My father hates me.
I’m not being dramatic. He told me that.
My mother sent me an email she received from him, which contained a link to an article I wrote about trying to understand how he was still alive and able to continue his campaign of abuse against our family.
I wanted to know how. I wanted to know why when so many good people died at a young age, he was able to continue living even in poor health.
It made me angry.
Not that he was alive. But he was alive and continued to hurt us – me, my mother and my brother – on purpose.
As if he took joy in it.
As if he lived for her.
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Then I recently found out how terrible he is to my 88 year old mother.
No, just not awful.
The kind of meanness that makes you shake your head in disbelief, wondering how anyone could be so cruel.
In fact, it was so bad that I went into strategic planning mode to talk her out of it. Now, I can happily report that my mother will never have to endure his abuse again and can enjoy her remaining years in peace and joy.
But even with the anger I sometimes feel toward my father, and the heartbreak I experience because of him, I still don’t hate him.
I don’t even wish him harm. I said that in the article I wrote about him.
Not only did he read the article, but he sent a link to my mother (for reasons we’re still unsure of), to his lawyer friend (maybe he wants to sue me for telling the truth?), and to another recipient: my ex-husband.
I can imagine their conversation:
For example: I can’t believe she wrote that about you after everything you did for her. She’s so ungrateful.
Father: She is very mean and bad.
Such as: agreed upon.
By the way, did I tell you that my ex-husband is narcissistic? And that my children and I are still recovering from his abuse?
When I told my father about the pain my ex-husband was causing me and begged him to stop talking to my ex-husband because he was hurting me, my father’s only response was, “Well, he was always nice to me.”
sigh.
But I’m used to this
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I accepted my father as he is. I know that won’t change. Unless it’s for the worse.
When I saw my father in person a few months ago, he immediately pulled up my article on his iPad.
As he held it out for me to see, his face had an angry redness that I remember from childhood, when he clenched his teeth so hard that I swore I heard enamel tearing.
“Do you think I’m the devil?” He said staring at me.
no! I want to say. My article was about me wondering if you sold your soul to the devil. Why else would you be so evil to your family?
But I choked. As I did every time I was in his presence.
At that moment, I was not a 55-year-old woman. I was a 15-year-old girl, afraid of her father’s temper, his criticism, and his inability to show even an ounce of love or compassion toward his only daughter.
I wasn’t expecting him to pull the article just because I didn’t know he’d read anything I wrote.
Then I realized he didn’t.
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He did not read my work. He didn’t even read the article. At least not in its entirety.
He picked out the words I used to describe him, then ignored the other parts where I explained my heartache as a daughter who would never understand why her father didn’t love her.
What he or she said after he first encountered me, I can’t remember in detail. Sometimes, my father’s wounds left me at a loss for words.
I tried to tell him to read the whole article. To read where I said I neither hate him nor wish him any harm.
But he didn’t hear me.
As he held up his iPad, he looked at me with disgust — a look I’d seen many times over the years whenever I dared to disagree with him, confront him, or tell him he was hurting me.
He was always angry at the pain I felt from his hands because how dare I be hurt because of something he did or said.
But this time I wanted to resist his anger. I wanted him to finally admit how he felt about me.
So, I paid.
I said to his red face and clenched teeth, “You really hate me, don’t you? Just admit it. You hate me.”
Our eyes are closed. My heart broke. And he said:
nothing.
That said it all.
