Father issues - still - again......

GotToChange

Mojisola wrote: »

I think it's quite normal to think your problems aren't important enough - as an outsider hearing them, I think you're wrong!

Would you find it easier to have a talk with one of the nurses first? We have some very experienced nurses at our practice who are very understanding of the problems people hide and/or don't recognise as being as serious as they are.

Hmm - great suggestion, in the real world.
I think I am just so wary now and convinced that I will P people off, that I am very afraid to talk to anybody (almost) -
and yes, I know that I need to "get over myself" to be able to make any progress at all.

*sigh* (heavily).
Really, I just did that.

heartbreak_star

I think you'll probably P people of more with the projected "woe is me" attitude you currently have. That's not how you feel inside - but it IS how you're coming across as you seem to be rejecting any possible avenues of help.

(I know that sounds harsh - it wasn't meant that way.)

HBS x

bargainbetty

GTC, I've read this through. If you want it broken down, here is a list of things to do.

1. Print out this thread. Take it to the doctors with you, and ask them to read your posts.
2. Start taking the anti-depressants they give you. I'm on them, it saved me from a significant nervous breakdown. Agree to go on the waiting list for counselling.
3. Scan all the documents and save the files onto a memory stick. Transfer all the emails onto it and put in a safe place.
4. Delete all the emails (you've got a memory stick copy)
5. Burn the other papers. The letters, pictures, everything. It will feel quite cathartic doing this.
6. Go to the counsellor. Talk about this. Be honest about how your parents still make you feel. Be honest about how you want to feel. Think hard about how you could achieve that aim, and if they can be part of it.

Your first step must be the doctors. A slight medication will help you feel so much stronger (it's not forever, I'm five months in and planning to be off them by Xmas), but it helps gain a perspective on things, and calms you down.

Good luck

GotToChange

MakeupAddict wrote: »

But that's just game playing. How does it help? From an earlier post:

I moved and did not give him my new address, but his brother then passed it on so he felt inclined to write. But then, when I write back, I am told that I mustn't.

Even after the call on 1/7, I actually changed my number so that the call he would attempt the next week would fail.


These are all forms of passive aggression. What are you hoping for? That he'll have a 'd'oh' forehead slap moment, and think 'that's it, she's beaten me, I'm going to be a proper dad from now on'? Not going to happen.

I don't know how old you are or how successful you feel you are in other areas of your life, but where your parents are concerned, you're still a little girl desperate for their love and approval, and like a child wanting a new toy you're trying to manipulate them into giving it. You need to take real, not pretend, control, to be an adult and find a mature response.

First step is going to be the hardest, to accept that they aren't going to turn into storybook parents. You've tried game playing, being a good girl, sharing (telling them about your horse as an example) and none of it has changed them. And then you need to lose the fear of who and what you'll be if you let them go from your life.

MuAx

I see quite clearly that the actions you quote could be seen as passive-aggressive behaviour - equally as an attempt to manipulate them or what they may do..... I promise you, I was not trying to affect what they/he might do - rather that I could protect myself from them either contacting me in the way that has always gone before (i.e. without any regard for me at all....) or from them NOT contacting me - I could hardly know they wouldn't get in touch if there were no means to do so, right? (I know; pathetic - but the only form of self-protection I could find. Without telling them that how it is is not good enough, kind or healthy, because I know what the result of that would be.....)

I know that I act like a child or puppy, desperate for their approval. I am ashamed that I do this, especially as it fails anway. But I would not consider myself manipulative in any way - as one needs to be in contact in some way in order to even try that, surely?

I did not - do not - for one moment think (or even hope) that there would be a "D'oh"/slaps forehead moment - but now you mention it, I'm no longer sure (if I ever was) what I might be hoping for. Sometimes, I just wish that he was dead, which is terrible. And yet, he has now started the "well, I could be dead, you know....." approach, but it somehow seems criminal for me to even half-wish that it would happen.

I have made little secret of the fact that I am "old enough" to know better - and am thus ashamed. This has been the refrain of my life and - I am sure I have said this before on here - in this instance, time has not healed at all, rather has made the whole thing much more painful and (almost) intolerable.

As for being any kind of success in any other aspect of my life.....?
:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

It would be "easy" (half-understandable) to pin my weaknesses and failings on this basic fundamental problem ("issue?" that has run through my life like writing through a stick of rock. It has played a part in who I am, what I can handle and how I view life and the world.... If I had had the **** start and somehow got past it, I would have done better, I am sure. I know that my sister who stayed with my mother and had a step-father (and never saw her dad, except one awful time) has succeeded in many ways (but has been damaged and has some very real issues) and my brother (who I never knew about as I grew up), who was adopted 6 weeks after birth, is also successful in many aspects of life. They escaped (the father - in the case of my sister, both mother and father - in my brother's case). I didn't.
(And, no, they and I do not have good/any relationships.)

It is as though there has been some kind of experiment (not usual in the 60s) to see what happens to children of the same parents subjected to different "upbringings". By virtue of having been connected with my father throughout my life, I feel that I have been damaged ina different way - and one that is a lot harder to overcome... (especially as, despite everything, I would not want to hurt his feelings)
...but, I pray, not impossible.

GotToChange

heartbreak_star wrote: »

I think you'll probably P people of more with the projected "woe is me" attitude you currently have. That's not how you feel inside - but it IS how you're coming across as you seem to be rejecting any possible avenues of help.

(I know that sounds harsh - it wasn't meant that way.)

HBS x

But I don't mean to be "woe is me" and I didn't think that I was rejecting the suggestions......

...and besides, there is a difference between P-ing professionals off in an environment that I find hard to deal with but am turning to for their assistance (as a last and dseperate measure) and P-ing you lovely people off by mistake as I try to answer what people are saying to me, but not quite managing to be as upbeat as I fear I am expecetd to be. This does not mean - again - that I am wallowing; really, far from it....
...but I do need to be able to work this through - even "just" the physical clutter of it - otherwise I will be in the long shadow cast by my background to the end of my days.

I - again -appreciate - every word that has been written/said to me on here (apart from the one that wrote off my future...:() and am trying to work out how to best followthrough with the wonderful advice I am being offered.

GotToChange

bargainbetty wrote: »

GTC, I've read this through. If you want it broken down, here is a list of things to do.

1. Print out this thread. Take it to the doctors with you, and ask them to read your posts.
2. Start taking the anti-depressants they give you. I'm on them, it saved me from a significant nervous breakdown. Agree to go on the waiting list for counselling.
3. Scan all the documents and save the files onto a memory stick. Transfer all the emails onto it and put in a safe place.
4. Delete all the emails (you've got a memory stick copy)
5. Burn the other papers. The letters, pictures, everything. It will feel quite cathartic doing this.
6. Go to the counsellor. Talk about this. Be honest about how your parents still make you feel. Be honest about how you want to feel. Think hard about how you could achieve that aim, and if they can be part of it.

Your first step must be the doctors. A slight medication will help you feel so much stronger (it's not forever, I'm five months in and planning to be off them by Xmas), but it helps gain a perspective on things, and calms you down.

Good luck

Thank you for this bb.....:) (Cannot believe you would read through it all....), I really appreciate what you are suggesting.

The one thing I would say (that will probably be seen as negative/unwilling to help myself) is that no Dr in my experience would be prepared to read through this thread, I just cannot imagine it, even if I wish they would as it would mean I didn't have to open my mouth and risk looking a fool.....

The other practical measures, I think I should be able to attempt - except that I really do struggle with the idea of burning everything. I wish I didn't feel that way and don't even know why I do.

Ugh.


I am so afraid of anti-depressants - apart from the thought of being medicated to "live" but - yes, call me shallow - weight gain that I have heard of (I am already struggling with what I think is a messed up thyroid.....). Not an excuse, just cannot deal with anything more....

lulu650

GotToChange wrote: »

I haven't read any of your other posts, but do you have your own family to concentrate on, or close friends?

Even if I have (did), I am not sure that they would or should be mutually exclusive. That said, when I was married, my husband came from a normal family and, whether I bleated on about it or not, he could never even attempt to figure out the mess that was my "family" - and it played a huge part in my downfall as a wife and mother.

I originally asked this because you come across as quite lonely and isolated. I've since read some of your posts and seen that there appears to have been some medical intervention in the past (?) and that you are estranged from your own daughter.

I don't have anything to add to posters supportive comments but I wish you well.

heartbreak_star

GotToChange wrote: »

I am so afraid of anti-depressants - apart from the thought of being medicated to "live" but - yes, call me shallow - weight gain that I have heard of (I am already struggling with what I think is a messed up thyroid.....). Not an excuse, just cannot deal with anything more....

It's not being "medicated to live". You're perpetuating the stigma there. AD's get you back on an even keel so you can deal with things more objectively. And with regard to hypothetical weight gain...that'd be temporary, and it sounds like another excuse.

Also, hypothyroidism can cause all sorts of other issues including exacerbating depression - I have hypothyroidism so I know this. Get thee to the GP for a blood test - medicating that will help too!

Do you exercise at all? Exercise and getting outside for even half an hour a day can help your mind and body

HBS x

GotToChange

heartbreak_star wrote: »

It's not being "medicated to live". You're perpetuating the stigma there. AD's get you back on an even keel so you can deal with things more objectively. And with regard to hypothetical weight gain...that'd be temporary, and it sounds like another excuse.

Also, hypothyroidism can cause all sorts of other issues including exacerbating depression - I have hypothyroidism so I know this. Get thee to the GP for a blood test - medicating that will help too!

Do you exercise at all? Exercise and getting outside for even half an hour a day can help your mind and body

HBS x

It isn't (meant as) an excuse.

I recollect an occasion when asking for help with (undiagnosed, admittedly) post-natal depression. The (same) surgery had me and my baby carted off to the phsych. ward, simply because I tried to insist they help me (husband had walked out for the third time.....). Maybe I asked in the wrong way, maybe that was their idea of help.... I'm not sure.

It has always felt that unless seeing the Dr with something highly visible, I lose them when I try to explain. This is also the case with the thyroid issue (about which I have posted elsewhere, I have lots of the signs - except for the abnormal hormone readings.....); I just come across really badly and am just cannot bear the thought of trying to explain myself.

Again, not an excuse - almost a phobia.

ecgirl07

GotToChange wrote: »

Again, probably sounding like an excuse (and believe me, I am not usually a hoarder....), the material that I have is something of source of reference - who on earth could remember the **** that has gone on, to be able to tell someone who could maybe help them, unless they have something to refer to? (rhetorical)

Key question here is - why do you want to remember the sh*t that gone on?

We went through a very horrible parents split and my dad turned into a big bit of an eejit and systematically managed to single handedly destroy his relationship with all his kids to the point he is cut out of our lives completely.

The funny thing is about 10 years after it all happened me and siblings were fuzzy on finer details - we know he was/is a selfish git and we know "certain things" happened but we dont have the small minutiae of on the 23rd of january 1992 he did this catalogued in a letter/email.

You dont need to remember any of it - let it all go - fill your head with the future not the past.