Divorcing my father.

I'm struggling tonight. Really struggling. I always think of myself as one who doesn't cry very often, but maybe that isn't true. What is normal, when it comes to crying? Tearing up every few weeks? All-out sobbing three or four times a year? Anyway. I'm tearing up a little bit now and that always shocks me. Emotion, begone to your usual dark corner and behave thyself.

Evidently I like to share my private life with the Internet. There are some risks there, but you know what, if I talk long enough in real life, this stuff always comes out anyway. I think I have some social filter issues. At least on here you don't have to read it, and you can avoid uncomfortable responses to an over-sharer, lol.

So tonight, because I am struggling, I am going to share something involving not just my private life but a few peoples' private lives. I don't know who all reads this, but chances are if you know me, you also know my father. Small towns are awesome that way.

So my dad. Did you know he was abusive? Yeah, neither did I until a couple years ago. I was doing research for a seperate issue and found myself reading apt descriptions of my family in a book called "The Batterer as a Parent." And apt descriptions of my father, words he said, things he did, in plain black and white print upon the page before me. Wow. And suddenly, things started making sense. My little sister as the scapegoat, my older sister the protector, my younger brother, the apprentice, and me, the golden child. This stuff hurts, it really does. I can't tell you how much it hurts. I still have to remind myself...normal fathers don't announce their children's pregnancies to their fellow students...they don't use their body and their anger to scare and threaten, to go to devious means to belittle their children's mother and destroy a connection. See, even now though, I feel like typing that out, although they are true, I feel like I am betraying my father. There is still that child in me that wants to run to him and get his approval, to prove I can be a worthy daughter. She wants to tell him, "Dad, THANK you for everything! Thank you for teaching me how to camp! Thank you for encouraging my reading! Thank you for all the ways you've helped me when I've struggled! See, I can be a good girl! See!"

I don't know how to tell that little girl that despite all those good things, she didn't really matter to that man. It was part of his efforts to maintain an  image. Such an involved father! How lucky those kids are! I suspected for a long time, not long after my daughter was born, that the only reason my father had anything to do with me was so he could play grandpa. I was just grateful that he was there. I didn't mind being used for his never-ending ego stroke. When my brother got into trouble as a young adult, he didn't want me to tell anyone. So I didn't. Well, I tried not to. Things started coming out regardless, and then who got a call and a lecture? Me. A grown woman with two kids, feeling like a young child who had just gotten caught stealing cookies or something because I respected the privacy of another adult. How dare I not promote our family's image at the cost of my own sanity and the boundaries of another.

That isn't even the worst of it. There was another person he hurt, who I love dearly, and he has the audacity to blame his actions on that person. That she wanted to be hurt. This is a child, mind you. I don't know that I can get any more detailed than that, but let it be known my father is a liar, a narcissist, and out for his own self-interests no matter who else pays for it. He has a lot to lose, my father. Maybe not as much as he once did...I wrote a letter to our Bishop and the head of the Diaconate Program. I get the impression they do not take me very seriously, but I couldn't keep my mouth shut anymore. I can't go to our church anymore either. I am terrified of running into someone, running into him, or my stepmother. It's pretty terrible that she has to be mixed up in this. I love her, my stepmom. I think she is a wonderful person. I'd be friends with her any day. Maybe someday I'll write her a letter, and let her know that what I did, it had nothing to do with her.

I'm going all over the place with this, please forgive me.

So I was done pretending. I mean, honestly, how long can one go on, ranting about abuse left and right, while having one right there, insulting one's husband, condescending about one's beliefs, and (the gall of it) shamelessly telling you that not only is he NOT the abusive one, but that every ex girlfriend, the ex wife, and his children abused him? Does he think I am stupid? That may be the one part that I just don't understand. I think my father is perfectly aware of right and wrong. But is he so self-absorbed that he thinks if he says it, it become truth? That I won't see through it? He knows how much I've been learning about this stuff. This is my LIFE lately. Weird.

So. I wrote him a letter one night, after he called and invited the whole family to tea the following week. My husband had told him that he was not going to see him anymore. I had kept going to things, visits, I felt like it wouldn't be fair for me to keep the kids from their grandpa, I couldn't bring myself to confrontation. But it was tearing me apart inside. Every time I saw him, it was harder to keep pretending nothing was wrong when I could now see through the illusion. I hated that he was always re-writing history. My husband detailed that he felt disrespected; my father did a perfect non-apology. Do you know what a non-apology is? "I'm sorry you feel that way."  As in, "Sucks to be you because I refuse to think that maybe I did something wrong." And then my father pretended it didn't happen. I suppose in his mind, he was extending an olive branch by inviting Josh over too. Really what it was though, was "You called me out on bad behavior, and I'll still show you generosity as long as you are willing to never call me out again, because I'm awesome that way."

I went the passive route. I just stopped seeking him out, for one.  I started screening his calls, didn't answer his messages. I worried what the next step would be. And, he showed up. He came to my home, bearing gifts, said he was worried about me when I didn't call him back. Normal concerned father. Yep. Until he started going on about how he hurt he was about it. I fudged something about the kids being sick and I've been out of touch (this was true) and he kept going on about how hurt he was that I would not call him back. Then my stepmother told me that I was giving him the silent treatment, and that it was abuse. She told me that I was abusive, in front of my children, because I didn't call my father back for a week.

After they left, I sat down and I typed out the letter and I sent it to him. I detailed my reasons, explained that it was for purposes of my own closure, and that I did not want to hear or see from him again.

Even reading this I feel that part of me that is just outraged that I could do such a thing. He is my father.

And I am surrounded by reminders. Notes to the kids inside their favorite books. Things they gave us. My youngest daughter was asking about him today. I just feel mean. And spiteful. And ungrateful. My older sister, when I was telling her that I didn't want to see him anymore but before I sent the letter, she told me that she thinks I feel this way out of anger and hatred. I said no. I mean, not that I don't have anger, I do have anger. I feel like my dad has broken our family beyond repair. I do not feel safe around my brother, my younger sister will have nothing to do with me, and I feel like a pawn in my dad's game of looking good to the community. I said I love him. I do love him. I love my father. I didn't want this. I didn't ask for it. I tried to hold it together. I tried. So hard. It was tearing me up inside. And who was I protecting? Not my children. Certainly not myself. I was protecting him, from his own actions. She said you can't love a person and do that to them. I have to remind myself...it is not something I am doing to him. It is something I have to do for myself.

I don't regret what I've done, exactly. There is a large amount of relief involved now. No more pretending.

Now the daunting task of going forward.