Ah, the cycle of life.
I remember the first topic I posted here. It was long. I was clearly hurting and confused. And as far as that particular issue, nothing has changed. I feel like I'm ready for it to. My therapist (
) agrees that I need to at least try to figure out what I want from my relationship with my dad, long term, and decide what I need to do to achieve that.
Thing is, I think I just want him to go away. He's been calling me (and texting me) non stop since my birthday and I just have no desire to talk to him. Actually, I have a really strong desire not to talk to him. And the longer I go without talking to him, the less likely it is that I will pick up my phone when he calls (which he does, every day, multiple times, without fail.)
I actually thought that we were getting closer to a much less involved, more spaced out relationship recently. After trying to get in touch with me for a few weeks with no luck, he asked me if I would just try to "answer twice a month or so at least" once we did talk. Hurray! That's what I wanted to hear.
But he keeps calling. How long till he takes a hint? Am I going to have to tell him I don't want to talk to him anymore? Do parents not just...fade away like everyone else after they are ignored for so long?
I'd like a drama free, less emotional, less confrontational way to get rid of my father, please.
My heart aches for all of you that were robbed of this relationship. I'm sorry. I lost a daughter, I'll be damned if I lose anymore of my children. Literally or figuratively.
I'm really glad you were able to repair your relationship with your father momo.
Original Post by cajunrider:
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
Original Post by stargazer1:
I don't have much advice, but when my parents divorced, my dad told me that he assumed he would never hear from me again. (I was 20 when it happened)
We've never had a good relationship because he was an abusive alcoholic.
Basically, we have a holiday relationship. I see him on birthdays and x-mas/thanksgiving. So about 4x a year.
I do call him once in a blue moon to check in or if I need to ask him something. It makes me sad that we don't have much of a relationship, but I know that we just can't have that type of a relationship. There is too much pain and resentment on my end of it.
As sad as it makes you, as a Dad I'd be willing to bet it makes him feel like dying. I'm not trying to be preachy or mean but the bond a Dad feels for his children (especially girls) can't be described.
I don't know Kevin. The dads that care never allow the relationship to get that way and the dads that don't will neglect it for years. The problem is that some of the neglecting dads grow old, have regrets, and try too hard to make up or to create a relationship that's not there and make the situation worse.
I'm still waiting for my mother to do this. I went years without speaking to her, it was just much too painful. I have only recently (in the last couple of years) started to even be able to see her on the acquaintance level, and that is sheerly out of self-preservation. I recently friended her on facebook, but she does not have the status listing of "mother" in the area you can do that. I call her mom, not out of respect, but out of....something else, not wanting to appear rude, I suppose.
NP, I suggest you set your boundaries. Tell your dad that you can't/don't want to/etc talk that much. Tell him he needs to stop calling you all the time. If you need to, tell him you'll call him when YOU are ready and for him to stop calling until then. It is self-preservation and if you are exhausting your emotional stores on him, or your feelings of him, then you won't have much left for yourself or more importantly, Peyton. Best of luck to you.
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
My heart aches for all of you that were robbed of this relationship. I'm sorry. I lost a daughter, I'll be damned if I lose anymore of my children. Literally or figuratively.
((buck)) im sorry.
LP, I am of no help on this issue. I wish I could give you some advice but I really have no idea. I think some of the advice is valid, but do what you feel is right for you and your little man.
Original Post by lostpumpkins:
Wow moonbow. And nomo. Thank you both for sharing.
I can definitely relate to the anger cycles. Sometimes, I don't feel so negative about it and just humor him by answering and having the awkward two minute conversation. It keeps him from ringing my phone off the hook for another week or so.
Other times, I feel very resentful of his efforts. Its not my fault he sucked my whole life....why is it on me to soothe his guilt and participate in this dance of awkward obligation? I'm not getting anything out of our "conversations". The rare visit is unbearably tense and silent. It feels like serving a sentence...but wait, I didn't commit any crimes, he did. Maybe he deserves to sit alone and feel like crap. Maybe he deserves to wait by the phone on father's day. I certainly don't deserve to suffer a relationship with him just because he needs to sleep at night.
Yeah, I'm feeling pretty bitter and angry right now. He called again. You would think he had something to say.
My father was dead for about 5 or 6 years before I was able to fully process and let go of all the hurt. The hurt manifested as anger for much of my young life.
I feel your pain. I bolded the sentences that jumped out at me from your post. I want to validate them. There's too many sappy posters coming in here telling you to just suck it up and tell your dad you love him because he's your dad and the only one you'll get.
My father sat in his old age filled with regrets I'm sure. How could he not? He was a dry drunk for about 10 years before his death. He was more unpleasant as a dry drunk than when he was actively drinking. He even occasionally thought it appropriate to give me advice. Yeah right! That would really tick me off.
It wasn't my fault that all during my youth that he made drinking a priority over me. It wasn't my fault that we had to live in a crappy house with half broken/half fixed rooms.
At his funeral it was weird. There he was laying in his casket and I felt nothing. It was as if an acquaintance had died. It was surreal. I felt like I should feel sadness, but there was none. There were no regrets that he was gone either. I went through the motions of what American daughters are supposed to do at funeral time, but I didn't feel it. I knew it would scandalize my mother if I said what I really thought. I couldn't get up and say words. I just let the relatives and friends think I was grieving instead. There was nothing to grieve. I have never liked faking things, and I didn't fake grief, I just let people assume what they wanted to believe. It was out of kindness to my mother and my father's family that I did this. I didn't want to cause hurt to the living.
The grieving came much later. I had to grieve not ever really having a dad in my life. I had to grieve for me, not for him.
Very few people get this. A friend of ours lost his father about a year ago. His wife was talking to me about how much he missed his dad and then she started talking to me about how I must understand what he's going through since my dad was gone. She was the type of friend that I could be honest with and I told her I had absolutely no idea what it was like to lose a father. We had a good talk that day and it felt good to be honest.
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
Original Post by stargazer1:
I don't have much advice, but when my parents divorced, my dad told me that he assumed he would never hear from me again. (I was 20 when it happened)
We've never had a good relationship because he was an abusive alcoholic.
Basically, we have a holiday relationship. I see him on birthdays and x-mas/thanksgiving. So about 4x a year.
I do call him once in a blue moon to check in or if I need to ask him something. It makes me sad that we don't have much of a relationship, but I know that we just can't have that type of a relationship. There is too much pain and resentment on my end of it.
As sad as it makes you, as a Dad I'd be willing to bet it makes him feel like dying. I'm not trying to be preachy or mean but the bond a Dad feels for his children (especially girls) can't be described.
It didn't make me sad that I didn't have much of a relationship with my father at all. It made me feel very hurt that he couldn't or wouldn't even try to overcome his shortcomings and try to be sober when I really needed him. So, if he was sitting there in his chair in his old age feeling like dying, he got what he put out.
My father said he loved me. He never really showed it much. He said it occasionally. I believe he probably did. It was not my responsibility to "be a good daughter" and pretend that all he did wrong didn't effect me. As a matter of fact, it damn near killed me. He nearly killed me as an infant by picking me up and holding me and being so drunk that he let me slide out of his arms and between his leg and the arm chair. When my mother found me I was almost blue.
So, no, YOU don't know what it's like for a daughter to have a crappy father. AND you seem to have no clue what it feels like to have someone lecture you on loving a crappy father.
i got what you want and it sure didnt make me happy. my dad was not a great role model, alcoholic, abusive to my mother, absent most my childhood but for some reason i still wanted a relationship with him. i did all the running and when finally as an young adult i realised he couldnt give a **** about me, i gave him an ultimatum that unless he visited me i woudlnt visit him again. Well he chose not to visit. i never saw him again (apart from his own mothers funeral). He died when i was 33. Im now approaching 50 and although i couldnt have changed his desire to not want to see me, ive been dealing with the rejection my whole life. It has had effects on all my relationships, i feel like i was programmed to expect rejection and to be way down peoples important list, its a curse.
My one big regret is that i didnt have a chance to have all this out with him before he died. i would loved answers. Would have loved to have heard why he chose to do what he did. but that will never happen now, so i am left to my own conclusions.
So be very careful what you wish for. Keep the lines of communication open, your dad is trying so hard, even if in the past he did not. He sounds like he is feeling remorse and is afraid of losing you and is hanging on by his fingernails. Maybe telling him that at this time you need some space but not forever, because in my opinion, in time you will want him back in your life. Life is certainly not easy at times, i wish you luck. x
Isn't it always Daddy who ruins little girls?
In my experience, completely ignoring him didn't work. I stopped answering phone calls, I'd close the curtains whenever he pulled in my driveway and refused to answer the door. Anything he mailed to me got returned immediately without being opened and all of the little gifts he left on my doorstep were tossed in the trash. It took me moving and changing my phone number for him to get the hint.
Toss me in with the crowd that says "eff 'im".
Kevin, I really wish I'd been born to a daddy like you. I got a really sucky sperm donor instead. He and my mom divorced when I was 4 1/2, right after my brother was born... because she had the audacity to have a boy. His list of transgressions in those 4 1/2 years are appalling so I won't go into them, just know, none were caring or fatherly or loving. He was too busy having his own life.
After the divorce, my brother and I were trotted out only when there was someone (i.e. a girlfriend) to be impressed with his mad fatherly skills. He never paid support. We would go from seeing him for a spurt of every other weekend for month or so... to once every two years. After he got remarried to a lady that already had a daughter, I don't think I saw him for YEARS after that, and definitely no phone calls or birthday cards.
My mom got remarried when I was 9 and I got a new dad when I was about 10 or 11. Really. He adopted us and gave us his last name, and even though sometimes he wasn't very good at the whole daddy thing (his own upbringing left a LOT to be desired), he still tried. He was still the one that was there when I came home with my first broken heart. He was the one that taught my brother and me how to drive, the one that was there for every birthday and holiday, the one that got frustrated and worried about us when we weren't home by curfew. HE'S the one that put in all that time. Not the sperm donor. The sperm donor signed off on his parental rights because we just weren't all that useful to him and he was tired of getting court notices that he owed mom money.
So my adoptive dad's the one that got to walk me down the aisle at my wedding, he's the one my kids call grandpa (and yes, my kids know I have another "dad"), he's the one that gets all the daughterly love. He gets all the benefits of having been a dad and going through the rough stuff when there was rough stuff with me.
The other one? Yeah. He tried when I was 13/14 or so. My cousins were up from Florida, visiting at my grandma's house. *Someone* called him and told him we were there. He walked in the front door, all smiles thinking this was going to be some grand reunion or something... I looked him straight in the eye, grabbed my brother and walked out the back door to a nearby playground. My brother didn't even know who he was. I had nothing to say to him. He never made a bond with us, never wanted us, never forged a relationship. Why should I, as the child, suddenly be all forgiving for something I had no control over?
I suppose if he tried to call me today, me being older and a bit more patient, I might be a little nicer than what I would have said to him in my 20s. So instead of telling him to take a flying f*** though a rolling donut, I might just leave it at I don't know you, go away. Dunno. Won't happen.
So, pumpkins, you're the one with the history with this man. Do y'all have ANY history together or not? Did he try, or make an effort with you when you were younger? Is there some sort of relationship foundation there? Honestly ask and answer yourself if you WANT a relationship with this man? Will you regret not having made one in 20, 30, 40 years? Will you be sad if he died and you didn't get to tell him things?
If yes to any of those, go forth and forge a relationship. If not, why put either of you through the BS? Just because he's older and feeling some sort of mortality and guilt doesn't make this your problem. I know for me, my biological coming back into my life at 25 or so would have been weird and a bit creepy. It'd be like getting to know a stranger I had no connection with. And I would have told him that in no uncertain terms -- but that's me. This one's your baby and every circumstance is different.
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
My heart aches for all of you that were robbed of this relationship. I'm sorry. I lost a daughter, I'll be damned if I lose anymore of my children. Literally or figuratively.
Oh Kevin, I am so sorry for your loss.
LP: How near are you to allowing your son's father back into your lives? Is that something that is still on the table?
Original Post by kathygator:
LP: How near are you to allowing your son's father back into your lives? Is that something that is still on the table?
I tried it, against my better judgement. He flaked out, again. Haven't heard from him in a few months. I figure that was his last shot.
We don't have any history together, no. (My father and I, in response to Erin.) Everything about our relationship has been obligatory. Every other weekend, check. Mandated child support, check. Once a week phone call, check. And that's it. We don't have an actual relationship. I know nothing about him and vice versa. There are people in his life who don't even know he has two older children. My sister is the center of his universe.
Once a year, he takes his little family to the mountains. The mountains that are about an hour and a half from where I live (he lives about six hours away). He literally drives right through my city and has never stopped. I actually suggested that he should a year or so ago and he brushed it off.
He's still continued calling me, even after I asked him to stop. I have a feeling he knew one day I'd stop trying.
Original Post by catwalker:
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
Original Post by stargazer1:
I don't have much advice, but when my parents divorced, my dad told me that he assumed he would never hear from me again. (I was 20 when it happened)
We've never had a good relationship because he was an abusive alcoholic.
Basically, we have a holiday relationship. I see him on birthdays and x-mas/thanksgiving. So about 4x a year.
I do call him once in a blue moon to check in or if I need to ask him something. It makes me sad that we don't have much of a relationship, but I know that we just can't have that type of a relationship. There is too much pain and resentment on my end of it.
As sad as it makes you, as a Dad I'd be willing to bet it makes him feel like dying. I'm not trying to be preachy or mean but the bond a Dad feels for his children (especially girls) can't be described.
It didn't make me sad that I didn't have much of a relationship with my father at all. It made me feel very hurt that he couldn't or wouldn't even try to overcome his shortcomings and try to be sober when I really needed him. So, if he was sitting there in his chair in his old age feeling like dying, he got what he put out.
My father said he loved me. He never really showed it much. He said it occasionally. I believe he probably did. It was not my responsibility to "be a good daughter" and pretend that all he did wrong didn't effect me. As a matter of fact, it damn near killed me. He nearly killed me as an infant by picking me up and holding me and being so drunk that he let me slide out of his arms and between his leg and the arm chair. When my mother found me I was almost blue.
So, no, YOU don't know what it's like for a daughter to have a crappy father. AND you seem to have no clue what it feels like to have someone lecture you on loving a crappy father.
This.
It's like, I'm supposed to be the bigger person, open my heart and let the past stay in the past...but I'm the child. I'm the one who got screwed over. How is it that a child can be born to a crappy parent...and then grow up and be expected to tolerate that crappy parent? That's what we're "supposed" to do...it's the "right" thing to do.
What you are described has been called a toxic relationship, the bad guys are toxic people. There are many articles written about this. I wish I could say something about Dads..mine died when I was young.
I am sorry you are obviously suffering.
Original Post by lostpumpkins:
[...]
It's like, I'm supposed to be the bigger person, open my heart and let the past stay in the past...but I'm the child. I'm the one who got screwed over. How is it that a child can be born to a crappy parent...and then grow up and be expected to tolerate that crappy parent? That's what we're "supposed" to do...it's the "right" thing to do.
I have no idea how I'd react if my dad actually wanted to talk to me or like, have dinner with me. I can barely even imagine it.
Here's the way I understand my relationship, such as it is, with my dad:
I was deprived of a good father or even a mediocre father. I was born into a family with multiple dysfunctions. None of that had anything to do with me. I was entirely blameless. I was accountable for nothing except being a child in a family with alcoholism which I did not contribute to. Like anyone else born into this situation, I survived and coped as best I could. The ways I coped were not always or even often healthy, but they worked. I did survive. I developed some harmful beliefs about myself in the process. But I made it to adulthood. So my parents didn't fail me completely.
Once I'm an adult, I'm responsible for my own well-being. I can't blame my parents for the choices I make any more. I've got a brain I can use to suss out where I need help and then I have the responsibility to get that help. Took me a pretty long time to I feel like I'm approaching resolution with my dad. None of what I'm doing is for his benefit - it's for mine. I get to choose what kind of person I want to be. And I don't want to be like him.
Is it fair that some people have really awesome dads and that I had an awful one? No. Life isn't fair.
I seriously doubt life was fair for my dad either. His dad was also an alcoholic and abusive. My hope is that I managed to break the cycle, however, my daughter doesn't have a great relationship with her dad either. Not her fault that I picked a flakey musician know-it-all.
One final thought - I don't look at my dad as having chosen to remain addicted to alcohol instead of being a good dad. Once a person is addicted, there's not much choice going on. I think he is sick. I think he has damaged himself quite seriously, on many levels. I don't think the hurt he caused me was intentional, but it was (is) real, and it happened because he didn't have the will or the ability or the belief that he could rise above it. That's the insidious thing about addictions. They indirectly damage more than the addict.
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
Original Post by cajunrider:
Original Post by kevinatthebrook:
Original Post by stargazer1:
I don't have much advice, but when my parents divorced, my dad told me that he assumed he would never hear from me again. (I was 20 when it happened)
We've never had a good relationship because he was an abusive alcoholic.
Basically, we have a holiday relationship. I see him on birthdays and x-mas/thanksgiving. So about 4x a year.
I do call him once in a blue moon to check in or if I need to ask him something. It makes me sad that we don't have much of a relationship, but I know that we just can't have that type of a relationship. There is too much pain and resentment on my end of it.
As sad as it makes you, as a Dad I'd be willing to bet it makes him feel like dying. I'm not trying to be preachy or mean but the bond a Dad feels for his children (especially girls) can't be described.
I don't know Kevin. The dads that care never allow the relationship to get that way and the dads that don't will neglect it for years. The problem is that some of the neglecting dads grow old, have regrets, and try too hard to make up or to create a relationship that's not there and make the situation worse.
It doesn't make their heart ache any less just because their attempts at reconciliation might be clumsy.
I don't know. My dad replaced us with a new family within a week... soooooo....
