When your DAD comes to therapy

Well holy moly. Yesterday was about exactly as long and exhausting as I thought it would be.

Firstly, I did not die or kill anyone on our LONG ass trip to my son’s cardiologist. We left at 7am and didn’t get home until 3pm. It was…a lot. And exhausting.

The good news coming out of the day is that his heart looks mostly stable. Which is…truly surprising. But good. He has a holter monitor for the next few days, but for now, I’ll take “stable”.

Behavior wise, everyone was as good as I could’ve hoped for, and I have no complaints.

Then….the thing happened.

My dad came to therapy with me last night.

UGHHHHHHHH!!!!!

Yeah. It was as bad as I knew it would be.

Here’s the TLDR version. (You’re welcome)

According to my dad, I am selfish and lazy and don’t love my kids, nor do I want to spend time with them.

I will have you know that I vehemently disagree with all of his assertions of me.

He also likened me with Cruella Deville, and said that “I disciple over the top” or something like that. I’ll have you know that I am in fact NOT Curella Deville, my kids aren’t scared of me (and in fact laugh in my face when I try to be any kind of serious with them).

I think his exact words were something along the lines of “the floor turns into electricity and everyone starts screaming and crying when I come home”. I just don’t even know what to say about that other than what the actual fuck is he talking about???!

I literally said “wow. That sounds like a bad Disney movie”. Because that’s what he’s describing. I wish I was that powerful!

I’m not though.

It’s funny, because my husband, ya know, the person I chose to walk through life with, the person I sleep next to, the person who witnesses me as a parent and shares our thoughts with each other….does NOT share this opinion of me.

I asked him last night when I got home if he thought all of those things. And he literally laughed and rolled his eyes.

So…wtf? I guess is just my biggest question?

Anyway, I saw ALL of that coming. Nothing he said was new or surprising. Although, I won’t lie, I didn’t expect him to call me selfish and lazy, and tell me that “I literally watch tv all day”. Damn I wish that were true!!

But what I honestly did not at all see coming is when the conversation shifted to my sister.

No…that took me by surprise. And again…I really just did not love that.

I don’t like talking about my sister. I don’t like thinking about her, or allowing her to take up ANY space in my life anymore.

If you’re new here, basically, she tortured and abused me for my entire life growing up, blamed me for everything that went wrong in the world, and used me as her very own personal scapegoat. She cut in front of me, told me I was the reason she was going to kill herself, stole from me….the list goes on. It’s literally endless.

So…I’m sorry. But I don’t have any love for her. Or forgiveness. And that upsets my parents. I’ll leave it at that.

My dad also seemed shocked by the fact that I hate myself? I thought that was just common knowledge at this point. But apparently, that was news. As was the fact that I carry around some trauma from my childhood. He wishes I would just “get over it” by now or something.

So….overall, it was just a really fun day.

I’m feeling great about myself today, really. Truly. Just fantastic.

Being told that I’m not a good parent (again, my husband fully disagrees), and hearing how horrible I am and how I do nothing all day long…yeah. Whatever. It is what it is.

I just REALLY, really hope that my therapist doesn’t actually believe that. Because he really did say some off the wall shit. I didn’t even bother defending myself or responding. Because it just doesn’t matter. Anything I said wouldn’t have been heard anyway.

Next week is my mom’s turn. That’ll be…fun? I think she’ll be nicer.

So, yeah. That was my day. I’m trying to get past it, but it’s hard.

I’m not lazy or selfish. Yet those are the words he used to describe me. And that sucks.