To tell my Dad to get lost and stop trying to control me…

[WineLass]

just joined MN and want advice on a few topics so here goes…..

41 year old female, 2 kids. Mam died when I was 20 poor woman was an alcoholic. Dad’s a cunt and always has been. He had an affair once mam was unwell and couldn’t work etc… he used to beat her up and my brother and was just vie. He wasn’t really physical with me mostly, though I remember him having his hands round my throat when I was a kid though. He was a hot head and a miserable twat and we were all tip toeing around him as we didn’t know what mood he’d be in (mostly miserable)

I’ve got my own life now but keep in touch with him briefly. DB is the same. My dad is hard work and I don’t enjoy taking on the phone to him but once every 5/6 weeks I’ll give him a call (begrudgingly)

He’s very selfish man and old cares about himself. He’s very much money oriented, always has been. He only takes an interest in my children when he has a new GF. He never send cards or bday wishes to me but asks me to send them to him (so his GF will think all is cool as he’s a good dad)

None of his 5 siblings have anything to do with him as he manipulated one of their aunties wills (so they say, but I can quite believe it)

He tries to control me with money and inheritance and says he’s going to leave it all to me, then if I do something, it’s left to my brother then if we’re ok again, it’s now to me.

So recently he asked for DC number and said in an emergency DC could call him for a lift etc- so against my better judgment I gave goal DCs number and within 12 hours he text DC saying they should call him once a week as it’s because of him my 16 year old exists!!! I told him he’s out of order and don’t need to call him once a week! and not to text DC again.

I’m so annoyed that I’ve got a dad like that! My mum died when I was barely an adult and I have a twat as a dad. He’s a controlling fucker and tries to use money to manipulate me and my brother. Telling me my brother won’t get anything he will leave if all to me….

i said don’t do that as it will cause rows, just make it equal. He was awful about my DB and I tried to say yabu as DB is having a hard time etc and now the twat isn’t speaking to me but is ok with my DB. It’s like he’s trying to bat is off from one another.

I’ve told him in the past im
on antidepressants and the stress I’m under worrying about my DC but he doesn’t care. So I told him not to contact me again and I won’t be in touch with him.

Does anybody else have narcissistic fathers like this? I think he thinks because he was around when I was a kid he’s a great dad, I wished he’d pissed of when I was 5! Vile man.

Am I right to tel him to piss off an ls not contact me aging?!!

YANBU to go no contact. Men like this end up pissing money up the wall or leaving their money/property to girlfriends so don’t let him control and manipulate with promises of an inheritance.

And stop sending him cards!

@bellezarara Thank you for your reply. I won’t send him any more cards for sure. He’s a horrid man and only cares bout himself!

I’m so sorry he’s like this. Xx

Go no contact and keep your children away from him.

Dear OP
I have an awful man for a biological father. I could write pages and pages on him, but I don’t have the energy.
i feel for you. it is very hard and very painful.
I am an only child. Parents separated before I was born. My father was erratic, violent, controlling, and emotionally abusive to my mother when they were together and when he was visiting, and the same to me most of my life. He (and his wife) have openly stated that „he never wanted to be a dad“ - as if this honesty is a virtue, as if I should therefore be grateful for whatever scraps of attention are chucked my way, down the years, as if this justifies his unkindness, his cruelty and neglect.
He contributed barely anything to the cost of raising me, I had no established contact or routine of visitation (he’d turn up every few months or so, randomly, for a few hours), no room at his/ his new partner‘s house. The fact access to him was so sporadic and limited is probably for the best as he was a real sociopath/ psychopath- I hate to think the state I’d have been in had he given the first f* about me.
As i got older and more inclined to call out his violent, and abusive behaviour, like your dad, his preferred method of manipulation became cash.
Partly because he buggered off and left my mum to manage with a baby on her own in the early 70s, and did whatever he could to get out of paying her anything, we were always skint, so threats to disinherit me were commonplace from about the age of 9 and haven’t progressed much beyond that in the resulting 40 years. (He‘s now loaded.)

I have had a number of long periods of NC with him, and have been NC with him for the last 6 years. I have some limited contact with his wife. His wife and sister periodically try to get me to try again (i don’t think anyone attempts to rattle his cage) but I am politely adamant not again, not whilst he makes no effort to evolve. He can charm the birds from the trees when he wants to but when the chips are down he is vicious and deliberately cruel. He has never changed and unless he does so substantially and shows remorse/ intent to behave differently (which he won’t) then I am not open to more abuse. I also have a Family to think of who i will not subject to this. He is 81.

Like your dad, many of his family also have nothing to do with him.

i have deep sympathy for the pain this awful dynamic creates. It isn’t just you, although it bloody well feels like it for a lot of the time.

Noone can tell you what to do, but you are entitled to peace and respect. I do suggest some independent therapeutic support if you can/ aren’t already. I think you have to have lived something like this to understand the damage and pain of this kind of enmeshment.

I really do get it and I’m sorry for anyone who has to navigate this in their life because it is poisonous and very complicated. Love and respect to you, OP.

@Volpini Wow your post made me feel much stronger and that I wasn’t alone. You have no idea how much you have helped me in that reply. You were giving your experience and I can honestly say, I’m so grateful for your post. I feel I’ve made the right decision under the circumstances. Thank you x

@justasking111 @Allofaflutter @bellezarara Thank you all for your replies, I feel stronger already!!!

Any time. I swear to god, if one more person in my life says „but he’s your dad“ when explaining why I don’t see him, I will probably punch them in the face. Do not listen to a minute more of anyone trying to guilt trip you and especially if they haven’t had to walk in your shoes through sth like this.

As if I hadn’t actually ever wanted him to just be a fkn dad or just go away and leave me be.
I would have dearly wished to have been loved, cared about, been treated like a daughter. But I haven’t got that and I have had to learn to accept that I have got a biological father but ive not had a dad.

OP, I dearly wish my father would wise up and just sort hinself out and my door would be open were that to happen. I live in hope, but without expectation. I can honestly say no one has tried harder than me with someone like this undeserving man - yet there comes a time that to keep doing this to oneself is madness.

We both deserve peace and I can honestly say I am happier not having to deal with his unwarranted cruelty having drawn a final line in the sand in this. I wish you peace x

Yes, similar in many of the ways you've mentioned OP. Mine has given up looking after himself totally for the last 13 years (no coincidence that this coincided with me announcing I was pg) and has been a complete martyr ever since. Apparently everything good in my life has come from his sacrifice (complete rubbish - grandparents bought me up and paid for everything, he never lifted a finger and barely even spoke to me until I was 16, and it's usually to chide me about something I'm not good at). He has great sides too, which is why it can be hard to break away - he has a dry wit, clever if you don't ask too many questions in a very learnt way, can remember funny stories and used to very rarely do something useful like mow my lawn when he came to stay. However the silent rages, using money as a weapon and trying to manipulate my daughter have got so severe in the last 5 years I've had to just stop. I had a serious health issue a couple of months ago and he came under the pretence of "helping" and demanded I cook for him, expected me to drive him 2 hrs home and refused to believe I could barely walk. Since then I had some bad news and emailed him about it, which he hasn't even bothered to reply to. Not even a "sorry to hear that", nada. I know he is suffering because it's not all about him and wants to have me worry and check he is still alive (! honestly he gets huffy if I don't check in in case he has died, zero health issues and barely a grey hair!). I'm refusing after actually nearly dying myself and getting zilch from him. He can make the first move now, I'm completely done after years and years of trying to get him to think well of me.

Bit of a rant there, but you have my sympathies. I'd just go quiet and see what he does.

Oh for goodness sake !

you are going through all this, and your family is suffering as a result - just incase you inherit some money !

the will probably already leaves it elsewhere i.e. the local seagull rescue

He is her only family. You may think it's easy just to give that up but it isn't, particularly if your relationship with them was unstable from childhood. It's very hard to unlearn patterns of behaviour.

OP’s post literally spells out the heartache caused by a lifetime of ill treatment by one of the two parents who were supposed to love and cherish her and her dilemma as to how to handle this systemic callousness and control/ manipulation. How can you read that and get from it “Lass just wants cash?”
I haven’t the time or energy to get into it but perhaps take some of your own time to consider how damaging a lifetime of such threats by an abusive parent can be to an unacknowledged, unaccepted, unvalued child, even when they are now an adult.
OP deserves kindness not more shame.

@KitKatChunki @Volpini

I’ve read both of your replies and want to say thank you to both of you for having my back. I’m fed up with the crap that comes with a shit parent and clearly some people have no idea how hard it is. Thank you for enlightening people as to how crap it is

Because I have this same inheritance/acknowledgment damage from my own parent, I have real protections about who I attempt to express it to for precisely this reason.
Yes, it’s about cash, but it’s really not about cash. If only it were that straight forward!
What a sh*t club to be in, but we’ve got you.
x

@Volpini @WineLass Indeed, I always think it says more about the people who can just focus on the inheritance than the years of neglect and manipulation. It's easy for some people to expect the only reason to put up with poor behaviour is for money but just because they use it as a manipulative tool doesn't mean that is a driving factor. In fact with my dad partly because he uses inheritance as a means to try to hold things over my head actually makes me feel sorry for him. I wondered for a long time if he really thought the only reason I loved him was for his money and how sad a life that must be. It doesn't have the same hold over me as he thinks it does. I've spent my life looking after things for him and he fails to acknowledge it, but thinks he has done me massive favours without seeing anything I've done. It's controlling and self absorbed but deep down I always felt like he was childish and needing attention - you become the parent as the voice of reason. Because we've had to grow up young it's a situation we are trained for, which is a recipe for perpetuating the behaviour in the parent. It's so frustratingly circular!

At least we all know what not to do to our kids! No guilt tripping, keeping them from achieving potential and belittling mine will ever happen on my watch!

Another vote for going no contact. Distance yourself and your children from his nastiness and his attempts to control.

My dad was the same. An aggressive selfish horrible man who liked to play his children off against each other. I stopped speaking to him when I was 16.

The last time he said he'd cut me out of his will, I laughed in his face. The ideas that a) he had anything to leave or b) that I would want anything of his were absurd.

So much of this is very very familiar.
My own father was clearly very damaged and I’ve often observed seems emotionally arrested. When my children were very small it became more obvious to me that some of his responses were like those of a three year old.
ive had the same feelings of sorrow for him. A year after I stopped speaking to him, we were both at a large funeral of a family member who was dear to me. I avoided him but one of my well meaning but a bit dim family members called me and my husband over to sit at the huge table they were sat at, only for my father and his wife to then return from the buffet to the same table. I didn’t speak to my father the whole time but had a lovely moment where I observed how much his closest relatives were talking and laughing with me. He was sort of on the outside. This was hugely circular. My father was kicked out by my mother for his affairs and she then discovered she was pregnant with me. Rather than admit his behaviour,and to try and avoid his responsibility for any of it, he told everyone I wasn’t his child. Consequently I only met my paternal grandmother once before she died and I didn’t meet his sister, my aunt, until I was ten. I was in my 30s before i met the rest of the extended family. Consequently, I grew up always feeling I was someone to be ashamed of: That I was dirty (even though I wasn’t illegitimate) and common and people didn’t want to know me. The reality of why I didn’t meet anyone else until later was actually more to do with dynamics and family fractures, but it gave me problems around being accepted and fitting in that are deeply embedded, to this day.
Not sure why I wrote all of that, but to provide the context of seeing him across the table at my relative’s wake where I was accepted and loved and he was the outsider looking old and sad and vulnerable. I had exactly that observation, that his power over us all was gone and that - like the Enperor‘s new clothes - his lording it over everyone that we weren’t good enough had no more power. Not even his money protected him from the obvious fact that he had alienated himself from everyone and noone was voluntarily speaking to him. Because he’s bloody hard work even on a good day. What he had said and done to precipitate my finally losing it with him and deciding enough was absolutely despicable yet he came over to attempt to speak to me as if nothing had happened as we were leaving „hello!“ and I merely said „goodbye“ and walked past him and left. I haven’t seen him since.

Like you said. All he has is his money. It IS sad. But he has the power - and the cash - to do something about it. In my father‘s case, he’d rather wallow than attempt to make amends. I sympathise but I reserve my sympathy for those of us he has damaged.

it would take me pages and pages to try and e explain my messed up feelings of his legacy to me around acceptance and money, but I think when you’ve had a lifetime of emotional torture, and a parent has repeatedly demonstrated they consider you worthless, that they don’t care about you, anyone would want to avoid a person‘s final act as confirming you really, REALLY meant nothing. Its not about the money.

It must be quite hurtful to feel your own father believes he can buy your affection with the promise of money. It's very likely he won't leave it to either of you anyway, so assume that's gone. But even a smidgeon of parental love would go a long way. It's like he sees love as transactional, not as unconditional, so the inheritance is a symbol of approval to be bestowed or withheld on a whim, a substitute for actually caring about his own child. Pity or despise him as you feel appropriate, it is unlikely to make a difference to him. One thing I am sure of, you've done the right thing shielding your own children from that toxic influence. It's enough for them to know that some people are just impossible to get along with, including some people you're related to, which in itself is an important life lesson.

And don't let some berk come on here and say "you'll be sorry when he's dead" (there's always one). Sorry for what? Sorry you didn't have the sort of father you could mourn properly? Sorry for the lack of happy memories that would have warmed your heart even as you cried? Sure. Sorry for your lack of engagement in his decades of mind games? No indeed.

Wow this is so similar to my own situation. My dad is extremely manipulative and narcissistic. Abused us all verbally and emotionally, then left for one of the many women he was cheating on mum with. I'm so sorry.

Definitely nc, I haven't been brave enough to do this yet because dad's sick and was recently declared homeless. But I don't let him near my children ever because he would pull same shit on them as he did with me.

Yanbu

Ah, fuck that for a game of soldiers. Chances are he'll spend the money or leave it to somewhere (or someone) else just for one further dig at everybody's expense, anyhow.

Yup, I've had to write my Will after my health issue and without his contributions I am under the IHT threashold. If I die he will not have anything to do with my daughter because she has actually asked for non-family members to be guardians. It will be up to them to decide if he has access and they are very wise to his behaviours and not as favourable to him as I have been over the years.

It's such a sorry state for things to get to but it has an interesting effect in that I can see these one dimensional men a mile off. I'm actually quite disgusted by men who's sole focus is money. I don't see them as having the ability to have stable relationships at all because their main focus is always on winning and their hoard.