My Incel father and brother

[Inshockandsome]

I am not sure what to do.

All of my life I have lived under a cloud of misogyny and I have been treated like a second class citizen in my own home. There to serve and know my place. Initially as a child I became a tom boy to take the pressure off - because I recognised my femininity as a vulnerability.

I was beaten, demeaned and consistently emotionally abused. I was objectified, and told my education doesn’t matter as I will just be married and have children anyway. It was a toxic environment to grow up in.

My father openly demeans all of the women around us - waiters, bar people - anyone that is female. The women he hated most were strong women or anyone that dared to challenge him. He said he hated ‘kids’ and never intended to have a relationship with me. I was there only to keep my mother ‘quiet’. My mother has always stood by him, despite his open contempt of her.

I found my voice as a teenager and stood up to him. He reacted with extreme violence, he would use ritual humiliation and weaponised my body against me. A severe eating disorder followed, multiple suicide attempts before I escaped.

My grandmother (his mother) died and he didn’t seem too bothered. His main interest was his inheritance.

Fast forward to today, my mother tells me he follows certain ‘groups’ on line. He speaks openly now of his feelings around strong men, weak women etc. I had to remove my children from their lives years ago. I have stopped contact for many years.

My brother is now the same. Ruined by his enduring dislike of women, despite having a wife and 3 x dds.

Father is now seriously ill and I have no idea what to do.

You should be glad to be far away. Pray his illness takes him and be glad he's gone. Lets hope there's an afterlife where hes punished.

I think you still have so much to work through from this and I wish you the best of luck.

It's a hard one. You could go and see him and still not get closure though. He will not have changed.

I choose to still have a relationship with my father but he was emotionally abusive and at times violent. I have not had much therapy to speak of but like you say he is the only father I will ever have.
It's hard isn't it.
I feel like I have got to a place where I accept he was who he was and I do not have teh bond that I had with my mother- who I also had anger about as she looked the other way when he was abusive as she just could not get out of the marriage but I have had to forgive her as the years have gone by as you just get that people do the best they could with their character weaknesses and their own life stories.

If you think it may leave you with regret you could go and say goodbye and tell him about the impact he had on you-people need to know this, maybe he can take some responsibility for who he was.

The people on here, they were not there and do not know what went down and what the depth of your feelings are.

I have never been able to go no contact-it'snot who I am.

But I did have to get away at an early age and that left me with a lot of guilt that I just left my mother in the lion's den so the feelings stay with you a lifetime don't they.

Guilt, shame, depression, anxiety.

We don't choose our upbringings and just have to make the best of what we get ( in other words, survive) and get out if it's bad, which you did do. Do you want to return and see if you can get closure?

Only you really know. Is it even possible with a man like that?

I’d go no where near him. You owe him nothing and his behaviour does not warrant any death bed forgiveness.

but he didn’t kill me and he paid for my childhood.

This is too low a bar. Do you think he knows he is a shit father?

There was a woman here who was abused by her husband right to his death bed. He would say “You deserve to be dying of cancer, this should be you.” about her, in front of the nurses.
At that stage she could handle it because it was the last few weeks.

Do you want to visit? Can you cope with one final barrage, knowing that you have the right to give as good as you get, but also knowing that it’s the same old crap from him?

Exactly, it is not about you and OP very definitely DOES NOT need to do anything that works for you only what works for her.

Just because you read some stupid platitude on the back of a cereal box you're not suddenly some sage and wise counsellor.

You're wrong. Completely, inutterably wrong. Stop giving bad advice to people, you are perpetuating their abuse, minimising their suffering and causing secondary wounding.

Everything was already explained in my first comment.

She absolutely definitively DOES NOT have to forgive. Ever. To get on with her life without thinking about her abuser or suffering any further. If she wants to, when she's ready, she will.

If he's buried I might go to the grave to make sure he's gone, but other than that, I'd stay far away.

In addition, these coercive forgiveness gurus who think they know it all never actually give a definition of forgiveness, their definition is whatever suits them at the time.

Nope. There is no need of any kind at all to forgive your abuser, when you want to and when you are ready, you will. And that might be never, and that's perfectly fine too.

Again, discard them, get help to deal with the flashbacks and any other cognitive issues and move on from them, it is quite possible to live your life without it being in any way badly impacted by your abuser, over time you can learn to discard them. And only if YOU want to forgive when YOU are ready should that even be a consideration.

Anyone suggesting forgiveness to an abused person is likely to cause them greater harm.

The forgiveness gurus are perpetuating abuse.

He is only your father because he impregnanted your mother. His fatherly responsibilities seem to have ended there. In every other way, he behaved like an abusive monster, not a father.

Is your mum expecting you to see him and comfort hm? It will open up old wounds that you have had years of therapy to deal with. If you see him or speak to him, it is likely that he will take the opportunity to mock and belittle you. Men like him don't change.

Did your mum ever try and stop his abusive treatment of you or did she just watch while he used extreme violence on you and humiliated you? I think that she is lucky that you maintain some contact with her. She should have tried to protect you.

He is not your father. He may be your biological parent, but a father is different. At least to me that word has meaning. It means love and safety. It means trust and fun.

What you had to endure at his hands is unconscionable and if stay away to keep your own peace and calm I would judge that as a wise decision. I suspect those that know you best and understand the history would feel the same.

The truth of what we actually feel doesn’t need to match what society expects and says we should.

In your shoes, I think I’d leave him well alone.

I don’t need to forgive him strangely, because I have reached a point of acceptance with him.

He did what he did, he continues to be who is, and there is nothing I can do to change it. Or him. He does not want to change, and I assume he is happy this way.

I don’t feel I have massively missed out on having a father, because I had plenty of women in my life that loved me, I grew up in a church that offered quiet comfort and stability. You can’t miss what you have never had. I don’t feel the need to offfer forgiveness. Thar ship has sailed long ago.

The way he justifies his behaviour/abuse and neglect is by blaming me squarely for it.

He was forced to harm me because I was a ‘difficult’ child (I was not) I was ‘selfish’ (in reality I was a trained people pleaser from a young age) and ‘stubborn’ (he didn’t break me) and if I were to see him again I fear the recriminations would start again.

He isn’t able to easily be in my company because I am a good person, and it doesn’t sit well with him, the version of me that he has created to justify what happened doesn’t exist. He doesn’t like me. He never has. He doesn’t like women full stop, and definitely can’t tolerate one with ‘opinions’. He gets really angry. I would never be able to call him out on the past, I would never even finish my first sentence.

There is however a lingering thought that I never really knew him, couldn’t reach him and maybe in his mind he did his best (provided for us) Thinking about it now, I realise these are my mother’s words that we must be grateful that he doesn’t spend his wages at the pub, so therefore he is a good father.

I obviously know it takes much more than that to be a good father, but on some level her words have stayed with me. He did with hard for us…. Should I acknowledge that?

He has done awful things. Awful. But he is still my father

He is and the loss of having a father who was cruel and harmful is still felt on a very visceral human level however in your case you have lost him all your life you had lost him and you have to protect yourself and that child who never had a father. She deserved to have an adult to protect them now and you are that adult.

My thoughts exactly

I presume that he gave your mum money and she bought and prepared the food that you ate. Children don't need to be grateful for being fed. It's the bare minimum legal requirement for parents to feed their children. It's not something that you need to feel grateful for.

As for paying the bills, that's what adults have to do. You being fed will have probably kept the authorities away from your parents. If he hadn't done that, and you went to school obviously malnourished, your teachers would have taken some kind of action.

Father is now seriously ill?
Tell him to go fuck himself.

I'm very sorry for what you experienced. The reason I talk like that is my vaguely similar life as a young person (another country).
Yourself first!
🍀

So many women ask Mumsnet to help them cope with difficult men because they don’t want to break up their children’s family.

They should all read this thread.

OP, I’m sorry your mother didn’t rescue you by leaving him. You rescued yourself when you were old enough — well done — and you owe them nothing. I’m glad you are happy with a good man. I don’t think you would do any good to anyone by seeing them again.

Women who force themselves and their children to endure a man’s abuse or other behaviour that ruins childhood, please take note.

What does OP need to be forgiven for? He father should be in prison for severe abusve, not dying peacefully while the daughter he abused says sorry.

You think that she should tell this monster that she loves him? That's insane!

Stop bloody analysing. You had a shit Dad, so did loads of other people.
ignore him. The fact he is dying at an old age is not your problem.
You are not going to get closure. He does not have enough self awareness, to him, he just was who he was, stop trying to “get him” It is too late and you won’t get anywhere.
“Bye dad, I am sorry you had a sad life and didn’t get to know the incredible, wonderful, loving person I have turned out to be. What a shame you missed out. I wish you could have had a better life but let’s be honest, you get out, what you put in, see ya”

Your mum told herself and you that he was a "hard working man" as a way of convincing herself to stay. When you're in an abusive relationship, you cling to anything that's good about it, and that's what she chose to cling onto. It's barely a crumb of goodness. Thankfully you're free and you don't have to cling to this crumb.

I would start therapy again to help you process this. If your previous therapist retired, she may be happy to offer a couple of sessions to supplement her pension? Or she might be able to suggest someone else?

I am sorry for others that have suffered like this. It should never have happened. It is very challenging to deal with parents, as an adult, that have failed in their most basic duty to do no harm. Especially as they age and prepare to leave the world,

Most parents invest so much time and love into their children. To walk to the ends of the earth for them. As I have done for mine. It’s unfathomable to me that anyone can harm a child, but that was my life for a very long time.

You write very articulately and with huge self-awareness. Don’t you see that: "but he didn’t kill me and he paid for my childhood.” is no more than the absolute minimum than a parent should do for a child? It certainly doesn’t make up for all the abuse you have suffered at his hands? You owe him nothing and he should expect nothing from you. Please, do not try to reconcile, it will do you and your children more harm than good.

I have found ‘analysing’ him as an adult very helpful. Understanding how abuse works, and truly getting under the bonnet so to speak very healing. I have looked at almost every element of my childhood in order to understand what happened to me, in order to move on. You might not find it helpful, but I did.

Now he is terminally ill I have to be sure I can live with my part in this. I have to protect my future peace by not having regrets. Not leaving anything unsaid. I am sorry if my post touched a nerve or has upset you.

Yes that was absolutely my mother’s low bar, and not mine. That is exactly what she said to justify her own participation. After all, she stood by and allowed some terrible things to happen right in front of her, and she would just walk into the kitchen.

I am thinking about going back into therapy. I would need to find someone new.

OP, if you're worried about "closure", could you consider writing a letter to your dad to say whatever you might want to say? You don't actually have to see him, but it might be cathartic to write something? Whether you actually send it to him or not?

You owe him nothing, but this is about what will help you in the longer term.

I wouldn’t be surprised if he has some regrets on his deathbed. For what you have said, I don’t think I would go but only you can decide. Do what is best for you not what is best for him.

I was thinking about a letter, and sending it. To thank him for his hard work, for buying the shoes on my feet as a child, and acknowledging that he was my father, even if we no longer see each other. I might even say how much I fear him and how much I would have liked a proper relationship with him, that moment has now gone. I’ll never have a father now.

I agree with the posts that say there is a very heavy price to pay for staying with men like this. That is true, the life waiting for them is not one I would wish on anyone. They will eventually lose everything, even themselves. It is a very sad and disturbing process.