ACOAHappyNow

I grew up in a typical alcoholic home. Had a father who was a rageaholic and would literally scream at me for, say, not being able to hit a baseball at the age of 4 (had vision problems) and would leave me crumpled on the ground and sobbing regularly, with no one to comfort me afterwards or come to my rescue.

They used to do fun things like throw rubber spiders at me (I had a phobia about those when I was five) to watch me scream and cry and run in terror. And I could see by the looks on their faces, the family enjoyed my pain.

There was sexual abuse, tons of verbal abuse, a small amount of physical abuse.

I wanted to someday be strong enough to detach completely from my family. My sister and brother are still jerks to me and don't acknowledge that I deserve to be treated like a human being. So I went no contact a year or two ago.

Fast forward, my Dad is dying of something that is causing him GI problems and messing with his red and white blood cells. Doctors can't figure it out.

Ive been under the care of a psychiatrist lately because I have been recently diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and I am semi-disabled and not doing so well at this point.

So I've been discussing my family of origin issues with the doctor. She asked me why on earth I have anything at all to do with any of them and I said, I still love them, and I feel too guilty completely abandoning my father when he's so sick and old now.

But at the same time I'm still furious at how I was treated as a kid. I never really got a resolution with my father. Once or twice I tried to bring it up, got the courage up, but was told I made it all up. No resolution.

So here I am with my shrink sessions stirring up bad memories of my childhood, with MS lesions in my brain leaving me less ability to filter and modulate my emotions, and I lost it when my father tried to push me into reuniting with my sister who is still abusive to me.

It's not just me who thinks my family was abusive and still is to me, my husband says my family is all crazy and they didn't deserve me, that I was too good for that family. My husband frankly refers to my father as a sociopath.

Well I blew up. I got tired of my family always not caring about what I want and what is good for me, insisting we look like a good family from the outside, you know?

I just lost it and I wrote several nasty emails pouring my feelings out, telling them that when they visit I need Dave to be there at all times because I don't feel safe around them when I am alone with them (true, and for good reason) and showing them where my husband referred to my family as crazy and sociopathic.

So I got a letter from my father's latest wife (I've only met her a few times) telling me I tore my Dad's heart out and he was utterly destroyed and lying on the bed in despair. Asked me how I thought I had the right to destroy everything in my path and saying she didn't understand how one human being could be so cruel to another human being, especially a father who is very sick.

So I feel very guilty that I finally told the truth, I do wish I'd been less straightforward and blunt and angry. But it's also the first time in my life where I told the truth and stood up for myself and I felt I needed that one moment in my life before he dies and the chance is gone forever.

Just a really bad few days.

PS I didn't answer my stepmother back, don't want to engage with her really, don't have a relationship at all with her, but I did email my Dad saying I was sorry I hurt him.

My husband thinks the stepmother is delusional if she can't see by the problems all us kids have that the family was really dysfunctional. Another factor might be that the stepmother has a kid in her own family who has gone no contact with her for years now (not sure why.)