Can't face visiting my dad

[Borntorunfast]

This is complicated and it's long, sorry!!

I've posted about my dad before. We thought he had dementia. It has taken ages to get the GP to take our concerns seriously, and in the meantime his behaviour went off the scale: eg. seven 999 call-outs in 4 days, all due to him making up illnesses, flinging himself on the floor ("falls") and then wedging himself between furniture so that no one could pick him up, screaming (ironically that he couldn't breathe, but he could breathe well enough to scream for 3 hours straight), terrible verbal abuse towards my mum, uncles, the paramedics, and me.

Anyway, after all those call-outs, the paramedics triggered a safeguarding report (mainly for mum, due to his verbal abuse), and they took him in.

Dad has been in hospital for 2 weeks. He's had a CT and MRI scan.

He doesn't have dementia.

He has now been referred to the hospital psychiatry team for an assessment next week. They want to put him on an anti-psychotic medication, as his behaviour has continued in hospital. In some ways this is good as we now have evidence/witnesses (dad lies all the time and puts "on a good show" whenever we have tried to get him help in the past). Though he's refusing the meds.

But - Dad wants me to visit. I've been on holiday for 2 weeks but am now back.

I've not had a visit or call this year where Dad hasn't shouted at me. Or been angry and abusive. I don't want to see him because it upsets me to the degree that I then can't sleep for several nights. I have ASD and so get upset more than (I think) 'normal' people; he makes me feel deeply unsafe, I can't quite describe it.

He's also been a shit dad all my life.

I spent every day of my holiday on the phone advocating for both him and mum, and speaking to mum 2-3 times a day, messaging in between. I am super calm and practical and know that the best help I can give is this - sorting and pushing and advocating. Being the grown up.

I can't be that person if I feel so frightened when we are in the same room. I feel like a tiny child being terrorised by this awful looming bullying man, even though he's 80, clearly out of his mind, and frail.

Should I just woman up and go see him? My family think I am a massive bitch for not - but I do SO much for my parents, just not in a showy way (unlike my brother). If I go I'll get my 'good daughter' credits and they'll back off for a bit. None of my family know I have ASD, btw - I don't feel safe enough to tell them. I have long been characterised as the 'weird' and 'emotional' one, though they are all happy enough to lean on me when something difficult needs sorting out.

I don't know what to do. Would really welcome advice as I feel, as someone with ASD, that my decision making is off. Thanks if you read this far!!

Tell him before you go or as you walk in if he starts ranting at you then you are leaving. You don't have to take bad behaviour from anyone, you really don't.
I had my last conversation 12 years ago with my dad and stepmother where I said if they can't be civil then I'll no longer engage with them. They went mental, I haven't seen them since.
You deserve to feel happy and safe, don't give that up for someone who wasn't even a good dad to you.
Tell anyone who has something to say about it that he's had a lifetime of chances. Block them if that's not good enough for them.

Don't go. What is the point? Does shouting at you make him any better? I doubt it.

You could say to your family "I am not going to see Dad just to get abused - and he always abuses me."

And leave it at that. Broken record
"But..."
"No, I am not going to see him. Why should I go just to get shouted at? Im not doing that."

End of.

I would agree not to be guilt trapped into visiting. But it might be worth making sure that the hospital ward team and psychs are fully aware of the safeguarding concerns re your mum, and that he is consistently abusive to you also, so no one has any expectations that you can provide care post discharge - you may well have done this already, just thought I’d mention

This absolutely, why should you be scared out of your wits by frankly an old, nasty bully. He’s done enough damage,
Free yourself from this git of an old man, he sounds like he’s been a shit father anyway, so nothing to loose.

Firstly, you don’t owe him a thing. You might decide to direct your energies towards supporting your mum as best you can (if that’s what you want to do).

Secondly; I suspect there are a lot of people of your dad’s age out there with what would now be called a personality disorder, but they’ve never encountered mental health services because they cover well and, sadly, it’s their family who suffers most from their behaviour. When age and a degree of physical/cognitive decline set in, then the wheels come off and they can’t maintain the plausible persona anymore. It doesn’t sound like a radical personality change with your dad, more an exaggeration of how he’s always been. I hope the psychiatry team might shed some light on this issue for you; it can be surprisingly liberating to be told clearly that the person’s behaviour can’t be changed by you and wasn’t your fault (even though you know it cognitively). I suspect you wouldn’t be debating whether to visit if you felt nothing for him.

Thirdly, if you can access it, please do consider some counselling or therapy for yourself. There’s a lot of painful history in your posts.

I wouldn't go, my dad has mental illness, bi-polar (and probably some other things he hasn't shared) all my life. Even when he is on his meds and completely stable he isn't a nice person and has been awful to me at times, both within and outside of an episode. So I don't see him any more, and I'm much happier for it. Mental illness isn't an excuse to be horrible to other people all the time.

We had the very same situation with a relative of mine. They queried dementia, but it was just the way his personality went, very controlling. His antics eventually meant that he was forced into a home.

I agree with this OP. I've been through seven years of caring, for a wonderful dad, and it's trying enough without being verbally abused. There was a man like this on my dads Ward and I remember his son asking whether he could be sedated and they weren't looking into it but like you I don't think he had a diagnosis quite at that time.
You've been through enough. You are enough. Explain to the family that visiting with his extreme behaviour affects your mental health/affects the input you've been giving in other areas of care. and my advice would be don't visit unless he is suitably diagnosed and medicated.

I'm reading your thread, OP, and with you in spirit - and with everyone else on here who's in (or has been in) our very unenviable club

No I wouldn’t visit for a while. End of

Maybe it would be helpful to be clear in your own mind as to what you think would do you the greater injury; feeling guilty for not visiting or being so full of fear and resentment it's making you ill. From an outsider's point of view, the latter is doing you no favours. Your dread at the thought of seeing your father practically breaks through the screen and is probably threatening your mental and possibly physical health. On top of that, you rightly worry that it will make you less functional in the areas where your strengths lie; the advocacy, paperwork and admin side of having a family member hospitalised. It's hard to see how anyone would benefit from your exposure to your father's horrible rants, and that includes your father. If he's to benefit from your help, it may be that it's imperative for you to keep away. Remember that there's no iron law preventing you from changing your mind if your father becomes more amenable and you feel able to cope. However, what matters most is that you don't forget to look after yourself alongside caring for and advocating for others.

How's your dad my love he popped into my head today randomly sad😢