All She Cared About Was How SHE Felt
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“I remember there was a time in my life when I was around like 15 years old and I was trying to open up to my mom about being depressed and slightly suicidal, hoping that I could get some help. I’m the middle of three children and both my siblings were already going to see psychiatrists, so I knew I was asking a lot.
I still remember sitting on the kitchen floor, my mom stirring a pot on the stove, turning to me and saying, ‘Can’t I at least just have one normal child?’ I never brought it up again and years later, she wondered why I never told her about my issues and about wanting to commit suicide.”
She Was Just Adding Insult To Injury
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“When my sister was dying, I was there with my mother and she said to me – multiple times – that, ‘You don’t have any children, so you don’t understand what I’m going through.’
She knows I’m unable to have children. I always replied with, ‘Please stop staying that. I know you’re upset but that’s not fair.’ And she would just keep saying it, even arguing her point.
When my sister did die, I left the morning after her funeral and gave my mother minimal support. It was just a really hurtful thing to say.”
They Didn’t Care About Her Accomplishments
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“In high school, I got really into writing. I’d always enjoyed it but I really began to commit when I was around 15; I was writing a lot and doing my best to learn about the craft to try and get better.
As an exercise, I decided to try doing NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, takes place in November and you try to write 50k words in one month). I managed to complete it and had never been so excited about anything before – I’m notoriously bad at seeing things through to the end, I tend to give up halfway. Nope, I was staring at a 50k word count on the last day. I was so excited, I ran out into the living room and told my parents, basically jumping up and down.
My mom looked at me and asked me, ‘Why would you even do that?’ I explained and she followed up with, ‘What a waste of time.’
My dad then chimed in saying that, ‘I should never do that again, what a massive waste of time and energy.’
So that pretty much crushed my young dreams. I reverted back to my room and barely wrote much for the next couple years, not entirely because of their comments, but they definitely played a part.
This month (6 years later) I’ve done Camp NaNoWriMo and I’m on track to hit 50k once again! I’m very excited about it but don’t plan on mentioning it to my parents ever.”
“I Know He Meant To Be Funny…”
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“The summer after high school, my depression hit hard and I gained about 30lbs over three months. I was pretty sensitive about it because I’d been so slim and fit my whole life and now I just felt like a big lazy tub of goo. One day, I was making a ham sandwich and took it over to eat on the couch, next to my dad. I sit down and he looks right at me and says ‘You know if you eat that, it’s cannibalism.’
My heart just dropped.
I excused myself to the bathroom and just sat there on the toilet, ugly crying, for about five minutes. I got myself together, went back out and threw the sandwich away. I know he meant it to be funny but…ouch.”
Now They All Pretend It Never Happened
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“When I was 13 or so, I was starting to get a little chubby and I was sensitive about my weight. We were debating between two different restaurants and I voted against Italian but got outvoted by the rest of the family. When asked if we wanted a table or booth, my Dad said to the hostess, ‘A table would be better, he’s a big guy,’ and patted me on my shoulder. I was really upset and stormed out of the restaurant and to this day, my dad denies saying that and my mom believes that I was just throwing a tantrum over going to the restaurant that I didn’t like.”
She Could Never Live Up To Her Mother’s Intuition
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“My mum’s got this funny little story from when she was pregnant with me. For nine months, she envisioned a tiny dainty baby girl, blonde hair, blue eyes. Elizabeth Grace. She was gonna dress me up in cute little outfits and I’d grow up to be a dancer or something.
She ends the story with, ‘And then I gave birth to a literal gorilla. This ugly, screaming thing covered in thick black hair. She (points to me) didn’t stop screaming until she was six, took her first steps into a mud puddle, ruining the beautiful dress she was wearing and got kicked out of two ballet schools.’
Now she genuinely thinks this is a funny story, that I am the exact opposite of what she was hoping for, but I heard this story constantly when I was a child and it really messes with my self-worth. Why did I get kicked out of two ballet schools? Because Elizabeth Grace was a ballerina and I HATED HER!
I only told mum a few years ago how much that story bothered me growing and she was shocked, she had absolutely no idea. Haven’t heard it since.”
He Learned His Parents’ Priorities That Night
“We had a small fire in the house. My stepdad woke my mum up, who proceeded to go up to the third floor and wake my brother up. Then they came down the stairs to wake my other brother up and then went upstairs again to check that the first brother was getting up. Neither ever tried to wake me up. I remember waking up, thinking everyone was just getting up for work and school, so I ignored the voices and dozed off again.
It was only when I realized that it was still dark that I figured something must be wrong. Not once did she check on me or knock on my door. Everyone was fine and the fire was dealt with, but it still hurts now that she never even considered me when the fire was spreading.”
She Found Out Just How Meaningful Her Words Could be
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“My mum made me go to tanning studios because my skin wasn’t brown enough. She made me color my hair because it wasn’t blonde enough. She told me that I was getting fat and at the same time that I should eat more of her cookies (I never considered myself fat, my BMI was normal).
My grades weren’t good enough, my boyfriends weren’t good enough. She told me I should break up with my current boyfriend because then I would lose some weight and she knows I have problems with eating when I’m feeling sad.
My whole family comes from Poland so we speak Polish and German at home, but I never learned Polish, I don’t really know how to read it, just basic sentences. People understand me and I understand them. That’s it. But they make fun of me and my skills all the time and when I don’t want to speak Polish, they complain about it… I just can’t make anything right.
My dad never told me he loved me, never hugged me. My grandpa died and I was leaning on my dad’s shoulder, crying, and he just said that I ‘made his shirt wet.’
So I developed some strategies to deal with this. I never asked anyone for help, I was never proud of myself for anything I accomplished, I never trusted anyone, I was never able to state my opinion. So a couple of years ago, I went to a therapist to get rid of those patterns. Best thing I could have ever done but even that was for my mum a disgrace. In her mind, I had a perfect childhood and nothing ever happened to me. So ‘why would I need a therapist?’ I was always pretty open about it, but she told me to shut up about it whenever other family members were there.
After a lot of work and talking to her and my dad about this, we finally got to a point where we can be normal around each other. Whenever they do or say something that hurts me, I say it really clearly. It took some practice but I found a way for myself to deal with it and shut their voices out. I still have some problems with my self-confidence, though. It’s hard to change your view in a couple of years when you basically were told that you would never be perfect your whole life.”
Their Parents
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“My mother walked in on me cutting myself at the age of 13. I asked for a therapist and the first thing she said was how long she’d have to drive. Then she began talking about everyone else except me and how I have it easy. I gave in and said that I didn’t need a therapist and that I was fine, but after I had the worst panic attack of my life. I realized that I couldn’t handle it. I asked for therapy again and she finally agreed… About two months passed and I still had nothing. I had given up on her and went to my sister, crying and saying that I couldn’t take it anymore. After my sister scolded my mother and lectured her about ignorance and responsibility, she finally got me one. Then there was my dad. He was abusive, but there were small things he did that really hurt. He didn’t know my birthday, how old I was or even my name. He would always call me by my sister’s name and wouldn’t correct himself.
If it weren’t for her, I would have committed suicide on many occasions. She’s my savior and the most amazing person I know. However, it’s not all rainbows and sunshine for her and I feel like I need to tell people the downside of early maturity. Unfortunately, she had to stand in as an adult from a very young age because my parents were incompetent. She never said anything about this until the age of 18 when she started crying, asking why she had to be the adult and why she and I have to deal with the consequences of our parents’ actions. She said that neither of us should have had to hear their constant fighting and that we should be able to be the children we were supposed to be. She never got the chance to be a child and has endured more abuse than I have. These days, despite me being four years younger, she likes to act like my child and I act like her mother. The only way for me to repay her is to let her experience the blessing of innocence and how life can be with affection. We’re all each other have and it seems like we’re all each other need.”
He Thought At Least One Person Would Show Up…
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“My senior year in high school, I made the all-state symphonic band for bass clarinet. I told my parents and they said my younger brother has a middle school football game on the day of the recital and they might not make it. I thought nothing of it, thinking at least my mom or one of my grandparents would show up since they enjoy music. Nope. The day of the recital, we performed, afterward I looked for a relative after I changed out of my tux and packed my instrument away. No one was there. I rode with my band direct on a 3-hour trip back to town and it was an enjoyable ride, but as my last performance in high school, before I became a nobody in college again, it hurt me a lot. I never fully recovered from it and it left me in a bit of a depression all the way up till I dropped out of college. I even still get angry at it now.”
A Father’s Failing
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“When my daughter was 5 or so, I told her to go get dressed up as pretty as she could for our ‘father-daughter date.’ She came back wearing a pink tutu. There was nothing wrong with it, but for some reason, I felt embarrassed and asked her to go dress up seriously, that what she had on now was more for fun. The look on her face was pretty heartbreaking but she quickly ran off to change and I didn’t read into it enough at the moment. She got dressed up in normal clothes and we had a great night out at the movies and some food.
I’m not sure if she ever thought about it again. But it fully hit me later that she had dressed up to what SHE thought was the absolute prettiest. And I just told her to act seriously. I missed a big one there and I still feel horrible when I think back to it.”
He Didn’t Even Try To Understand Them
“So my youngest sister (there’s three of us total) and I are nerds. Which thankfully, is a more acceptable thing today. A few years ago, Dragoncon was going on (at the time we lived super close to downtown Atlanta) and I told my dad that I would be taking my youngest sister to the convention for at least the day (if not every day of the convention).
His response?
‘You’re going to the freak show?’
And with that one sentence, he had alienated two of his three daughters simply because our likes were ‘freakish’ and ‘nerdy’ in his eyes. Mind you, this was MAYBE back in 2012, so it’s not like our interests were considered odd. Marvel was in ‘Stage Two’ of its movies, everyone and their grandma had at least some love of comics, and yet…
He meant it as an offhand comment but just like that, he had brushed aside our likes as if they were something to be ashamed of.
For anyone wondering, you bet your butt we went anyway and did a last minute cosplay to spite him.
Oh. And let’s not forget how he handled our grades through school. My middle sister kept getting an A- in one class so for months, he jokingly called her ‘Minus’ until she had a mental breakdown in front of him about it. I got accepted into every college I applied to and he was STILL upset because ‘You didn’t challenge yourself.’ I’m sorry, didn’t you only get into 2/10 colleges? How am I the failure here?
Jokes on him, I dropped out twice and now work in an industry where you don’t need a degree.”
It Wasn’t Just That He Left
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“My dad’s actions before his death messed with me but I have mixed feelings about them now, and wonder if he would have been different if he had known he would die in the near future.
My dad and mom divorced when I was age 8; Dad remarried when I was 12 to a good lady who treated me and my brother like her own kids right from the beginning and became an important part of our lives. When I was 18, Dad dropped his second wife, my stepmom, off at work and disappeared without explanation. We found out from emails he sent later, he’d left to run away with a woman in another state he had been having an online affair with (and possibly in person, too, but we weren’t sure if they’d met previously). Dad would only send emails and refused to tell us his phone number, address or even where he lived now. He said he would feel comfortable doing so ‘someday.’ I got angry and wrote him that he was the adult and he had my number, if he ever decided to be an adult again, he could call me, but I would not talk to him on email anymore because he had no right to shut us out like that. He divorced my stepmom through the mail, then immediately married his internet side piece.
He never called. That was the last time we communicated. When I was 21, he died of a massive heart attack at 54. We found out from his third wife’s lawyer. His third wife’s lawyer called my mother and told her. A week after his funeral.
We found his obituary online and found out he had been living in Chadron, Nebraska. The obituary listed his third wife’s children from her previous relationship as his children. No mention at all of me and my brother, even though we were his only actual children.
I know obit/funeral was more his third wife’s fault for acting like we didn’t exist, but Dad chose to act like a selfish prick in his final three years of life and died without ever trying or attempting to make amends and be genuine about his kids and prior relationships. The fact is, what he did was totally a horrible move.”
His Father Had Accepted Him…Or So He Thought
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“My father and I never got along, going back to the earliest of years, but when I came out as gay in my early 20’s he was outright awful. Telling me I was an embarrassment, etc. Years went by, I thought perhaps he had grown and I tried to rebuild (read: build) a relationship with him.
Fast forward. A family friend, someone who went to university with my mom and dad, was conversing with my dad and asked for my email address because their daughter wanted to connect with me. My dad went on to write an email to her which read, ‘Since you’re interested, I should let you know he has proclaimed himself gay and moved overseas where they apparently treat people like him better, or so he says. I guess I’m dealing with it okay since I never talk about it.’
How do I know about this? Because in trying to give his friend my email address to give to her daughter, he added in the cc: line to bring up my address, so he could copy and paste. Then he forgot to erase my address.
His response was, ‘Oh, I’m sorry you saw that.’
And he wonders why I don’t want to have a relationship with him. I should add, he proclaims himself to be a liberal.”
Her Mother Didn’t Care Enough To Keep Her Art
“My mom is someone who likes order and who loves archiving things. For example, she doesn’t even throw out things that she wore before my 27-year-old brother was born. Or my big brother’s clipped nails from when he was a baby. Or his millions of pictures.
However, she does none of that with my drawings. Or my childhood pictures, but that’s another story. My album ends on my first birthday.
I’m a girl who draws and scribbles a lot, and after a while, that makes a big pack of used paper in the house. I always sorted them out at the end of the school year and gave them to my mom to put them somewhere. One day, I decided to look at them again to get a little bit of inspiration and they were nowhere to be found. A whole year’s worth of drawings! Poof! I ended up finding one or two of them tossed away, wrinkled. I started crying immediately.
She was out of town and I ended up calling her, angry. I was about to lose my mind, but I somehow managed to just cry and hung up the phone. I called her back after I had calmed down to tell her I was sorry that I sounded angry and explained to her that my art was very dear to me and that I had trusted her to keep them safe, and that I was very upset. She got angry at me. I’m still mad about the whole ordeal.”
An Ignorant Dad And A Lose Lipped Step-Mom
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“There’s only one time that my dad hurt me so badly that my first reaction was to cry.
I don’t want to get into too many details for personal reasons, but we’ll just say that this one fateful Friday night was probably the worst in my life. At this point in my life, I didn’t have a great relationship with my dad. So I didn’t share much. But this was so bad and so scarring that I had to call him. I needed an adult. (I was 20ish at the time).
I asked him to keep it between us because there was also a huge embarrassment factor as well.
A few weeks down the road, I had family members asking me about said event. When I prodded into where they got that information, I found out it was from my stepmom. So I went back to my dad, asking him why he had told her. His response was, ‘She’s my wife, I tell her everything. I didn’t think it was a big deal.’ But what he magically seemed to forget is that she and her family are the worst gossipers. They’re constantly sharing people’s secrets, twisting events, spreading rumors, etc. So, of course, she went off and told other chicks from her side of the family. There’s no such thing as a secret with them.
I broke down into tears, which was completely and wildly out of character, asking him how he could betray my trust so badly. You tell your new wife about bills, broken arms, schedules, finances, etc. You know, things that affect both people. But when your son comes to you in confidence, trying to find help for his broken self, you don’t go blabbing his business to the woman you’ve had only been married to for three years who is known to have loose lips.
What made everything worse was that before I had confronted him, he had no idea how bad he messed up. It hadn’t even crossed his mind that I didn’t want my gossipy, unliked stepmother knowing my business. And that was like whole new punch in the gut.
Since that day, my dad has only been privy to my surface level. I don’t let him inside anymore. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”