yeah, 100%. my dad had an extremely abusive upbringing, like his (adoptive) mother forced him to sleep in the dog house and hit him with whips and crazy shit, so he can’t even perceive that the way he treated me was abusive (even though i have a fucking scar from where he threw a knife at me for literally no reason) because what he did to me doesn’t even register to him as abuse because he loves me.
i’ll look into the book, but fwiw, i’ve had many years of therapy, and i’ve near enough made peace with the idea of not having him in my life. i really struggle to communicate with him, his denials register to me as gaslighting which is really triggering, so it’s hard for me to help him. he also doesn’t read books at all, probably because of undiagnosed dyslexia
Christ, what a mess. Sorry for that. I just can’t stop recommending this book to everyone, but I know books can’t solve every problem. It did help me reframe things, but it did also slightly burden me with a certain understanding about the way the world is. So much boils down to emotional immaturity and people never growing up.
I went through this with my mom. In one of our last conversations, I mentioned that years ago, when I was 18 and lived with her briefly, I took like fourty of her seroquel pills to try and kill myself. “Remember when I slept for three days straight?” And told her what I remembered of that time. Instead of her saying, “oh wow I didnt know that happened” and empathizing or something, she just denied it ever happened, got mad at me and called me a liar.
I never spoke to her again. I dont remember our last words but this one one of the staws for me.
The last time I spoke to my step father, the real abuser, was when I was 16. Letting go of that mess was easy.
Sometimes healing, or “forgiveness” (I hate that word) is in letting go. My Bio dad/mom were both raised pretty fucked up, especially my bio dad, not dissimilar from what ur father went through. I mourn his childhood, but not his death (he died) nor who he was as an adult.
Stay being good to yourself, I hope you find peace and healing in letting go <3
yeah, 100%. my dad had an extremely abusive upbringing, like his (adoptive) mother forced him to sleep in the dog house and hit him with whips and crazy shit, so he can’t even perceive that the way he treated me was abusive (even though i have a fucking scar from where he threw a knife at me for literally no reason) because what he did to me doesn’t even register to him as abuse because he loves me.
i’ll look into the book, but fwiw, i’ve had many years of therapy, and i’ve near enough made peace with the idea of not having him in my life. i really struggle to communicate with him, his denials register to me as gaslighting which is really triggering, so it’s hard for me to help him. he also doesn’t read books at all, probably because of undiagnosed dyslexia
Christ, what a mess. Sorry for that. I just can’t stop recommending this book to everyone, but I know books can’t solve every problem. It did help me reframe things, but it did also slightly burden me with a certain understanding about the way the world is. So much boils down to emotional immaturity and people never growing up.
I went through this with my mom. In one of our last conversations, I mentioned that years ago, when I was 18 and lived with her briefly, I took like fourty of her seroquel pills to try and kill myself. “Remember when I slept for three days straight?” And told her what I remembered of that time. Instead of her saying, “oh wow I didnt know that happened” and empathizing or something, she just denied it ever happened, got mad at me and called me a liar.
I never spoke to her again. I dont remember our last words but this one one of the staws for me.
The last time I spoke to my step father, the real abuser, was when I was 16. Letting go of that mess was easy.
Sometimes healing, or “forgiveness” (I hate that word) is in letting go. My Bio dad/mom were both raised pretty fucked up, especially my bio dad, not dissimilar from what ur father went through. I mourn his childhood, but not his death (he died) nor who he was as an adult.
Stay being good to yourself, I hope you find peace and healing in letting go <3
it’s not your job to help him. it’s your job to help yourself.