coyote21

I believe we dads are more important than everyone used to think back a generation or so ago. My dad was a chickensh!t and decided to runaway like a frightened child when my mom had had enough of his drunken BS and sent him packing.

Ran all the way west till he couldn't run any more. He's 81, if he's still alive, talked to him a few years ago before I decided to "stop going to the hardware store for bread". He can kiss my a$$ and rot in he!! for not being man enough to stay. Resentments anyone? Ha!

Funny in a way, I'm pretty sure HE is the reason I couldn't leave LMC. So I guess that's something good out of his cowardice. What a punk.

Sorry for ranting on your post TC, but I get it big time.

Thanks and God bless us all,
Coyote

wicked

Oh yeah, loads of resentment, and the guy is dead! Geez, still working on that one.
He did the same thing, ran away and divorced my mother, and she could not get support out of him.
He told me he chose NC to move to because they were the "easiest" on the support thing.
This is 40 years ago, but yeah, still got that resentment going.
I have learned not all men are like that, but that took a long time, had to go thru a couple of fools myself.
Okay, sorry taking charge.
Geez.

TakingCharge999

Funny in a way, I'm pretty sure HE is the reason I couldn't leave LMC. So I guess that's something good out of his cowardice. What a punk.

Aww... that is how the world heals, coyote. I always have a good feeling when I read your posts and read you care and love LMC like any good dad. It makes me go "that is how its supposed to be like". I mean in life I do not have so many good examples of that. In my last trip with my 2 best girlfriends, yup, their dads left as well.

1 of my friend's dad feels guilty and is making amends to my friend (like buying her a car and giving her LOTS of money) the other one seems more at peace with himself, and my girlfriend is far far in recovery and is OK with the past now and now has a decent boyfriend that does not abuse her.

I guess that was also the reason of my down as I see one has peace and the other has attention and I still got nothing. Just an email or FB note here and there saying "I love you!" but well I am starting to contact my anger in therapy and I am just annoyed at this time.

Glad at 8 I got therapy. I have been teary all day about this. I guess I am realizing the huge huge void I have been dragging all along. And those 3 words "I am sorry" seem too difficult to be said by grand dad, dad, XABF. Maybe saying them takes someone huge and they just do not have it in them.

Thanks for making me feel less alone today. I feel in good company. I'll let you know how it goes after therapy. It feels good, just to cry with someone that won't judge you. Some friends tell me "oh but your dad is very smart, and paid your university, many dads don't do that, you should be grateful" well yes but giving out $$ doesn't make you a father I am sorry. Or then the old "tough love"

"This only hurts you" as in "besides feeling like $hit, you are also stupid"

Sheesh. I am glad you guys get it. Thank you, thank you.



PS uncertainity, this shaman didn't say it was wrong to seek for protection from a male partner... I guess in a healthy relationship the man is protective of the woman?

Live

TC, I think in a healthy relationship..both sexes are protective of each other. Perhaps they show it in different ways but when we love and care for someone we naturally want to protect them from hurts and harm. So, I think it goes both ways. A couple stands together united in the outside world.

My sweetie and I both know that we have each other's back. any time and all the time.

Live

oh yeah, my daughter will not talk to me about her relationship with her dad..and it is a good thing because I have a heap ton of resentment.

He abandoned her when we were divorced and even moreso after her brother died. He got with a woman and they were always there for her kids but his own ...nada.

So, lately I hear he has been trying to make it up to her. Me, I think...pin a rose on his a$$...she is 27 now and he gets tons of credit..no matter that he wasn't there all this time..but this suddenly makes him a hero???
I have always been there for her any time she wanted or needed me.

I still think he is just throwing tokens her way.

For her sake I will keep my thoughts to myself. But I do hate it when she wants me to forgive, forget and accept him now. My only inclination is to spit in his direction.

Live

Now, if he did some really big things...that would count. Like buy a big insurance policy and make her sole beneficiary instead of it all going to his now wife and etc etc etc.
The wife can have the house and the regular insurance. But I want to see him do some really amends making.

Do you agree?

I think he should admit to her what he did, apologize and make her a priority and etc.
Am I wrong?
You are near her age..what would you require?

TakingCharge999

Time alone for dad and daughter. Plenty of it. That is HUGE.


Perhaps because my dad has women wanting his attention, his mom, his wife, my older daughter, time alone with my dad is #1. It has been so SCARCE in my life.

I even recall my dad telling me "they are very demanding and get jealous of each other.. but you are alway calm..." yeah right..the DOORMAT used to get NOTHING.

Now I am about to lose it at work and still got 30 min to go so, I'll breathe deeply and practice the art of storing the feelings in an inner box to let them out when I am home. But those are good healing tears. I believe getting angry/annoyed is way better than just feeling sad and helpless!!

Live

me too.. I was joking (only partly) a couple of days ago..I now have appropriate anger and am not afraid to use it!

My daughter really despises her dad's new wife. and the wife has made no efforts towards my daughter. SO, when the dad does visit..he comes alone. That is very good.
I hope he is still visiting her. I haven't heard anything for over 6 months. Knowing him I am afraid his good intentions lasted all of a couple of token gestures. You can tell I do not trust the man nor have much respect for him.
AND it isn't about the way he treated me, it is about the way he treated the kids during and after the divorce.

I just have this gut feeling he is looking to her to assuage his guilt and that it won't be much more than that.
I do hope I am wrong. She deserves a much better deal from him than what he was handing out her way. It was insulting.

TakingCharge999

I am leaving on Thursday if my boss allows. I am having mixed feelings. I hope I can talk with my dad about stuff. Good news is that the wife is not coming so it will only be the 2 of us and I will have space to ask him questions. I hate secrets. I want to know if my grandad abandoned them and what age my dad was. I want to know what my dad thinks about it, if he accepts or denies any hurt, resentment. I want to know why my dad decided to divorce. According to my therapist this is key for my recovery. We do not know if there was a trigger. Hopefully I'll be able to have a therapy session before I leave. Wish me luck please..


Instead of trying to judge others I am trying to see what I get out of this, the first thing that comes to mind is to be able to see the grandad and my dad as just human beings with mistakes. I have no idea what I would say to my grandad if he is able to speak. I would like to ask him if he ever felt remorse for leaving his kids alone and without food many times. Honestly, that is what I want to know. But of course that is too harsh and mean for a man on a deathbed huh...

Time to email the therapist. Thanks for letting me vent here....

Thumper

I'm not sure how I missed this thread originally TC. I hope you get a chance to have a good discussion with your dad and get some resolution to some of your questions.

This thread has made me think of my parents, my grandparents, myself, how certain things move from one generation to the next.

Your last paragraph reminds me of this quote. "The alcoholic parent is not satisfied with his own childhood," Bly says, using the bruised rhetoric of recovery. "He wants yours too... When the father vanishes into alcohol, the son lingers and lingers, searching for a lost part of himself." I find that so profound. It breaks my heart. It breaks my heart for my children - and it breaks my heart for the adult alcoholics or co-dependents that were once children themselves, etc.

Today I can see that in my family alcoholism and all the dysfunction that surrounds it is not the only thing that has been passed from generation to generation. There is something more. There is a thread of love and most of all strength. It gets stronger in each generation and someday the legacy in this family will be a positive one.

Learn2Live

(((hugs))) TC. I hope you get what you need from this visit and the discussions you have. It is good to clear the air. Thinking of you.

TakingCharge999

Thanks a lot Thumper. Incredible how we carry patterns from generation to generation... even within a country .. (mine is a NATION of victims/codependents!!)

Something I have been thinking is that perhaps I am carrying old resentments towards the male figure in my life that are not mine. Perhaps I am more able to forgive and move on. I do not want to see my dad only because he is dying. I am still in time to see him in life and in health. I wonder if that great void will ever heal. Perhaps those weights are not mine to carry but I have made them mine to empathize with my dad and get his love. That is what I have done with my mom, get depressed as well, to get her love...

IT is also moving to me as I am deep in therapy and it feels strange to be talking to my dad normally, and excited about seeing each other etc etc when deep down I know I am full of anger, resentment and would like to yell to both of them how both of their actions have affected me and that I am wonderful and never deserved to feel so alone and abandoned.. and that my dad didn't deserve that either........... that I'm tired of secrets..and tired of their lack of character to say "I'm sorry". ARGH.

Ok.. the therapist told me to write a letter to each one of them saying what I really feel. I got work tonight.

Thanks Thumper, and everybody for your support.

TakingCharge999

Thanks L2L !!

TakingCharge999

Also I am thinking if I feel like crying at some point I will not restrain myself and I will do it. It will take courage. But I am done putting a mask. Ah, the gift of desperation...

TakingCharge999

I am glad I went. I am glad I met grandad.
He looked EXACTLY like my dad.
And I could only visit the first day.
My last day I was going there and he passed out, because he tried to walk.
Unfortunately I received news he got depressed after my aunt, my dad and I left. He didn't even want to move.. we believe he was waiting to see my dad..
We are expecting bad news any moment..

I didn't find out why my grandmom has been angry with the grandad. Angry and resentful for... 30 years. I may plan to visit the grandmom. Perhaps with a tequila she will trust what she went through? (of course none of us are alcoholics) we had a really good time once, I might start planning this.

I learned many other things in that trip.

1 If I don't take care of myself I will become very fat just like any other woman in the family. They have a real obesity problem.

2 I set myself up for pain and sadness. I expect my dad to be a dad. He can't be. I have to accept it. I expect my mom to celebrate. She is deep in depression. She can't celebrate, relax. I have to accept it. It hurts a great deal but I try to think I am aware of this now because now I know what HEALTHY PEOPLE look like and how dads can share with their daughters and give them stuff/attention, and how moms can love their own lives and do their own thing and be happy with their lives no matter the age. Before I didn't realize there were other ways to live..

3 Everyone in my family is SUPER codependent. EVERYONE!!

4 The choices for partners my family on that side are everything about codependency and lack of money and have nothing to do with self fulfillment/independence. Also that there have been a few alcoholics in the family. No one said it out loud either, I picked it up by certain comments. Also my older cousin's husband has been agressive with a pet and when I saw my older cousin she was very serious and didn't talk much I can only imagine what goes on behind closed doors.

5 Women have a history of suffering, abandonment and loneliness.

6 I have a new respect for my older sister as she chose a really good man and has traveled and is not afraid of life and no longer prolonging #4. I need to tell her.

7 My dad has a supercodependent relationship with his wife and she is also like a Mom to him. MY therapist helped me realize my dad is angry with his mom and as he can't handle it, he has 'taken it out' on me (unconsciously). This is another tough one I am still processing.

Thanks all for your support through this.......

theuncertainty

Hugs, TC. I'm glad your visit with your grandad went OK, but sorry that he's not doing well.

TakingCharge999

He has left the hospital and is OK at home. Limited mobility but OK.
Thanks all for your support!!

I realized during this thread this is where I hit my bottom of "expecting emotional support from dad". I realized I am powerless. He hasn't given it to me. He is not giving it to me right now. He won't give it ever. It hurts to realize this. But its also healing. I am done living in clouds. He never learned it from his dad. How could he give it to me?

It hurt that the granddad didn't ask me a single thing but hey he was going to die without knowing my name, even so, that is just what it is. I wonder how I would be able to live, without knowing all my grand children?? Ok. Time to rest now.....

Live

((((((((((((((((tc))))))))))))))))))

Tuffgirl

This thread broke my heart. I am saying a little prayer for you, TC, today. It hurts before it heals...so true, so true. Like a big nasty paper cut or a broken bone, only deeper inside and far more painful. And good for all of us who take the time to hurt, heal, and refuse to repeat the same old patterns. That's pretty courageous!

Take good care. Happy Valentines Day!
~T

TakingCharge999

He is in the hospital again.
The doctors hurt his leg too much and he had to go through an operation.
Depending on how he recovers they might need to remove part of his leg (below the knee)

Please if you can send the family good vibes it will be appreciated