Would you be fed up of your dad speaking to you like this?

[ohgetmeoutofhere]

Sometimes he is nice
Other times he is nasty
I'm 37 and he is 80
He has always been like this so it's not a age thing.
I ring him every morning at 9am
Today's call lasted 20 seconds
I rang as normal
"Morning you okay "
Then he goes off on one "why wouldn't I be okay ? Eh ,it's you who makes me not okay"
I reply "okay just asking "
"You having a good morning?"
"Well I was till your rang"
So I say "I haven't done anything dad ,I'm just ringing like I do every day "
I try and change the call around by asking if he has anything planned but he is answering in his angry voice
I just say okay I'm off now bye

I do everything for him
His washing ,his shopping
What do I do wrong ?
Why can't he just speak to me nicely ?

@ohgetmeoutofhere

Has he really always been this bad. Did he speak to your mother like this? What was their marriage like? Also, I know this sounds intrusive, but does he actually like you as a person, is there some history behind this? There is no excuse for his behaviour whatsoever and as he has an active social life and is fit and healthy, I would step back. At the very least stop calling him every day. His verbal abuse is very bad for your self worth.

Your dad is being very manipulative in talking to you like that. He does it because he knows he can and that you will then try harder when you converse with him. Old age isn't great but the old need to understand that it is not on yo take their frustrations out on the one who does most for them
My dad was like this and DH's mother was the same even though we did a lot for them. It took me years to learn how to manage them
As soon as your dad said it's you causing the problem you should have just cheerfully said ...oh ...thought you liked these morning calls
Will leave you to it then. Have a good day. Then said goodbye and hung up. When you ring next day you will probably get a different attitude, if not, don't stay chatting. We found the best way forward was not to show it bothered you. Ours wanted a reaction, to see us upset. It's a power/control thing
When they didn't get the reaction they wanted, their snappiness reduced. As you do care about him you have to learn to distinguish between this type of manipulation and genuine need. We went over unexpectedly to check if we thought this attitude was covering a genuine need up, we continued to do lots for them but we refused to feed into being abused ourselves. Good luck op. It's not easy I know. 💐

When my MIL died my wife took to calling her dad every evening at 7. Just a brief two minute call to make sure he was ok and didn't need anything (he was still very independent at 80). No matter where we were in the world she'd call at 7 his time.

He really appreciated her calls, was always pleased to hear from her and always said he slept better knowing someone cared enough to call him every day. Calls lasted until the day he died.

@ohgetmeoutofhere unfortunately, you have a grump.