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I don’t know if it’s the fact that I celebrated a birthday a week ago and my impending death grows ever closer or if my girlfriend being gone and me having the apartment to myself is driving me stir crazy, but I’ve been unable to sleep at night due to persistent thoughts keeping me up. The usual thoughts occur throughout the night: am I horrible at my job, what am I doing with my life, is my girlfriend elaborately catfishing me, why don’t I have a dog yet, could I even care for a living thing? Those latter thoughts usually end with me going to PetCo and staring at fish until a manager kicks me out for being “creepy.”
But one thought, one nagging thought that I’ve lived with since I was 12, prods at me the most. Like a fly that lands on a kid’s face during a UNICEF commercial, I know that it’s there, I know that it’s bothering me, but I can’t seem to just blink and get rid of it. The ever-present cloud of me wondering whether I’m a horrible person for not particularly liking my Dad. It drives me insane. It not only wracks me with guilt and anger, but it brings on a sense of sadness that really feels bottomless sometimes.
It’s a tale as old as time. Dad went to get milk at the grocery store, but never came back. Except in my case, the milk was 21 year old hard bodies and the grocery store was an Eastern European country. While I respect the game and understand that you have to shoot your shot, I was still a kid when he left. Not old enough to feel a sense of true loss, but old enough to feel like an outsider when you see other people interacting with the male figures in their lives. Sure, he came back every now and again to visit. The extent of his Hugh Hefner-esque escapades didn’t really come out up until a few years ago, but during those times when he came home, there was always a sense of sadness and conflict from my other family members that always brought upon some guilt from me whenever I smiled at smelling his cologne in the doorway.
Those visits were usually brief and were filled with some fatherly activity, so I can’t really complain on that front. We went to a few baseball games, got candy at the gas station, and maybe watched some television together. But those visits were never without their oddities, like the time he tried to teach me to ride a bike, but by the time the thought occurred to him that I probably needed to learn, I had already taught myself.
Eventually, weeks became months and months became years and the visits were farther and fewer between. Swim meets were missed, high school graduations passed, and my college move-in was facilitated by a couple of bad-ass women who prove that women are the backbone of America. But even with all of those amazing presences in my life, there’s no real substitute for a male figure in your life. We had a chance to reconcile once when I visited him abroad one summer. The visit soured after a few yelling matches and me punching a wall.
Even after that, we would call every now and again and he would still send money to support us. And truthfully, that’s where the real confusion sets-in. I’ll never be able to hate my Dad, because at the end of the day, he still found it in himself to attempt to support us. A sense of obligation stayed with him for some reason when he could easily have just slipped away into the night like a respectful one-night stand. No, I could never hate him, but I don’t know to what extent I have to like him. I hear horror stories of people losing touch with their Dads and only reconciling after horrible accidents, or worse, deaths and it terrifies me that I’m handling this situation horribly.
At the end of the day, however conflicted I am when it comes to him, I’m not going to get a new Dad. And maybe I owe him one. After all, we’re as shaped by the presences that aren’t in our life as we are by the ones that are present and because of his lack of presence, I now know that I could never bring that kind of conflict upon any family I might have one day. While I know that he’ll never change, I’ve grown into a man that can be hurt, but still empathetic. When we talk on the phone, I always say I love him (even if I don’t), because I could never hurt him out of spite. And that’s where I think I was going with this before you sly dogs caught me monologuing: as frustrating as it is, there’s no textbook for those of us with broken families and strained relationships. But, as we get older and experience our own hardships, it does become easier to recognize others trials. Like those of a newly arrived immigrant from Eastern Europe, who spoke no English, had 2 kids and a wife to support, and just couldn’t handle the pressure and had to return to a place where he felt comfortable. At the end of the day, I have to feel empathy for a man like that. Or who knows, maybe I’m just too fucked up to realize how crazy I sound..
Respond
Haven’t seen or talked to my dad since I was 12 and it fucking sucks. Sorry I don’t have anything more insightful than that.
This is not directed at the author, rather at other PGPers who may be relating to this: While there are many situations where it’s worth it to patch things up with a troublesome person in your life, realize that there are some situations where it’s never going to work. Do not feel obligated to keep a toxic person in your life, and do not feel guilty for the choices they have made.
Well said. My dad suffers from mental illness and addiction issues and refuses to accept help, or seek out help on his own. It’s easy to say “make a relationship work” but that’s not always the case, nor healthy for the person who is putting in all the effort.
My dad never left, but was not there for me emotionally growing up in ways that I needed to be. I’ve recently been coming to terms by how that lack of a role has affected me in my life, and it’s a weird pill to swallow. He’s never going to change or acknowledge the hurt. Is accepting him for who he is and all his limitations allowing myself to be hurt more? Is it still okay to have a relationship with people who have hurt us as long as we keep a wall up from the aspects of their personality that we know are destructive? There’s not really an answer. I’ve learned to accept my dad, with the understanding that I cannot rely on him for emotional support. It seems like you’ve reached a certain level of acceptance too. Thanks for this article!!
Agreed. Sometimes you keep the toxic person in your life, but you have to erect some mental/emotional barriers to keep yourself sane. The conflict between duty to a messed-up family member and the duty to yourself is hard.
I came here to say this, and you did it so much better than I would have. My husband and his dad don’t have any real relationship, and with the impending arrival of our first two kids I know it’s weighing on him heavily. But I think it takes a special type of strength to recognize what you need and to draw those lines.
Jeez PGP is really bringing these onion ninja articles lately. I’m sorry you’re going through this and it’s not fair to you what your dad did (or didn’t do) when you were a kid. Just know that when you’re an adult, you get to choose who you have a relationship with and what kind of relationship you have with them and that includes your dad.
Look on the bright side though: he taught you what not to do as a father, which is arguably just as important as what to do.
Realizing that you never want your children to feel the way you did is the most important thing that you can do in this situation. Don’t repeat the cycle, do better.
This is so important. A few years ago, my mom told me all the stuff my dad did, and it scared me that I could’ve inherited any of those predispositions. One of my friends told me that the fact that I was worried about that was the #1 reason that it wouldn’t happen
If my Dad were only a Trans-Atlantic flight away, I’d go broke commuting there. He wasn’t perfect, as none of us are. You only get one in this life, and once they’re really gone, there isn’t a flight you can hop or a phone you can dial to reach out. You’re both men now, so if I were you, I’d try anything I could to fix it, because there are a lot of ya who’d go through anything just to say “Hey Dad, what’s up?”
My dad spent what seems like most of my childhood in the bar after my mother died and while I still resent him occasionally when I’m in a shit mood, he’s cut out booze entirely, we lost my older brother, and I’ve forgiven him. We have a very close relationship now.
Parents get older and your opportunities to mend things are limited, so yeah, if you can and want to at all, make the effort now. If your parent continues to be a shithead though, or you just can’t bring yourself to include them in your life after what they did, absolutely do not blame yourself. You’re the kid.
“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.”
– Mary Oliver
Couldn’t pick my dad out of a lineup if you held a gun to my head. I’ve considered getting in touch, but if he didn’t reach out in over 20 years, why the hell should I? Ever since I made that decision, I’ve been much better off for it
Sorry you had to go through this.
My eye allergy just flared up
I have a relationship with my dad although it’s nowhere close to what it used to be. Once I got to college, he had a lot of personal “priorities” and the kids took the backseat. Eventually, I just had to put up some boundaries and change my expectations of our relationship and it’s definitely helped my resentment towards him. I don’t expect anything more than he can/will give and I don’t feel the guilt for not reaching out as often. It sucks, but it’s what you make it.
February 9th marked 4 years since the last time I truly interacted with my father. While it still continues to hurt and nag at me, I am honestly so glad that I have nothing to do with him anymore. Any man that abuses, cheats on, and financially ruins the woman he supposedly loves is no man at all. Just because you’re “family” doesn’t mean you have to love or even like someone. What truly makes someone family is them supporting and loving you for who you are and that’s what I have in my step-dad. It’s ok to be angry and it’s ok to be hurt as long as you know that you have the choice to decide to not be like him and be better than they ever were. Maybe this is just me venting out some of my anger and frustration. Sorry for the rant but know that you are not alone.