Alpha Wives and Alpha Widows (2024)

Apr 12·edited Apr 12

With a thumbs-up from Vox for daughters of Alpha fathers, I’ll bite.

My dad is a high performing Alpha who was at the top of his field for decades. Very handsome, stunningly smart. Overwhelmingly charismatic, even when he’s being a dick. He loves life in the fast lane, in a fashion that makes it clear Wolf of Wall Street may as well have been a documentary. I know that the midget tossing scene is real, because he was in an adjacent industry and I remember him laughing to my mom about what the crazy guys over on Wall Street were doing for their annual meeting. His parallel industry had just as much booze, cocaine, and women. He thrived in it. His biggest regret in life is that he can’t be young again to do it all over. He made tens of millions for himself (Mostly for his ex-wives. He doesn’t care. “I want her to be safe. I can always make more money.) And billions, with a b, for his shareholders.

He and my mom met in high school. And were the stereotypical gorgeous, “all the men want to be him and the women want to do him/be her”, alpha couple. They are from an ethnic group that is unusually short (I have Nordic ad mixture from my mom and am taller than Dad), so he couldn’t compete in football or basketball, and instead became the regional men’s gymnastics champion. My mom was a chaste Barbie, model level gorgeous, total femme fatale. Modeled professionally but hit a ceiling, due to ethnicity and shortness. Probably also being monogamous with her alpha boyfriend and not putting out to get to the next level.

They both love being the center of attention in a room, command it effortlessly, and recall their college years together as the best time of their life. They are BOTH very high in dark triad features. And should not have had children. Not in an “I’d rather be dead” sort of way, but in a children pulled them apart and ruined their marriage.

When he was home, which wasn’t often, Dad was jealous of the attention mom gave the kids. He wanted her attention to himself like he had had for a decade, and like he got from everywhere else in the world. In turn, she was angry that he was still out partying, living the high life, excelling beyond belief in his career, fraternizing with other women, while she was stuck at home with us.

They were an equal match for stubbornness. As Vox describes, he did and does respect her when she say no to him, and when they went head to head it was epic. Despite the respect, he still does whatever he wants anyway including: moving the family thousands of miles without consulting her by selling the house and taking a next-level job without discussing it with her, spending upwards of $400,000 on booze/drugs/women that was missing from the forensic accounting in the divorce, any number of affairs that he swears he never had, and disappearing on business for days or weeks at a time without telling her where he was going or why.

He stills likes to drink and party as a senior citizen, and when asked about it he’s just like “yeah, yeah, I know the science. The 12-steps, everything. But I just don’t care enough to be sober. It’s not fun.” He has had zero consequences for his drug and alcohol abuse, except my mom divorcing him, but she only did it to protect her share of the assets in case he killed someone drunk driving in his very expensive cars. They live separately now, but still sleep together and present as a married couple in their retirement town. When he lost his license due to excessive DUIs, he just got an Uber driver to become his professional driver. For years.

One of his favorite work stories is how his secretary would keep a coin jar on her desk and charge him 50 cents whenever he swore at somebody. One day he had such a cluster f*ck to untangle from his subordinates’ screw up that as he stormed past her desk, he shoved a $100 bill into the jar. In life, court, etc. Fines just set the amount of f*ck-you money you need on hand to be able to do what you want and not have people waste your time about it. I’m seen him deal with finder benders by pulling $2000 in cash out of his wallet, handing it to the other driver, and leaving.

As a father, he largely wasn’t around because his work and the social life it required was paramount. Sometimes he would come home drunk or high on co*ke after a big event, but he mostly stayed at his apartment near work when that happened. Presumably with other women. My younger siblings literally could not keep up with him, in terms of temperament or health, or with the volatility of the fights between two dark triad parents. And though we were boundlessly provided for in material terms, my siblings had little or no emotional involvement with him.

I happened to excel at one of his favorite hobbies, and got substantial one-on-one time with him doing that hobby together, which could not be done with drugs or alcohol. I truly got the best of him of any of the kids in the family. It was wonderful to both have his full attention and feel so special to him for the decade or so we shared that. I’m still the apple of his eye…when he bothers to spend time with me, which is like a long weekend, twice a year. He’s fantastic at getting emergency things done, or having his secretary do it If and whenever I was in a pinch (before I was married and had a consistent and reliable husband - thank God!), Dad never failed to follow through when I’ve asked for material help. But any level of emotional support, understanding, sympathy, loyalty, consistency, constancy etc. seems to have been reserved for his work Bravos.

He’s very sure he was an excellent father because we had a good time together and I went to great schools and landed a well educated husband.

After my mom, Dad married again to a woman his age, very clearly for access to a higher level of social influence that, due to his cultural background, he would not have been able to enter into otherwise. He started a whole new life with her and her children, and, except for paying for schooling, left me and my sister largely in the dust. When I ask him about it he says he “tried to include us but we were busy.” They later divorced, once he had made the connections he needed.

I later found out he had had a third marriage and divorce, with the woman my mom most suspected him of having an affair with. But he doesn’t count it because it was just a quick drive through thing in Vegas, and she didn’t take any of his money when they split.

He recently asked my husband if my husband was banging one of his (husband’s) coworkers on the side. And my husband was utterly outraged, how-dare you-make-such-an-accusation-against-me-in-my-own-home furious. I had to explain to my husband that he had missed the opportunity for male camaraderie with his father-in-law and that the correct answer would have been “well, Light on the Shore doesn’t know, and I swear to you she never will… I would never leave the family for a side piece … but….”

Not all alphas, probably not most, are of the life-in-the-fast lane variety. I’ll post seaparately on my husband, who is a much more sedate natural leader. But in my professional opinion as the daughter of this type of Alpha, the best thing for their kids would be to be sent to boarding school. Near enough to home that the kids can enjoy the occasional event and trip that gives them their Dad’s scare undivided attention, but allows them to form father figure relationships with Beta and Delta teachers and coaches. Mom can then focus most of her time and energy on Dad and advancing whatever it is he is out to achieve in the world.

I know one family with similar parents to mine, who dealt with al this by having full time nanny care for their four kids. Daytime, nighttime, and weekend nannies. The kids cried a lot growing up that their parents were never at parent teacher night or sports events or whatever. But as adults they are closer with their alpha-duo parents than I or any of my siblings are with ours.