Thursday, November 19, 2009

There has been some other interesting goings on over this past week. As I’ve mentioned before my Dad and I haven’t really been on speaking terms for about a year. Every time I have tried to break the silence first it has not gone well. But oddly enough I actually heard from him last week. My step brother Toby and his dysfunctional life were having issues again and Dad was checking to see if Toby could stay with us until he found his own place. Long story short the psycho woman Toby is married to went ape shit on him and smucked him with a curling iron, busted him in the lips and the nuts etc. etc. Not a healthy situation and with Toby being on probation he needs to get out. Toby wound up moving back to the town where his Grandparents live at the urging of his probation officer. But throughout this my Dad and I have had several decent conversations. He hasn’t been pissed off at me or anyone in my general direction. He’s sounded more like Dad. I spoke with him again for a bit over my lunch hour today and he called me Munchkin, which is something I haven’t heard in a very long time. That’s what he called me ever since I was little. I haven’t heard it a whole lot in the last ten years since the divorce. It was nice, and once again showed me that at least a glimmer of the man I once knew is still there.

Now I’m sure that there are going to be more angry moments/messages I’m going to get from him. But I’m getting better at moving past them and have a firm stance that he has to be the one to make the next step to communicate again. In a lot of ways I understand his hurt/anger/bitterness but he’s not allowing himself to try to heal.

I had to leave this post half way yesterday since I got busy at work. Since then I’ve talked to my Dad and I’m very tired. It was a rather bizarre conversation. He rehashed all the crap that he thinks I have done to him over the years and why he’s been angry with me etc. etc. then in the next breath would say that it was okay though because he being angry is just how he deals with stuff. Then he’d get back on another tangent about other things he remembered that upset him.

My father thinks that I sold out because I lived with Mom when they got divorced and because I still choose to have contact with my Mom and her side of the family along with my Step Dad. He brought up all of the things I’ve accused him of doing and saying and gets pissed off because I can’t remember the bad stuff my Mom has done.

Just for one day if he could live inside my head he would understand. He remembers things quite a bit differently than I do, than a lot of people do. One thing that he’s dwelled on is that I accused him of calling me a whore. Well that’s not far off.

About 3 months after Mom and I moved out Mom asked Dad if he would help install a teen line for my room in our new place. He was still being semi normal then and she thought him and I could do it together. Well this was shortly after fathers day and instead of staying in my room and the outside of the house doing the work he started snooping through my Mom’s room. By this time her and Stan (my now step dad) had openly started dating. I wasn’t crazy about this factor but I thought Stan was a nice guy and liked him. Dad found a card I had given Stan on father’s day and lost it. Now it wasn’t an actual father’s day card it was a hey you’re here and I accept that. Not much thought went into it other than I felt bad that Stan wasn’t going to get anything from his daughter for father’s day so I picked up a .99 cent card for him. I also spent a lot of time picking out the one for my Dad and gave it to him. Well after finding the card Dad left then came back a short time later with my cat and threw her at me and basically just threw a big fit and told me “You’re going to be a whore just like your Mother”. Then left.

I was 15 at the time and had always believed my parents had a great marriage until I found out about Stan and all the problems they had came to a head. And having my own Dad say something like that was worse to me than anything. I understood the card thing upset him but he wasn’t ever supposed to see Stan’s card. It was tucked away in the bottom of a dresser drawer and Dad never should have been snooping.

I also have a very long list of things in my mind that I remember that my Mom has done. But at that time and even now it does absolutely no good to list them. Why dwell on stuff that’s happened and cannot change?

And I will admit that I did make a lot of self centered decisions back then. But in my eyes both of my parents had lost their minds and were no longer the people I knew or necessarily trusted. I did what I thought would be best for me. Most of my decisions revolved around being able to be with my friends. And a lot of my decisions did come back to bite me in the ass. But life doesn’t come with a how to manual, you take a stab at something it doesn’t work you learn and you move on.

My Dad has it in his mind that he didn’t go that far off the deep end when the divorce happened. But I saw it; I saw what our home looked like after he took a sledge hammer to it inside. I still have my great, great grandmother’s china hutch that bears the marks from it. I heard what he had to say first hand about Mom and Stan and my Grandma. I heard from others what he had to say. I heard the phone calls he’d make to me in the middle of the night ranting and raving.

Also along with my self centered decisions I made a lot of others that I thought would make everyone happy and they always blew up in my face. My world changed just as much as anyone else’s during that whole stupid mess and I tried to deal with the bumpy pot hole filled road as best I could. I didn’t always do the best job with it but neither did they. And I sure as hell never did anything to intentionally hurt either one of them. I never sold my Dad down the river as he put it.

He had every right to be hurt and angry about the divorce and things that happened. I understand, but to still be the way he is 10 years later just doesn’t cut it for me. The man that raised me was a better man than he is being now, than he has been. In ways I am mad at him for not trying to come out of this place he’s in. And maybe it’s unfair towards him to feel that way. Everyone has a right to feel the way they do, but I guess I just don’t feel that gives them the right to constantly remind people and yell at them and all that crap. I wasn’t always angry with him about how he is, for a long time I’ve tried to be patient thinking eventually he will start to heal. But after going through this for ten years my patience is not what it used to be. Especially now that I have my own family to think of. Especially now that my daughter doesn’t get the chance to know the man that raised me, because that man isn’t ever coming back. But I will deal with it. I will try just as hard to accept that fact and let him be who he is. I may not like it but I cannot change it. I will be the person I was raised to be.

3 Comments:

At 12:25 PM , Blogger Sarah said...

Okay so you were 15 and a minor and you lived with your mom, like 90% of other divorced kids? Am I the only one that doesn't see a big deal in that?

You shouldn't be in the middle of the divorce at all. And it's not fair for your dad to constantly place you there. Don't forget you are entitled to your feelings as well.

 
At 3:40 PM , Blogger SuvvyGirl said...

Thank you for your support on this issue. He called again today and the weirdness continued. Kinda worried about him :P

 
At 12:11 PM , Blogger Helen said...

Oh wow, I'm so sorry you had to go through all of that. Divorce is ugly and he shouldn't have taken it out on you - you aren't your mom and he shold have been proud of you trying ot accept that things had changed.

i really hope you manage to sort things out, it really isn't your fault!

 

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