Dad Issues - Do I tell him how I feel or keep it quiet? Sorry it's long

[hockeypuck]

I'll try and keep this as short as possible. I have never got on well with my father, he is quite anti-social and I wasn't the child he wanted. My sister is 16 months older than me and is the son he always wanted!.

My dad was always disapointed with me as a child, he never understood me I don't think and made no secret about how proud of my sister he was. When he went through a hard time in his 50s he had to have counselling for his rage, the psychotherapist asked for a family appointment with us all and basically blamed me for his problems saying I wasn't the child he wanted (my mum sacked her sfter this). When my dad had a rage he hit me and sometimes my mum, he never laid a hand on my sister.

After uni I moved away from home and these issues have never really surfaced since. I realised that I would never get an apology because he wouldn't be able to understand what he did wrong. Until my sisters wedding last month, when I found it really hard. On my wedding day 11 years ago, he didn't tell me I looked nice, I asked how I looked and he said "fine", he didn't buy me a present or anything like that. On my sisters wedding he told her she looked lovely, he bought her a silver plate and had it engraved with a saying that was important to both of them, something about sailing. In his speech he talked about how proud of her he was, that she went to the same college at Oxford as him, that she liked sailing like him etc etc.

Since then it has resurfaced all the anger and upset I had as a child. I didn't turn out bad, I have a stack of friends who love me, I'm applying for PhD funding and I have a husband and 2 children, but every time I am near either him or my sister I feel completely useless and such a big disappointment.

My dad is now 73, he has had a couple of strokes and is not a well man. I don't think he'll be here for more than a couple more years.

I don't know whether its ever going to be a good idea to say anything to him about how I feel before he dies, or whether it's better to keep it quiet and deal with it myself in the ways that I can, distance and ignoring it mainly - along with never ever letting my kids feel that way about themselves.

So, I guess I'm asking for advice, experiences etc about whether its best to let sleeping dogs lie or whether it's important to get some kind of closure before a parents death.

[NotABanana]

I would definitely write a letter detailing everything you feel. Whether you send it or not is another matter.

I also feel that your mother and sister bear some responsibilty for allowing this to go on for so long.

FWIW I wasn't the son my mother wanted either.

[cyteen]

Agree with Ruby. I think if you don't even try to broach the subject (even if you write the letter but never send it) it will niggle at you forever and leave you wondering what his response would have been.

[hockeypuck]

Thanks ladies. I think it's just the surprise that it reared it's head again after so long - bloody weddings hey! but I guess it would have come up at his funeral otherwise.

My sister allowed it to continue as it was in her interests to be the compliant son he wanted. She is also a pragmatist. She said he got her a present because he's retired now so has more time in his brain to think about doing nice things, and he told her she looked beautiful because he probably realised he should have said it to me at my wedding and didn't. I'm not convinced

[vonsudenfed]

I've spent too much of my life being furious with my father. so I can completely sympathise with you.

And I think you need to sort it out - but perhaps not with him. Have you considered going to see a counsellor/therapist about this? I think that would help you come to terms with what sounds like a fairly grim upbringing, and to get the anger out of your system, but without needing to confront him. And you can then get on with life without constantly waiting for him to be the father you wanted (and deserved).

I did this, and it made the world of difference to me. It also made me realise that my father wasn't going to change, or admit he was wrong, so I was wasting my energy hoping for that. And, funnily enough, as I started to change, he did acknowledge, a little bit, that everything hadn't been as perfect as he thought.

[hockeypuck]

Unfortunately my sister is a bad sounding board because she had the perfect father. She cannot accept that my experiences were that different and she is so happy that she has now retired (at 35) and can spend more time with him in his final years.

She did once acknowledge that she felt a lot of pressure being his favourite and worked hard not to fall off the pedestal, but she and I are so different we have a hard time getting along.

My mum is still around and we did a lot of talking after the wedding about how we both feel (very similarly). My sister cannot empathise with either of us unfortunately.

[hockeypuck]

vonsudenfed thanks for the advice, I think it's certainly something to consider.

[Hassled]

I loved my father vey much and he was a good man. However he made some spectacular blunders in my childhood - the worse being leaving me (then 16) and DB (18) to go to and deal with our mother's funeral alone (they had divorced). There was other stuff as well. He died 5 years ago and I never told him about how I'd felt during this and it's something I regret deeply. It would have helped me a great deal. I know it would have caused upset and unhappiness but I do feel we would have had a better relationship afterwards if we had talked through it all, so I could have understood his behaviour and moved on. Do it while you can.

[hockeypuck]

Thanks for sharing your experience Hassled. Maybe if I approach it not as a finger pointing - you were a shit father and it's all your fault, but as an "I'd like us to get along better and this is what has been stopping me" method it might be worthwhile bringing it up.

My only real concern about bringing it up is that he'll read it, feel bad and then die suddenly without resolving it.

[CarGirl]

It has taken me a long to forgive my parents, it has made a huge difference to me now that I have. I have real peace about it but I can't imagine myself going to their funerals, I will be very upset and probably need to grieve my lost childhood and need to do it on my own IYSWIM. I very rarely have contact with my parents because I couldn't handle it, I probably could now but don't feel the need to - I've lived without them emotionally all my life I just don't "need" them etc.

Sorry if that is of little help to your situation, I wouldn't bother sending the letter (writing it absolutely) because I think it will just get flung back at you and cause more pain.

[fourlittlefeet]

I had some real issues with my father's behaviour when I was little. They didn't truly surface until I was about 27 and started having some panic attacks at work trying to decide who I was.

During the time I had off in order to sort it out, it came to me that I was really angry with my dad for his behaviour when I was little.

I went to visit him and tried to explain how I felt, and how his behaviour had affected me. I didn't say he was wrong and I was right, merely narrated it from my point of view. He didn't apologise (which I was hoping for) but actually, just letting out all the hurt straight to the person who caused it was immensely therapeutic and I don't regret it at all.

I haven't really thought about it nearly as much since, and I feel that part of my history is now at rest.

sorry if this is a bit confused. what I'm trying to say is if you have a problem with someone, I'd talk to them.
xx

[hockeypuck]

that makes a lot o sense fourlittlefeet. Unfortunately my dad doesn't talk. My mum says that when he's at home he goes a whole day without one single word a lot of the time. If I went and confronted him he wold not have a clue what to do or say and we'd be left with silence while he thought about it. I thought he might find it easier to see it written down so that he has time to digest it and think of a (written I expect) response.

[fourlittlefeet]

I think you need to follow your instincts.

my dad talks a lot usually, but was completely quiet during my outburst, then said very quietly, I'm sorry thats how you feel.

it was a very odd experience. I hope you get some resolution for yours as forgiveness on your part and therefore peace, won't really come until you've dealt with it in your own way.

good luck
x

[CarGirl]

It has taken me a long to forgive my parents, it has made a huge difference to me now that I have. I have real peace about it but I can't imagine myself going to their funerals, I will be very upset and probably need to grieve my lost childhood and need to do it on my own IYSWIM. I very rarely have contact with my parents because I couldn't handle it, I probably could now but don't feel the need to - I've lived without them emotionally all my life I just don't "need" them etc.

Sorry if that is of little help to your situation, I wouldn't bother sending the letter (writing it absolutely) because I think it will just get flung back at you and cause more pain.

[Kimi]

Poor you, If it were me I would wite a letter and tell him what a dissapointment he was as a father.
Also let your sister take care of him when his health fails, parents chose to have children, children do not chose to be born, and you love and are thankful for any child you get, sadly your father souynds like one of those people who should never have been allowed to have the blessing of children.

[pavlovthecat]

I don't think you should try to minimise it with him, by not apportioning blame, I think you need to be honest, and open about what you want to say to him. It will not harm him to know he has been crap to you. Why should he not know?

I think you put it very succinctly in your OP. Maybe you could send that? Or use that as a template? You might find that there is some deep rooted reason that will get shared, and some understanding can be found, or you might find that he just feels this way for no reason.

But, if you find there is some explanation, or at least from his part, or regret on his part in any form, you might want to know.

[hockeypuck]

UPDATE:

I have been just as scerwed up and bothersome about all this over the last 2 weeks. It got to the point when I found it really hard to deal with fathers day today and was pushing my children and DH away by being a bit of a self-centred vicious cowbag really!!!

So, I phoned my dad today and said, I was sorry I hadn't seen him much in the 2 weeks we spent staying in my sisters house (near them) after the wedding but that I found the wedding hard. He thought it was because my sister had a bigger wedding etc, I said it wasn't, it was because I had issues with him. I said I have never felt like he's proud of me and never known what to do to make him proud and wondered why I didn't live up to his expectations.

He said he didn't know how to be about words and things which is why he didn't say anything nice to me on my wedding day.

I asked why he wasn't proud of me and he said "I never really liked you after the age of about 7 and in your early teens, you were a very difficult child. Once you sorted yourself out and went to university I was very proud of you"

I said I'd speak to him soon and wished him a happy fathers day.

So, basically, he is just completely emotionally and socially inept. He has no idea how to lve someone for who they are and he cannot communicate. He has in short a disability. He acknowledges he wasn't proud of me and didn't love me when I didn't fit into his mold of who he wanted a child of his to be, but since I've done more things that I should have done he is proud of me.

I don't know how this makes me feel really. I'm very glad I have got it out in the open and I feel like I can move on and out the last month since the wedding behind me. I don't think it has tackled the problem, but I feel very happy about having been brave enough to talk to him after all these years.

I also feel that it frees me to move on a bit. I realise that it is entirely his issue, not me that is the problem and I can have some closure for that.

Thank you all so much for your support and words of wisdom.

[BlaDeBla]

Well done!! I read my dad the riot act, and frankly I might as well have been talking to a dustbin lid. AT least my mum accepted that he is a brute and that she has spent a lot of the past nearly 1/2 century in fear of his violent rages. I don't think anything will change until the men in white coats cart him off in a big white taxi.

In his 20s he had a psychotic breakdown, and I don't think he ever really recovered. He is making my mum's life a misery.

[hockeypuck]

BlaDeBla - sounds quite similar then! Do you feel now that you can move on because you realise that it's him and not you who is the problem?

I hadn't really realised till now the full extent of how i personally had 'beaten myself up' about everything I do wrong. I resolve from now on to move on with my life instead of always looking back at my childhood.

[edam]

Bloody well done, that woman.

I saw a counsellor when I realised I was wasting far too much energy worrying (in a sheepdog sense) away at issues regarding my father. Worth every penny. Today I can let most of the irritating things about him go, while my sister still gets wound up.

[BlaDeBla]

Sometimes I feel that I can move on, but it's quite hard. In the spring term I did a course just for me, and for the first time I enjoyed being in a student situation. I hope I will be able to go back to college to learn instead of self-destruct!

I've spent a lot of my life hurting myself one way or another - pulling my hair out, eating probs, major depression, unable to see myself as a payable entity, (which has damaged any jobs I have done massively). I have teetered on the edge of alcoholism but not quite fallen down the pit.

I too have decided that really life is for getting on with. I spoke to a kind man at NAPAC who said that shove what anyone thinks - it's too late to bother about that kind of thing. Anyway, I think he's got a good point!

It's very sad for my mum to be married to a nutter, and I don't like telling her how he behaved, but she says she wants to know. My dad's unravelling is becoming increasingly public.

[hockeypuck]

BlaDeBla - have you seen Good Will Hunting? When I was telling my DH all about my evenings conversations with my parents and said "i know it's not my fault now".

He reminded me of that bit where Robin Williams as the shrink keeps on saying "It's not your fault" to Matt Damon and he keeps saying "yeah I know" but not really taking it in. Then he gets really upset when he really takes on the belief that it was not his fault.

Cue more tears!
Good luck with your studies - sounds very much like how I'm dealing with it all too!

[windygalestoday]

i havent read all of the replies but i too had a shit time and i think its gone, its past- nothing can repair it so i turned the pages over and im now writing my life on a whole clean sheet you cant go back he cant make it right even if he admitted the different treatment what good could come of it?? hes not been v well, your mum has issues with him i think you have just got to move forwards -youre not to blame you cant change anything so just move on and make your life a success.