My dad is dying and I'm not sure how I feel

[Nevercansaygoodbye123]

I am a 57 year old gay man, and I'm really after some advice/information/perspective?

I've never really liked my dad. He has never been abusive, but we have never really got on. I got on far more with my mother. I think I've tried to make him proud of me, but I feel it's never happened. Tried to be interested in sports at school - not interested in any. Tried not to be gay - too interest in men.

I can remember a number of incidents where I just thought you're not very nice.

He taught me to ride a bike, but this was more telling me off when I did it wrong rather than encouraging me.

I remember getting a dartboard and Subbuteo for Christmas when I wanted neither. And him having darts matches with me, I wasn't very good at darts and hated it. And he constantly lost his temper with me for not taking an interest.

When my mother died he put a notice in the newspaper but didn't include the name of my partner of 20 years, although my sister's husband's name was there.

After my mother died and he lived alone I phoned him every day; when he went into an old people's home he refused to have a phone - mobile or fixed and that cut me out as I don't live near him. On the occasions I visit he remarks he didn't know I was coming.

Now he is hospital and it's not looking good, but I don't really feel upset.

Thoughts?

You don't need to visit if you don't want to or feel upset, we all have different relationships with our parents. Has he asked to see you, how is your relationship with your sister. Maybe he was jealous of you, before you were born he was the only man in the house, maybe he didn't approve of your adult relationship, who knows. Don't feel guilty, don't visit out of duty, no one should judge you, do what feels right for you. Who told you he is in hospital, will you need to get involved in his care of when he has passed.

It doesn’t really sound like he was a parent to you and it’s okay if you don’t feel anything. He (I imagine) provided for you and kept you safe but didn’t go further than that. You have made sure he was safe in old age, ringing him everyday and it was him that ended the relationship by refusing to have a phone.

Its okay to not really feel any attachment or grief.

My sister lives local to him, so she sees hi often - the home he is in is opposite where her son goes to school. I am hugely thankful of her help.

Are we close? we are if I make the effort to visit her. Without my parents she has visited me once since I left home some 30 years ago. I appreciate I live away, initially in London and now in Scotland and she has an autistic son, but ...

Just to say, im sorry. It sounds like you made quite an effort to ring your dad every day after your mum died. It must have been a blow to not be able to ring him at the care home, but you know this isnt your fault.

Sometimes our parents cannot be the people we need them to be. They cannot accept us as we are. We deal with that sometimes when they are still alive, grieving for the parent we wished we had but didnt get, even in our fifties......I have to say to myself, they did the best they were capable of.........(even if it at times it was woefully inadequate). Accepting that they are not going to change or be different is hard, its a continual process and it is painful.

I would say, just accept how you are feeling. You dont need to reproach yourself or judge yourself for it. It sounds like you have tried hard to be a good son, you have made efforts. It also sounds like your dad has hurt you a lot emotionally over many many years, and it may be that you've had to protect yourself from the many many years of hurt, which is why you're not feeling anything now. Be kind to yourself through all of this.

Tried not to be gay - too interested in men

brilliant. keep that dark humour topped up, you’re going to need it for a while but you know that

sweetheart feel it. feel the pain, feel the void where there should be a kind dad. feel it as much as your little you can dare and i promise there is a brighter future where, after some time, lots, this whole bloody awful sad painful space where there should have been a relationship with a gentle father will be easier, smaller, kinder and things will make more sense. right now what i say may seem like madness to your ears, it always does when people say ‘this ain’t gonna feel half as bad/confusing one day’ but you are going to be fine. seek out all the lovely safe people I know you already have in your life for support and let them love you.

I think that, for your own conscience, you should visit occasionally, purely to stop yourself feeling guilty when he passes.

It sounds like he didn’t really know how to build a relationship with you. That wasn’t your fault.

Not unusual by any means. In time, after he dies, you might find that you think differently about him, because you’ll remember things you’ve forgotten. But you might not change how you feel.

Above all, remember that how you feel is how you feel and you should not try to intellectualise or persuade yourself to feel differently.

Don’t beat yourself up. A lot of people feel the same way about parents. Mourn the father you never had.

Good wishes xx

@Nevercansaygoodbye123 it sounds like you never got the father you needed, which can make for a more complicated bereavement reaction. A child needs to feel loved and accepted. It could be that your father struggled to be a parent, perhaps because of his own deficits or past traumas. Maybe he also struggled to accept your sexual orientation, which again is on him.

Lots of people have difficult relationships with parents who simply weren't very good parents. You don't have to be grief-stricken when they die, but you will probably feel some sadness and if it's hard for you to accept that you didn't ever have the father you deserved and now never will, think about getting some counselling to help you to come to terms with that loss. I wish you all the best.

Some parents are very rigid in their beliefs of how to parent. Also, they want their children to be and behave as they see fit, with no space for individuality. It's unfortunate and distressing, but very common.

It's no surprise you're not feeling upset. He doesn't seem to have been the father you deserve. Grief isn't just one thing. If you do want to communicate with him, maybe write him a letter?

Sounds like you had a complicated relationship with your dad for understandable reasons.
But, in case this helps......, I had a loving, supportive and far less complicated relationship with my mum. She died last year and for some weird reason I don't feel too upset. She'd had a good innings and didn't suffer at the end. I always dreaded the thought of her passing away, but I don't think anyone can predict how you will feel about these things in reality. I think it might actually be harder for someone who has a more complicated relationship with the person who is ailing.

I’ve got a shitty dad. He was abusive and violent. He’s not long for this world and I’ve thought about how I’ll manage it when he’s on his last legs in hospital. I’ve decided that I will go just because I know I’ll feel guilty if I don’t and I refuse to spend any amount of my life feeling guilty or preoccupied with thoughts about him. I don’t think I should feel guilty as he doesn’t deserve anything really but I know I will if that makes sense so the easiest thing would just be to go through the motions for an hour or so at a hospital . This is me though. You have to think about what you can cope with.
As for feeling upset, or not feeling upset I don’t think that’s strange given you don’t have much of a relationship.

I’m so sorry you didn’t have the dad you deserved. It’s hard to love someone like that. Yet you’ve been a very good son. Be kind to yourself.

@Nevercansaygoodbye123

If a father isn't interested in you but in the son he wants you to be, then there's going to be a lot of friction. He won't have seen and valued the person you are, and that makes things difficult.

If he shows lack of interest and a lot of unpleasant comments, over time love can fade. Or, to put another way, you may still love him but you will have had to accept the big and perhaps growing distance between you.

You've probably done a lot of grieving for not having a loving father already.

There may be more to come, or there may not. But if there's one thing Ive learned, its that if we are fairly normal people with fairly normal reactions - if we aren't attached to our parents there's a reason. If we don't miss them, there's a reason. They haven't made themselves missable.

It's okay to not feel a great deal, even if cultural expectations are that you'll be sad. If you have strong relationships in the rest of your life, then it's more to do with him and how he was towards you and how that affected the bond between you, than a lack in you.

My dad died twelve years ago and I was devastated but, with hindsight it was because that was it; our relationship would never get any better.
Might make me sound like a cold hearted bitch but I don't miss him.