgive (xyz) a rapist!” and others go “But the rapist has to do jkl before you should forgive (qrs) them!” and so on. Equivocation makes all debates more confusing.
yes, what makes it harder then is here is the example God sets:
repentance = forgivenes. You repent, He forgives, unconditionally.
We are expected to emulate that. Furthermore, God doesn’t “layer” sins. there aren’t “less bad” ones and “horrible ones”. (Unless you’re Catholic, then there’s the whole Purgatory thing) But the point is that a lie, or a murder, either only require repentance. That’s a really hard act to follow, given human nature….
A concept that’s hard to wrap your head around, for sure. My nephew’s mom keeps bringing up the idea of “how could murderers get saved?”
I point out that saying that is basically going “I know I’ve done some bad things in my life, but they weren’t bad enough to keep me from being saved; really, they’re just not as bad as murder or rape or torture, so on some level I deserve entrance into Heaven.”
Not a single one of us meets the perfect standard necessary to spend eternity in the presence of God. God had to meet that standard for us; no one else could. And from that viewpoint, a murderer is not on a different level from the rest of us.
I don’t have any delusions about being good enough to get to Heaven on my own merits. And what I think while discussing this issue with the woman in question is: I have in my head a litany of the many things you’ve done wrong over the years, some of them seriously bad (including screwing up so bad that her kids spent years in foster care, and lying to the cops so that a guy went to jail for months over something he didn’t do, which has permanently tanked his ability to get a job), many of them chronic (like draining the resources of friends and family because she can’t manage to budget her income and prioritizes luxuries over necessities) — and that’s just the ones I KNOW about — and you think somehow a murderer is significantly worse than you are?
To be fair, it may well be that her internal reasoning is more like “I know I’ve done horrible things, and since I think some people (like murderers) can’t be saved, I have trouble believing that *I* can be saved” — which would be a much more reasonable reason to keep asking that same question.
“Repent” by the by means “to change your mind (about God’s offer).” It’s acquired quite a different connotation in modern parlance (“feel sorry for your sins” and “completely change your life” being two big ones that don’t fit into the Gospel).
I think the hardest thing about forgiveness, for me, is when people keep doing the same thing. Like, at what point are you appropriately forgiving them, and at what point are you stupidly being a doormat or remaining in a bad relationship, or enabling them instead of benefiting them?
It is not loving to give a drug addict resources that they can easily trade for drugs, because if the drugs are hurting them and making it impossible for them to live a normal life, then allowing them to buy more off your money is harming them rather than helping. So there’s a question of wisdom as to when to provide resources and when to withhold them or to provide in a different way.
There’s also the fact that your own mental, emotional, and physical well-being needs to factor in. For example, when an abusive guy says “If you leave, I’ll kill myself,” then putting that burden on yourself is wrong. Letting that person continue to sap away at your health because you’re afraid of hurting them, that’s not helpful.
(Also not effective. Abusers who continue to have victims do not change. Abusers who lose access to their victims have a chance of changing — if the lack of access is total, and the victim doesn’t give them any hope of “They’ll come back to me and I can abuse them again if I act nice for a few months” etc. So sticking it out in a bad relationship, hoping the person will change, is not helping either you OR them.)
ehhh… divorced couples do it all the time. Eve at one parent’s, actual day at the other.
There is no abandonment. He just wants her to spend time with his family without Andi. Also guys,do you really think they’d forgive Andi so easily? Course not.
Her not being there is best for all of them.
ditto— what you said…
I don’t really like the start of this chapter. Having Andi think she’d be invited to Todd’s family’s house for Christmas makes the character look like an idiot. And now it looks like this is leading to Amanda being mad at her dad for being mad at her mom again. We just had that happen.
I thought Andi and Todd moved on to being friendly with each other but still there would be clear boundaries. I kind of wanted the conflict to be about Todd thinking he could have Amanda be with him and not Andi for all of Christmas. Possibly even throw in Amanda bragging about Todd and Andi fighting over spending time with her to Selkie. But Andi thinking she could still be with Todd’s family and Amanda being mad at Todd feels like a rehash or the characters going around in a circle.
I’m sure the greater chapter story will turn out great but the way Andi is acting and Amanda’s response seems kind of forced in order to create conflict and progress the rest of the chapter.
In real life, the same old argument gets rehashed over and over until finally everything falls in place. I get that it’s not good to do that too often in a story, but Andi thinking she could still spend x-mas with Todd’s family is totally in character for her, and Amanda still feeling protective of her mother is also totally in character, even after a month or two of character growth, which is what we have in the story so far.
Has Todd ever met Andi’s mother, does he know what she’s like?
That is a Very interesting avenue. I don’t know that I have heard that explored. I assume they’ve met, Todd & Andi were dating in high school, so I would assume so.
I’m cracking up at your name. Do you have a baby? 🙂
Yes, I do 🙂
It would be very hard to imagine they didn’t have some contact with her mother as well as his parents when Andi was pregnant and they were both trying to figure out what to do
Am I wrong in assuming that the last line should have been “We stopped being a family nine *years* ago.”? Because I got the impression that Todd and Andi broke up long before he got his degree, and adopted Selkie…
The breakup was just before he adopted, it was the argument over Todd wanting to adopt while Andi didn’t because it’s “like babysitting” which ultimately triggered their breakup. Todd then went ahead with it and adopted Selkie on his own shortly after.
it’s seems to what Mikael said, in that Andi and Todd were “an item” for most of the intervening years from pregnancy/adoption up to recently. While their relationship WASN’T all hunky-dory happy, and there WERE various other arguments going on off camera, but it wasn’t until the “he wanted to adopt but she said it’s like babysitting” argument happened that the strain to the relationship became the final event that caused them to break up… he moved on and adopted Selkie, and from reading between the lines of what was said early on in the comic, the breakup itself happened relatively recently (9 months-ish ago)
My understanding is that Todd and Andi broke up over Todd’s decision to adopt.
We don’t know yet what the plans for Christmas are, but if Andi was assuming she would spend Christmas with Todd’s family it looks like the schedule was not set up clearly. It’s definitely not clear for us. I would be surprised if Todd and his family were expecting to have Amanda for the entire holiday. More likely is a standard, non-custodial parent gets Christmas Eve-overnight-stockings-Christmas Breakfast and then custodial parent gets all of Christmas Day, church (if any), party dress time, tree and presents, Christmas Turkey Dinner. Some variation on that is pretty standard when the child is loved by two non-integrated households.
It is major tough to change Christmas traditions, but necessary as the generations roll on, and people change. Eventually it is essential to change, because not changing leads to everyone having a loathsome holiday. One of the worst things you can do is put people together on a holiday that are hurt or hostile. How many families have a wrecked Christmas every year because people who have been wounded and misused are supposed to suck it up and endure more abuse, whether it is only having drunk uncle Lester monopolize the party with rants about Mexicans, or spending Christmas with people who should be in prison, but short of that, should definitely have a restraining order barring them from your company? It’s hard call in some cases. I think that Todd’s parents have been shown to be open and loving and accepting. I don’t think they would be planning on excluding Andi if their would did not hurt so very deeply that having her there would change a celebration they could enjoy to forced politeness to someone who had (figuratively) murdered or kidnapped their grandchild.
Kidnapped the kid and then put them in a social torture chamber for eight years, yeah.
“One of the worst things you can do is put people together on a holiday that are hurt or hostile.” That’s a nice, pithy way of saying what I’ve been taking way too many words to say in other posts.
I’ve heard anecdotes of abuse victims being told to just suck it up because the family doesn’t have the balls to eject Uncle Pervert from the gathering — or Grandpa Pervert, or Daddy Pervert, or whatever (even female ones) — because somehow rocking the boat and causing social stress or making a scene is worse than forcing an abuse victim to spend their whole holiday stressed by being near their abuser, or, worse, actually suffering additional abuse during the event!
There’s an episode of Caillou I’ve heard about but haven’t seen. In it, the mom wants to have Caillou spend time with an old man, and Caillou is scared of him. The mom apparently goes “Aw, he’s nothing to be scared of” and leaves them together. I’m sure the episode is very happy and all, but as some comments pointed out, if your kid is uncomfortable with an adult, you don’t leave them alone together — you don’t know how serious the kid’s discomfort might be, or whether they’re picking up on a vibe you somehow missed.
In like vein, you don’t make victims invite their tormentors over for Christmas — or socially berate them if they can’t be nice about the issue.
Well, I for one understand where Todd is coming from, but you KNOW Amanda won’t… She’ll probably blow up in his face right then and there or be fitful about this when they do get to Todd’s parents..
I wonder how Todd’s gonna handle that..
Now I can’t remember, does Amanda know it was Andi who told Todd she’s dead yet? If not that could cause her to blow up too, only against Andi rather than Todd.
No, the last it was mentioned around Amanda no one gave names.
Probably for the best, Amanda’s at a very fragile stage right now. What would happen to her outlook on life, nevermind her already poor behavior and social skills, if she was told her Mother told her Father that she was dead so he wouldn’t look for her?
Oy. While I understand that no one in comic wants to break the news to the poor girl, I really question whether its good to keep it from here. It’s such a major thing, and it affected her entire life, and it’s going to come out eventually. It is really wise to let Amanda trust someone who’s obviously untrustworthy?
I agree she should be told sooner or later, but I think erring on the side of ‘later’ to avoid the ‘too soon’ is best. She is going to need years of reprogramming from loving parents, opening up that can of worms before she’s got some kind of stable base could seriously damage her progress. However, if they avoid ‘soon’ for too long it could become ‘too late’, wherein she finds out herself and reacts 100x worse than if she’d been told straight up.
Whenever they do do it, I SERIOUSLY hope that they BOTH enlist the help of a certified therapist to sit down with them while they tell her everything, and help them phrase it in such a way that doesn’t send her plummeting into a major downward spiral.
Yeah, Therapist is a must. For Andi as well.
It has not been directly stated, but it has been inferred, and Amanda is a very bright kid. I’d be very surprised if she doesn’t know at this point. But truthfully, we don’t know yet for sure what she’s deduced.
I thought she found out the last time she was eavesdropping.
Kompression, eh?
I’ll just leave this here: http://www.kompressormusic.com
I still really want to know what Andi and Amanda were talking about that had her in such a huff a few strips ago. Everything about the nails and hair is cute, but c’mon, plot! (You’ve been spoiling us with the amazing storyline)
I believe it was something along the lines of “You *will* be required to act with at least the minimum of civility towards Selkie while we’re visiting”
I wonder how much of that conversation Amanda and Selkie are gonna hear. Amanda seems suspicious of them, so she might hear something she isn’t supposed to.
Also, I am not surprised that Andi isn’t allowed to come over to Todd’s parents house for Christmas. I know she feels really guilty over what she did, but it is going to take a while before Todd and his family are willing to forgive her (assuming that they will forgive her. Dunno for sure or not).
The “nine months ago” comment doesn’t work too well, for me. Because it corresponds with a birth cycle, it feels like he saying “since she got pregnant,” which obviously isn’t right. Feels like it should either be “when I found out you lied to me about losing the baby” or “nine months ago, when you told me the truth.”
Maybe it’s just me.
It’s “nine months ago when we broke up”.
Yeah, but didn’t they break up long before that? Were they still dating, when he adopted Selkie?
Todd, Andi might not be a part of YOUR family but she is a part of Amanda’s. Do you ready think you should separate a mother and daughter on the holidays?
Yes? Happens in divorced families all the time. Some families can manage to get together and still be one big happy, but most of the time a separation of that sort gets under the skin and makes it impossible to relax around each other, to keep from thinking about the wrongs and the what-ifs and all that.
And, he’s not separating them for the entire holiday. Just part of it. That’s all.
Heck, in my family, when we popped over to my uncle’s for Christmas dinner, we didn’t even SEE my mom most of the night. She was in the kitchen, chatting with my aunt every year. I only really figured this out when I found out that she had never seen The Princess Bride, a movie we watched almost every year, and it turned out to be because she was never with us in the living room 🙂
Am I think only person recalling a scene from Wayne’s World?
I’m not sure of how the scene went, because the part my brain happily remembers is “I don’t own A gun, let alone MANY guns which would necessitate an entire RACK. What would I do with a gun rack?” But I think the scene ended with something like “That’s what being broken up MEANS!”
Seriously Todd needs to fucking chill, the world doesnt revolve around you -.-
I don’t see how you’re getting that impression from this exchange.
Todd’s bending over backwards to make the split-family thing work, but he has the right to maintain SOME boundaries. Especially when it comes to a larger family gathering, where 100% of the family members were directly harmed by Andi’s actions, not just once but repeatedly and over a period of eight years.
Can you imagine your reaction being acceptable for other circumstances?
“Look, Todd, I realize Andi lied about you and sent you to prison for eight years, but c’mon, dude, it’s Christmas and you need to chill. It’s not like the world revolves around YOU.”
“Look, Todd, I realize Andi stole your sperm and created a baby that she failed to mention for eight years, and now she’s only told you about the kid because she needs child support. But dude, chill out. You’ve got a kid now.”
“Look, Todd, I know Andi cheated on you, and then used the court to claim sole custody of your kid and raised her in an abusive family for eight years, and that you’ve only just recently met your daughter for the first time. But seriously, you’re acting like the world revolves around YOU. Just invite Andi over and chill the fuck out.”
What is Todd doing wrong exactly? He took her out of the room and is explaining his viewpoint. Is he angry yes, but he has the right to be angry. His only misstep is not distracting the kids with a tv show.
Personally, Andi is scum and has no right to push herself into the Christmas activities. She get’s Christmas Day, she does not get their time just because they used to.
Andi seems to still be operating under the delusion that Todd is a little miffed, and as soon as he gets over it, they’ll be a couple again. I sincerely feel sorry for her, but she is in the wrong here. Todd has been extremely generous with these joint activities, possibly excessively so, as they have fed into Andi’s delusion. Explaining where the line stands is absolutely necessary.
I’ve just gone over some past comics and… honestly Todd isn’t acting much different now than he was before the big truth came out – if anything he is actually doing a pretty good job of forcing himself to be nice! https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie147/ https://selkiecomic.com/comic/161-temp/
He was already pretty down on here before this, so while the Amanda reveal definitely didn’t help it’s not like he just needs to forgive her this one mistake and everything will be chill again.
I would not be acting half as nice. I would open the door, let Amanda in, and close it in Andi’s face.
Of course I would have explained to Amanda that the reason me and her mom aren’t together is that mom and dad had an argument and we do not get along. Then answer her questions shy of the most mentally scarring answers, but Andi would not be simply allowed into my domicile.
Oh no. He is just saying one day without Andi to spend time with his daughter and family. It isn’t like she’s been a toxic liar for eight years….oh wait…she has. And she hasn’t actually learned anything from this.
It really does seem like her getting Amanda was in part as a way to get back with Todd, or at least weasel her way back after he told her it’s over. Not the only reason as she obviously does care for Amanda in her own right now, but stuff like this isn’t helping her case.
To me, it came off as Andi not caring until she saw Todd with Selkie the first time. Had Todd not gone through with the adoption, Amanda would very likely still be in the orphanage. Without the breakup and the adoption, Andi unlikely would have ever given it a second thought.
We never did get a glimpse inside her head other than the photo montage, but it is very hard to come to the conclusion that Andi is not using this as a tool to get back together with Todd.
I’m starting to bank on Andy doing this to get back with Todd AND just because she wants to. Even if the only reason she WANTS to is because she knows that Amanda’s been with an abusive family because of her..
You do realize that Andi gave up Amanda up for adoption and lied about it to Todd and his family for YEARS, do you? And that said decision resulted in Amanda getting adopted by the family from hell,which led to her getting behavioral AND trust issues?
Sure Andi is remorseful about this, but you can’t possibly expect her to be forgiven so easily after what she did, can you?
Maybe I’m a bit biased because I believe Amanda is Andi’s child first and foremost, but I seriously think that if Todd really wants to become a good father, he should take Andi’s feelings into consideration. Yes she messed up in a BIG way, but it’s obvious she’s trying to fix things and become a better person. All she wants is to be there for Amanda. I get he is hurt, I understand if he doesn’t want to re-build a romantic relationship with Andi, but I feel as though she should get a second chance at being a friend.
I fully admit this is completely irrational and I’m well aware Todd’s the one who was wronged here but every single interaction between him and Andi that ends like this always leaves me irritated with him and sympathetic towards her. I think it has everything to do with the profound lack of sympathy he has towards her at all. Yes, again, I get why. It still bothers me. And yes I know she fucked up but I still keep going back to all the fear that lead to her doing what she did and the open irritation he had with her before she even made her first appearance (that UGH when he knew she was coming over). I understand she fucked up and this was a pretty terrible break up but I also feel like before the Amanda reveal Todd was already just DONE with her and not even trying that hard to hide it? And they were together since high school? I have to wonder how hard Todd ever really tried to find out why anything that bothered Andi actually bothered her? I don’t want them back together but I’m so tired of this dynamic where she’s constantly being shit all over. Maybe I wouldn’t feel this way if she seemed to have any real emotional support outside of her daughter. She has a terrible mother and it appears no real friends? I wish she could just get a boyfriend or a girlfriend or something because it’s really hard to be mad at someone who I get the impression had no one outside of Todd and his family before the relationship ended and has no one outside of her child now.
She just seems like she’s in very real pain and extremely isolated and extremely lonely. Yeah much of it is her own fault but that’s a dangerous combination especially with a child. I think she’s going to self destruct very soon.
Gonna call this one.
– Amanda will discover the truth about Andi’s deception. High probability she learns via Selkie somehow.
– Amanda will explode at Andi with righteous fury, and either run away TO dad’s place or run away somewhere dad finds her.
– Todd will then be in the position of having to explain to her how sometimes people end up in difficult situations beyond their capacity to handle, yadda yadda, and in the process of trying to explain the situation to Amanda in a way that will allow her a route to forgiveness, will discover one himself.
– Somewhere in all this, there will be sisterly bonding as both girls discover that they were “abandoned” by their mothers for reasons they don’t understand, and share a similar pain.
Odds?
you forget children love to eavesdrop behind closed doors
and Todd in his anger will probably say something he and Andi will regret
especially after however Amanda reacts to what ever happens.
Oh, Andi. It’s still sinking in to you that yes, you are in fact broken up and staying that way, and bringing Amanda back into Todd’s life doesn’t change that, only burns what was left of an already-broken bridge.
At the same time, I think it’s safe to say that for the last decade, Todd’s family was in fact her family (and as of the Amanda thing, I suspect she and Patricia are more or less estranged) and even with the Meet The Grandparents encounter I don’t think she’s really recognized and accepted that she isn’t welcome with them anymore, either. (And given the way their breakup was caused – the adoption comment – and the circumstances everyone found out after – AMANDA – while I think there may have been potential in some other universe for a truly amicable breakup where Andi was still part of the family, in this universe she completely wrecked those chances.)
(Note that this would have to be an alternate universe where there was an actual miscarriage or stillbirth, and the breakup conversation would be more in line with “I always imagined having biological children even after all this, I understand completely why you’d want to adopt especially with an older kid but I don’t know if it’s for me, but listen when you find your kid let me know so I can take you two out to celebrate with lunch, because you’re still one of my best friends.” Or one where they actually had a Talk during the pregnancy including Andi’s fears and Todd’s family agreed to take custody, and if/when Andi was feeling more capable of Being A Parent she’d be welcome to visit and they could consider the relationship thing again, but Todd’s first priority was gonna be child-rearing and any partner he had would have to be willing to co-parent there. So you know, either AU would be pretty much completely unrecognizable to our universe.)
Amanda is all “I’m watching you, mom-hater.”
Every single divorce analogy I see on here has me fuming.
This is not the same!
This is going to be Amanda and Selkies FIRST christmas with the family.
This is nowhere the same as a divorce where things would have been set up ahead of time and the kids are used to being around their family.
Amanda knows NONE of the people that will be there but Todd whos on her shit list right now.
Yes Andi is partially at fault (her mom was the adult who pushed the decision) for that but to kick her out while trying to tell Amanda shes welcome and loved is a bad idea.
Amanda wont see a bunch of loving people, shes going to see them as people who hate her mom. In Amandas world her mom is all she has and she loves her enough to give up her room for Amanda.
This is a great way to ruin the holidays for everyone. Ive see what a little kid with anger issues looks like when they reach righteous fury, its not pretty and no one is happy.
You think forcing Todds parents and siblings to spend Christmas Eve with Andi, a woman lied and told their son/brother his child was DEAD is going to make everyone’s holiday fun and happy times for all? Seriously? Andi needs to get a clue, she is not Todds girlfriend, she’s not going to BE Todds girlfriend, she needs to stop expecting to be part of his family, because she’s not.
Yes they share Amanda now and their lives will be connected because of it, but that does not require, nor would it be healthy to force them to be together for all holidays or even this holiday. A choice has to be made, Amanda either stays with Andi the whole time or she spends some time with Todds family too. Andi and Todds family is the worst scenario at this point.
you seem to be the only one here, besides me,
that actually understands how important it will be to Amanda,
That Todd and his Family, allow Andi to be part of their first christmas with Amanda. and for Todd and his Family to actually act Civil to Andi, despite all the drama that Andi has caused in the past.
Oh,we understand, we just also understand that children are very empathic. Amanda would sense the tension and negativity, and she might blame herself. How will that make it better?
How about how important it will be to Selkie? Its her first Christmas with her new family and *congratulations* she gets to spend it with her bully! Todd’s family gets to spend it with the woman who lied to them about Amanda being DEAD! But yes, by all means lets only care about Amanda.
Its pretty clear you were lucky enough not to grow up in a family full of drama.
Anyone who puts their own feelings before their childs though doesn’t deserve children. They are the priority. A child doesn’t get say about what family they end up in more often than not and if the family cant at least pretend to be adults for a day or two thats very sad.
My aunt tried to kill my mother and we all knew how to be polite around each other. damn.
Todd’s family is pretty childish but I could hope they could be civil.
Selkie is getting the short end of the stick both ways but with Andi there Andi has shown she is better at getting Amanda to behave than Todd.
Is that literally 9 months, or is that a cheap pregnancy-shot?
That’s how long since they broke up. Really, sometime doesn’t feel like that but less than a year has passed in the comic since the story started.
I was just struck by a thought. What if … Andi’s reaction to Todd’s suggestion that they adopt was brought about by fear of the chance that he might have picked Amanda in the first place?
This doesn’t make anything she’s done any better, but it would at least explain the lengths she went to in order to try discouraging Todd from adoption.
I doubt she ever considered that. She gave up Amanda to have a better life than the one 2 unprepared teenagers could offer. She kept the guilt away because she thought she was better off with her new family. Especially given how much of a shock it was for her to find out how much crap she’d gone through since being given up, she probably thought Amanda had been taken to a loving home a long, long time ago.
I can’t help but think that if everyone went and talked to Andi’s mother about all this, it would take less than fifteen minutes for at least 75% of their collective anger to be diverted to her.
Not really. Andi still lied to them for eight years. That will always be on Andi.
I have to say after reading some of the comment and stewing on my original on the fence thoughts from the last comic; I have to agree that Todd is in the right to tell Andi she shouldn’t expect to be welcomed openly after what’s transpired. I also agree that at some point if just to soften things, Todd and Andi should have a talk with Amanda that her Mom won’t always be allowed at family functions on Todd’s side because they aren’t together anymore and it’d be awkward.
I dread the day the entire truth ever comes out; but maybe when Amanda is getting into her teen years and is more mature she deserves to know if just so she doesn’t find out on her own the wrong way. Right now she’s too young and volatile to be told the truth.
I think the large portion of this interaction comes down to Andi seeking support and stability while trying to provide the same for Amanda. Unfortunately she is also not grasping or refusing to respect that her and Todd’s relationship has separated into one of friends zone only. Todd has tried to put distance between them while still trying to be involved with Amanda and Andi has clearly overstepped, and assumed things that are not.