This was my greatest take away from therapy. I’m currently on a therapy break, but I went to therapy for 4 years, initially due to some uncontrollable anxiety that was turning into a panic disorder. As the therapist pealed back layer after layer, aside from work burn out, I also had a lot of repressed feelings toward my parents. I was aware somewhat of my feelings toward my emotionally abusive mom, but my feelings toward my dad actually surprised me. I had put him on a pedestal for years because he was better in comparison compared to my mom, but in reality, he was emotionally neglectful, self absorbed into his relationships with his girlfriends/wives, and discouraged my dreams and ambitions with his apathy and attitude of “why try”.

I recently hit a breaking point with him, in that he was trying to not only subject me to his abusive wife’s abuse and manipulation, but also to have me go out of my way to praise her. They expected me to just drop off my 1 year old son at their house for them to “watch”, even though my dad basically ignores him when he’s around and my step mom is terrible with kids and is always heavily drugged out on sleeping pills.

I ended up having numerous in-person conversations with him about it, which he ignored. Sensing his complete departure from reality, I wrote him a long email spelling out all my feelings in detail. Unfortunately, he is still delusional and thinks I just need to sit down with his wife and a therapist to “hash out our differences”. I told him he married her, not me and I have no obligation to have a relationship with her. I’m 40 years old, and met her when I was about 30. It’s not like she raised me or had any real involvement in my life.