Basic Trope: An absent father who leaves after getting a woman pregnant.
- Straight: Alice and Bob have a one-night stand. Alice finds herself pregnant, but Bob is completely out of the picture.
- Exaggerated: Bob has several children, by several different women, whom he never again contacts or pays child support money to. In fact, he is always on the move, changing his name, so that the mothers of his children won't be able to find him.
- Downplayed: Alice and Bob were in a relationship, but they break up. Bob gets visitation rights, although he wishes he could be a bigger part of his kids' lives.
- Justified:
- Daddy Had a Good Reason for Abandoning You
- Bob dies.
- They were drunk when it happened, and Bob never remembered who she was.
- The child was conceived under less-than-consensual circumstances.
- Bob is just that irresponsible.
- Bob gets sent to Prison, and his strained relationship with his ex-girlfriend Alice and the fact that the prison is located in a remote area far from Alice and the kids, means seeing the kids is inconvenient, and Bob doesn't have enough money to pay child support due to earning only a few cents per hour (which he needs so he can buy basic things like soap and toothpaste from the comissary) assembling widgets.
- Bob assumed he was sterile and didn't think Alice's child could have been his.
- Alice and Bob were teenagers at the time and Bob just didn't take any responsibility.
- Alice never told Bob that she was pregnant.
- Bob was assisting Alice and the sterile Charles. Meaning that while Bob is the biological father, Charlie is the legal father of little Dannie.
- Bob donated at a sperm bank, he has no idea if his sperm was picked for anyone, let alone Alice Whatshername, whom he never actually met.
- Alice has decided to invoke Chosen Conception Partner and deliberately cut off contact with Bob after finding out she was pregnant.
- Inverted:
- Alice becomes pregnant, and Bob marries her, even if he isn't the child's father.
- Alternatively, after the baby is born, Alice is nowhere to be found.
- Subverted:
- Alice becomes pregnant, and Bob stays with her.
- Alice and Bob break up during or shortly after Alice's pregnancy, but Bob gets visitation rights, and cherishes every moment he has with his kids. And he is certainly good about paying child support on time.
- Alice becomes pregnant by Bob, but either miscarries or has an abortion.
- Double Subverted:
- But then they have a fight and break up, and Bob never contacts Alice again or sees his child.
- He doesn't get to see his kids as often as he'd like.
- Bob was out of the picture when Alice found out she was pregnant. He never knew about the pregnancy, or about the miscarriage or abortion.
- Parodied: Bob gets Alice pregnant. They haven't even had sex.
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted:
- Bob has no children by any of the women he's slept with.
- Bob gets Alice pregnant, but does not leave her or the child.
- Bob didn't sleep with Alice, therefore if she is pregnant, it's not his.
- Enforced: Disappeared Dad + Darker and Edgier
- Lampshaded: ???
- Invoked: Alice tells Bob she's pregnant, and the child is his. Bob flees the country.
- Exploited: Alice cuts off contact with Bob (with the exception, of course, of his monthly child-support check).
- Defied: Alice tells Bob she's pregnant, and the child is his. Bob proposes to her.
- Discussed: "My piece of shit ex owes me like thirty grand in child support and I'm pretty sure I know where he's living, but he knows I'm trying to get him served and his scumbag friend is covering for him even though I can't prove it."
- Conversed: "Bro, it's fuckin' bullshit, dude, Alice won't let me see my fuckin' daughter. All I wanna do is turn things around for her sake and be a good dad." "You haven't had a job that wasn't paid in cash in years, you don't have a license or a car after you wrecked it while driving drunk on your third DUI and the state revoked it, you live on your cousin's couch, and you have not done a single thing to improve your life since she threw you out. Shut the fuck up and take some actual responsibility instead of acting like a poor, innocent victim of your evil babymama for once in your life."
- Deconstructed:
- Children can certainly be raised by just one parent, but it's always better if they have another positive role model and caregiver. It is also more economically practical that way.
- The child (and possibly Alice) is(/are) resentful of Bob's absence.
- Alice initially plans to be a single parent but then discovers that parenthood is much harder and more demanding than she thought possibly due to complications and then has to seek support from Bob, including legally chasing him for child support.
- Reconstructed:
- Even if Alice and Bob don't stay together, Bob finds a way to be an active part of his children's life.
- Alternatively, Alice marries Carl, who is more of a dad than the kids' biological father.
- Alice raises the child alone. She has the financial means to provide for it without anyone else's help, and she raises a well-adjusted, healthy, happy child...all on her own.
- Alice's parents and/or siblings help her raise the child.
- Played For Drama: The difficulty Alice has raising the child alone, and Bob feeling guilty for leaving.
- Bob may very well feel guilty about abandoning his child. But he doesn’t even know how to start being a father or partner to Alice and their child. Making him feel like more of a failure (And chances are, he really is).
- Bob doesn't actually feel any sort of guilt about abandoning his child, but he sure does know how to put on a good show of it whenever he wants to convince his latest girlfriend that he's trying to be a good father but Alice won't let him, or whenever he just wants attention in general. Furthermore, Alice has a very good reason for trying to keep him out of his child's life, as he is an absolute mess of a human being who lives a chaotic, self-destructive, substance-addled, and financially unstable life that he consistently fails to take any responsibility for and doesn't seem to want to change, and every time he has reentered their life, he has placed them in some sort of dangerous or extremely inappropriate situation. While she initially tried to give him the benefit of the doubt, Alice realized that he doesn't see a problem with the way he lives his life and won't change a long time ago.
- Implied: Bob is always referred to as a "biological father" with heavy stress on the former word.
Back to Glorified Sperm Donor
