Recently Adele’s father, Mark Evans, has complained in the media that his daughter the famous singer Adele has disowned him. In his interview he says how much he wants to meet his grandchild, and the singer’s boyfriend. A rift between parent and child is common. In a situation like this one how does a person determine what is appropriate, and what is not appropriate?
There is no clear cut answer to that question. Many will have strong opinions on Adele’s decision not to speak with her father. From a relationship perspective the only opinion that matters is Adele’s. The clues to this decision can be discovered from the history reported in the press.
A relationship between parent and child is dependent upon the emotional bonds that have been created between the two people. It was reported that when Adele was three years old, her father left her and her mother. This is an important part of the history between Adele and her father for this emotional bond would have been broken. According to Eric Erikson’s psychosocial stages the first stage of life is trust vs mistrust.. http://psychology.about.com/library/bl_psychosocial_summary.htm When her father left Adele most certainly would have learned not to trust him. These early breaks in bonding between parent and child are often minimized by the parent who leaves the child. There is a belief system in place that somehow upon their return the absent parent should be greeted with open arms.
The article reports that the relationship between father and daughter continued because they were together for the holidays. Since bonding is based on proximity and getting your emotional needs met it is very unlikely that this emotional connection continued to be developed.
In the teen years children often try to develop their own identity. In fact, Eric Erickson calls the stage between 13-18 identity versus role confusion. During this period of time children often seek out the natural birth parents. The child has a strong desire to know their natural parents in attempt to create their own identities. The article was unclear about how often Adele met with her father during the teen years. It is possible that the closeness that was reported or observed, was Adele’s willingness to put her feelings aside to get to know her father. Since the bond is weak between Adele and her father it leads to the suspicion that it was not as often as is being reported.
In another article written about Adele it states that at the age of 16 she was beginning to be noticed for her singing abilities. She had already begun writing her own music by that time. It is not a coincidence that Adele associates her father’s return with her rise to fame.
Mark Evans has fallen victim to the consequence of his own behaviors. He walked out on his wife and child with the expectation that the love and care from his child would continue. He thought he could return when things were better or the child was older and less difficult to resume the relationship. It is hard to feel pity for his plight for it is one he created himself. Had Mark Evans stayed there for the hard times he would reaped the rewards of having a famous daughter who would be willing to share her life with him.
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