Why Men Leave

Pastor Sarah Jakes Roberts and Bishop TD Jakes have a candid father-daughter talk about family, relationships, and legacy at the 2019 Woman Evolve Conference.

Dear Lord,
Today…….I am asking all my prayer warriors to say a prayer that may help others. So many people are hurting right now. Many are struggling with finances and need jobs. Some are facing foreclosure and don’t even know how they are going to make it from week to week..

Many are lonely. . Many are heartbroken. . Many are facing sickness and health is fading. . Some are dealing with difficult family members. Many have lost HOPE.. Tonight, let us put our prayers and faith together decree and declare breakthrough over our families. Financial miracles WILL take place. Jobs WILL be found. Our Bodies WILL be made whole & sickness WILL flee. Marriages and relationships WILL be restored. Family members WILL find Jesus. Heartbreaks WILL be healed. JOY WILL be restored and HOPE WILL be found. In Jesus Name. Amen!!!!!! Keep God First…….

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No matter how poorly a person provides emotionally or financially uh in your life.
The first victory for a man is that he didn’t quit because most of the people suffering in this room are suffering from a life.
You knew nothing about that, that some of them don’t know who their father is.
Some of them were abused by their fathers, some of their fathers ran away and the child thinks that the father ran from them.
But in all likelihood, the, the father either ran from your mother. You really?
No, that’s true. He, he, he, he, he ran from the relationship that was going on with her at the time.
Or he ran from the pressure of being this iconic individual that was intimidating for this 20 year old or this 25 year old individual who, who is unfinished himself, who is flawed and broken and, and the whole family unit is predicated on the fact, it has to be a place of unconditional love.
It has to be because God isn’t through raising anybody in the house, anybody in the house.
And it’s very important that you understand that because if you don’t give that elasticity to a man.
He will leave, he will leave for the lack of uh being understood and being received because he wants everything you want.
Everything you just said that you want, that’s everything I want.
I wanna be seen, I wanna be valued, I wanna be affirmed.
I wanna be appreciated and I want it, I want it to happen after work.
And so in between all of that, that’s everything your mother wants. So everybody wants.
So you come home to hunger, tired.
So when you come home to hunger, tired and and and face criticism, which I didn’t, but some men do it makes you want to flee either back to work or away altogether to the grieving women in this room who feel like my father loved, didn’t love me.
He wasn’t there for me. Very seldom do men leave their Children, they leave their situation or they leave their spouse and they don’t know how to build a relationship with the child apart from the mother or the mother won’t let him.
So you mentioned elasticity.
We got somebody holler to somebody and we like, how do you balance not wanting to be like overcritical and nagging or judgmental but also having legitimate, you know, things that you wanna be able to discuss whether it’s in the father relationship or even a relationship with a husband with men.
Timing is everything, timing is everything. It is not what you say. It’s when you say it.
Not when I first come in the door.
Don’t meet me at the door with a bunch of complaints. I’m trying to find some refuse.
I’m trying to find some peace and men and most men, uh, need a cage, a detox spot to, to refuel from all the things that happened to you at work where you were often belittled, mistreated, hated on ostracized and to survive that and come home and run it.
The persons you’re doing it for have a list of what you didn’t do.
It makes you feel unappreciated. And here’s where the problem comes in.
There’s always somebody around the corner talking to you saying if, if you was my man and I was your woman and, and it’s, and it’s really not true, but it is the trap we fall in because we have a tendency to go to where the cops are not the criticisms.
If you do have something critical to say, pick a time that your emotions are not involved in it because you have to understand uh men don’t, whether in the workplace or at home or uh in life, we don’t communicate like women, we communicate very differently.
And so understanding what you mean is a process.
My, your mother will tell you my famous line with your mother, my famous, famous all time, 37 year old, there has never been a year in the 37 years.
We’ve been married that I didn’t say this at least 100 times during the year.
What do you mean by that?
Because what she said and what I heard are often two completely different things and the same thing is true in reverse.
What, what I said versus what you hear is two different things. I might say.
I don’t like your dress and you might hear, I don’t like you.
We, we can compartmentalize one issue from the other and, and speak about the issue and then wonder why the individual is bad because for us, it’s about the issue.
It’s not about the individual, but the woman often feels affronted.
A b most women grew up without a man. So she wants me to be her girlfriend in pants.
She, she talks to me like she want a girl and she receives from me like woman communication, male communication is very different.
It, yeah, because like when P T talks to me, I can’t hardly take it sometimes.
It’s like way direct and like, well, why did you, what were you thinking when you did that?
And then I, I become defensive and now I have an attitude and even though I grew up in the house with a man, I think there’s something about him saying something that suggests I didn’t do it well enough that maybe brings up this little girl who wanted to please her dad.
And so now it’s not just him saying I didn’t do this one thing.
Well, I hear all of these things that I didn’t do well throughout our relationship.
First mistake is you married your father?
I, I didn’t know that until about six months into it and that’s when I realized that they’re the same people.
It was like, really? Yeah. Yeah.
I, I tell you, it’s, it’s amazing how much we think alike.
Uh, being direct for us isn’t always an attack. Let me show you the opposite of it.
When, when a woman comes home to talk to her husband, she says, uh he wants to know what’s for dinner.
Well, I left work. I knew we didn’t have any green beans.
I had to go by the store and get some green beans. The traffic was absolutely everywhere.
Do you not know that I had to go to where they got green beans, five cans for a dollar and wait in line.
I ran into Helen while I was there and you know, I don’t like Helen and he’s sitting there just you wanna take your limp and pull it completely over the top of your head because all I wanna know is so, so psychology teaches that that that women circle around the issue.
You circle around the issue. We, we, we come down like a helicopter right on the issue.
A machete. I like to call it a machete. We’re your protectors.
But this is it a direct, a direct statement from me doesn’t necessarily mean I’m angry at all.
Doesn’t necessarily mean I’m angry at all. And so when you get angry and defensive, I feel misunderstood.
I got a big amen. I heard it come from before. I, I, I feel misunderstood.
Oh, the, the three men that are in this room are praying hard for me. OK?
So what, what you have to understand is that I, I feel misunderstood by just being straightforward with you and, and, and, and, and let me say this as it relates to marriage, you can get married in 30 you, you can, you can have a wedding in 30 minutes, but it takes 30 years to have a marriage.
By the time you learn how to read each other, you have raised your Children, you have buried your parents, you have been in every conceivable situation together and you have drawn conclusions and the reason that this is so difficult, but it starts generationally and passes down.
You, you already have the advantage of having some sense how to read them.
And you know how you and I can talk across the room and never say a word.
OK, I can talk to this girl and never part my lips.
We would look at each other and burst out and start laughing and, and, and said a word to each other.
That innate instinct is very helpful in reading your husband even though sometimes you read that he’s displeased with you.
Uh because he said, criticize something that you did but it’s funny that you would say that about him because with me though, I am direct and we’ve had our moments and look at the way she’s looking at me.
One of my greatest father, daughter moments with you was after you were started to write and you wrote me something and sent it to me.
And I was in L A at the time and I was busy and I was very direct and I, I’m embarrassed how direct I was.
I tell you it wasn’t good and I didn’t know what you meant. You needed to write it over.
I did when she, when you later wrote the book, I called you, I was called you from my desk and I left a message on your voice mail and I said I was gonna read the book because I’ve always been their guinea pigs, anything they cooked, I ate anything they, they wrote I read.
So I said, I’m gonna read this book because this, you’re my child.
But when I started reading it, it was so well written and so well done.
I couldn’t put it down the pace, the rhythm, the truth, the storytelling, the description was impeccable.
And then you taught me something, you call me crying and you said I wanna keep this message forever.
Oh oh, don’t do that.
And, and you said something to me that I will never forget.
You said, because this girl is extremely deep.
She’s real deep she said, what gave your compliment so much validity?
It’s the criticism that preceded it.
The fact that you had the courage to tell me when I was wrong, makes me believe you when you tell me I’m right.