He’s Stubborn, But I Love Him
So, I want to start by saying that I love my dad. He’s a stubborn emotional jerk, but I love him. I know he loves me, but he often is so focused on himself and his needs that he makes me distance myself from him. He had a rough childhood.
My grandfather is a verbally aggressive jerk and my grandmother is cold and passive-aggressive. They were very enmeshed with his life, but at the same time, it seemed to be only to control him and make sure he took care of my great-grandmother (i.e. his father’s mom) so that the family didn’t have to.
He was 100% taken advantage of. My dad took care of my great-grandmother for 14 years. Any time that he asked for a break or explained that his PTSD was getting worse, they would guilt him by saying “Fine, I guess we’ll tell Grandma that you’re breaking your promise.”
That “promise” was that he would take care of her so she could live out the rest of her life in her home like her husband did, and not have to end up in a retirement facility.
Eventually, my dad met my wonderful step-mother (who I consider my Mama), and she helped us get out of that house and not let us be manipulated by that family any longer.
She made us realize that we didn’t have the proper training to care for her and that my aunt, the trained nurse, should have been caring for my grandmother long ago or they should have hired a professional.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that my family did a number on my dad. And the consequences are that he is codependent, quick to misinterpret things and get defensive, and is only slightly a problematic person as a result of this trauma.
I understand that it’s hard to break a cycle like this, so I’m starting with myself now that I have a five-month-old daughter. Now, on to the main story of my post. My husband is deployed overseas and hasn’t met his daughter yet.
So it’s just me caring for my child with the occasional help of my younger brother who lives with us, but mostly stays in his room. My Mama and dad came to visit on their way to the other side of the country and were staying in their RV for about a week.
My dad knows about my boundaries, and I wouldn’t say he pushes them as much as he questions or doubts them. But I finally stood up to him. He was holding my daughter and was getting reckless with how he was playing with her.
He was doing dangerous things like balancing her with one hand, almost dropping her where she could have hit the coffee table and laughing about it.
He must have seen the look on my face, because he says to me, almost challenging, “What?! If you don’t like it, take her back!” Normally in our family, we’d just be quiet and agreeable, back down and say “no, just be careful” because we don’t ever want to look like the bad guy under any circumstance.
And I maybe hesitated for half a second before reaching out my hands and taking her. My dad looked surprised, and my Mama later told me that she was proud of me because what he did was unacceptable.
I was mostly worried about what she thought, because I get along so much better with her than I do with my father. Thinking about the whole thing now, I’m proud of myself, to be honest.
I don’t think anyone in my family has ever done anything like that before. But it needed to happen. And for anyone out there who is in a similar situation and constantly makes excuses for their parents’ bad behavior: I get it.
I’ve lived with the guilt of not wanting to make a fuss because of the hard life, mental issues, or whatever other reason your family members have for acting the way that they do. Story credit: Reddit / CeramicHorses