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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/9/2008 5:03:22 PM | | This thread is about forgiveness. I am sorry that your father did not have the skill to parent you correctly. As a consequence you have suffered. However, you are also being TESTED. Can you eventually forgive him? You will continue to suffer until you have forgiven him. Watch the movie "Dead Man Walking". The parents had to forgive their son's murderer. A very difficult task, but if they didn't, they would carry around bitterness in their hearts. This frame of mind, "bitterness", would affect all the other relationships they had, and prevented them from truly enjoying the blessings the world has to offer. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/9/2008 5:17:45 PM |
why was'nt he able to show it then ?
This is much bigger thing than someone can explain in a forum post.
If he was anything like mine, he just wasnt able to. Was he abused as a kid too? Mine was.
I really understand how you feel. I had to undergo a process called "The Journey" in order to forgive mine. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/9/2008 5:44:39 PM | The generations before us were all raised different. Many never heard that their parents loved them either. As to why he didn't show it,it is an answer you will never know.
I would encourage you to go. There are things on your mind that will sit there until you do. The anger, pain, resentment or whatever you have inside you needs to be addressed. It will not happen over night but it will happen.
My father wasn't kind and loving either. I go and sit at his grave, sometimes talk sometimes just sit. You cannot change the past but you can guide the future. Getting past all the old feelings will be better for you in the long run | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 5:16:13 AM | Hi,
It sounds like you're carrying a pretty heavy load, there, and really, you're the only one who can decide what to do with it. Something to think about, though - an old story.
Two travellers, an old man and his son, come to a river crossing. There's a rich old lady standing on the shore, clearly pissed off. She's surrounded by servants, all of whom are burdened with her luggage, and she's berating them for not carrying her across. The servants keep trying to explain that with all the mud, there's nowhere to put her stuff down without ruining it, but she's having none of it. She's screaming, cursing, hitting them with her umbrella - think Leona Helmsly on a bad hair day.
The old traveller gives a sigh, walks over, picks up the old lady, and fords the rive with the woman on his back. She's yelling and complaining the whole time, and when he gets her safely across, she storms off in a huff.
The two travellers, old and young, continue on their way. The son, however, is fuming. After a couple hours, he just can't hold it in anymore, and bursts out "I can't believe that woman! She was horrible! Even after you helped her, she didn't even say thank you! How can you be so calm?"
The older traveller turns to his son, and says "I put her down hours ago. Why are you still carrying her?"
VZ | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 5:42:11 AM | I'm haunted by everyone I lost, especially during the Christmas season.
I used to love this time of year.
It's amazing how loss can take everything you once loved and turn it against you, isn't it.
I tried going shopping the other day, the Christmas music and sight of all the families together triggered something in me, I found myself feeling so alone and grief stricken I could barely breathe.
It was excruitiating.
I'm on the other side of the "arguing with them" phase, I can remember the process, I think we all go there.
Everyone does.
Now I'm just frozen inside.
V | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 7:00:34 AM | Its all about forgiveness and letting go.There is no point in going to his grave, as all the angst is your heart not in that grave.The things people do, grow from the pain and anger unexpressed in the depths of their own hearts.People travel, drink, drug , have sex , whatever to escape their own self hate and misery.Some wallow in it like in a maelstrom of self pity. It never works,. It is like an miniscually larger vertebra in your spine, that continually aches.Your back looks ok, but that disc puts everything out of kilter.
You need to make peace with him , within yourself.Parents are just human, they are not perfect. They act with the knowledge and awareness, that they have. They know no different.As children we have an immature perspective.We don't see the whole picture and are egocentric, like all kids.Your dad acted like his childhood conditioned him too.Such wiring and conditioning is hard to change.If he did not choose to change, you could not control that.Sadly some manifest their anger and pain through violence and transference to others, often vulnerable kids.The person accountable for their actions is always them.Why should their offspring carry the burden of their actions or shame.Let go, whats is not your karma.
You are a grown man now, responsible for your thoughts and emotions. Thoughts and emotions are under our own control. Noone can make us feel or think anything, lest we choose it.Forgiveness for wrongs is an act of love towards yourself, it will give you peace of mind and a calm sense of closure. Keeping this anger towards your father serves no purpose, except to chain you in the past.We cant change, control or live in the past, just retain its painful lessons, so we can learn and grow.The past is dead, do not live with death.Awaken to life.We must embrace the present moment.Forgive and let go of this unnecessary burden, it is holding you back. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 7:29:17 AM | I never visit my fathers grave, he was an excellent soldier, highly decorated, very well respected but behind closed doors he was something else entirely.
After his suicide I felt as though I had his voice inside of my head, it was like being possessed by a drill sergeant.
That voice is now long gone.
It wasn't an auditory hallucination, more so a "mental voice" of sorts and a very negative one at that.
I have many of his high morals, principals, a code of honour but that's it.
Sounds like he humbled you in the way mine humbled me. Sounds like you learned from that pain, appreciated that you shouldn't treat others in the same way, it's a blessing in disguise so he actually did you a favour all along.
Remain defiant my friend, you'll someday prove to yourself that you were twice the man he ever was.
Kind regards,
V | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 7:30:52 AM | A lot of us live with ghosts and memories. Talking them out is what helps us resolve them...we don't bottle things up inside, then go all postal or something!
Relax...it is normal...unless you start answering yourself...then I'd be checking with a professional.
Refuse to go to his grave? {shrug}...no...not wrong....but it might help if you thought of the positive things he did in your life. Like provided shelter, food, clothes, instilled a sense of right and wrong in you. Also, he gave you a role model for you to shy away from...you don't want to be like him, but better than that...so, you mold yourself into that person you want to be! | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 8:09:50 AM | My dad has been nothing but destructive in my life. Really a bad deal. Terrible, and still is if he gets the chance. I went to counciling for a while over it . Basically I learned that in reality, sometimes we get dealt a dud. I look at it this way. I have great kids.
I have some good things in my life, by I don`t have a dad. I have an abuser. My therapist told me that I have no obligation to have any kind of relationship with a monster who would treat me like that. My first obligation is to respect myself enough to set up boundaries, stay away from him,without guilt, and move on without a dad. because I really didn`t have one. He`s done plenty of damage and would continue more if I allowed it.
As far as the abuser who sired me, he is now in very failing health and I doubt if he is going to live much longer. Will I visit him in the hospital? No. Why would I. He has made the choice as to our parting by his abandonment and behavior, not me, I am not responsible. It is not and has never been your "job" to put yourself in line for abuse.
So he did it all of his life and now you are doing it to yourself.
Hey, view it this way. They are a ton of mean miserable a-holes in the world and you were just unlucky enough to get one of these as a parent. Jus think of all the rapists and murderers in prison who have kids and how they feel. It`s terrible. But that`s life. If you let the hate go on, you are just letting him poison you further.
If you can, just have this person be a non entity and not matter. Focus on the positive things in your life. Don`t lower yourself to even bother wasting the energy to hate.
If your family wants you to go to the grave, and it is for the love of them and their benefit, if you can, man up and do it for them. When my dad dies, I will probably go to the funeral, not for the dad, but for my sister and my step mom who are descent people. Will I visit his grave alone? Heck no, what for? He never loved me. I would have been better off illegitimate and never knowing who he is, really. I`m a good caring loving person. He chose to make my life a living hell if I allowed it. So the bond was broken by him, not you. You have not obligation for any kind of emotion. You just got a dud. That happens. You have to deal with this reality, and dwell on the good things in your life. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 10:19:22 AM | OP I understand exactly what you mean. My father was a college professor and put on airs like he was in the upper level of society (partially because he re-married to a woman who was a social climber. I personally think he married her because she had big tits and she married him because he was a college professor.). Only behind closed doors he was one of the most selfish, self-centered men I have ever met. He also beat me. In later years he had another son and I got back in touch with him to see if there was anything that I could do to protect my little brother from him. I hated him so much that I used to look at myself in the mirror and hate myself because I looked so much like him. When he died, he had remarried again to a gold digger that got him to sign a power of attorney while he was sick and promptly put everything that he had in her name. When he died she threw out my little brother with nothing but the social security payments because he was a minor. I think that she would have taken that to if she could have figured out a way. My little brother was a minor. I took him in so he wouldn't have to go to foster homes and then he moved back to Arizona where his friends were when he turned 18. He is doing OK now. Going to college and stuff but that is no thanks to our dad or his golddigger **** of a wife. I still have bad feelings for her and would probably spit on her grave if I ever went there. My dad though I have made peace with. He was a product of his enviornment and his parents upbringing and I have learned to accept that he did the best that he could with what he had. He gave me the one thing that I needed the most and that is the spark of life. Now I have to learn to grow and become a better man and go beyond where my upbringing took me and I am doing that. I don't have any animosity for him any more.
Bob | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 10:45:50 AM | First of all I commend you OP for confronting your feelings and trying to sort them out and seek answers beyond yourself.. You will most likely never feel warm and fuzzy about your dad and thats OK!
The best you can do right now is put it in perspective and try to garner some inner peace... Forgiveness and letting go sure isn't easy but something you do for yourself..
Even though we are adults in this world , there is still the inner child inside each of us...
That child has an expectation of how his/he parents should be... Every child has a reasonable expectation to be loved protected and nurtured by our parents... But the sad reality is parents are flawed human beings, and despite their best intentions for us, can wreck havoc on a child's soul.. you carry that broken child within you which is why you feel so much pain and rightly so..
I wish this for you.. That one day you may step back and bury your fathers failings along with him and extinguish the pain holding you back and move forward with renewed perspective and maybe ...just maybe one day repeat the words:
"Dad, I blame you for nothing and forgive your everything"..and mean it..
It's about taking back control of your worth and nurturing that inner child and moving past pain... Do not allow your Dad's painful legacy to dictate and prevent you from being a human being at peace...
Don't hesitate to seek counseling.. Its the holidays and a particularly rough time for so many who have lost their parents irregardless of the relationship shared..
God bless | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 11:05:21 AM | Dont know if this will help you but understanding it helped me.
You are a genetic combination of your mum and dad. They were the combinations of others!
Your dad lives on inside you and you are allowing the negative side of your dad to effect you! Just simply take whatever it was that you like about your dad and go with that and turn the other stuff off! It kinda happens naturally after awhile! If theres nothing you liked about your dad, just turn him off completely! Turn your mum or your grandad on!
I had a philandering father. Put my mum through hell! However he was always a good samaritan to strangers! So I dont do the philandering bit..but I try to do the samaritan bit! Get it! My dads been dead for same time as yours! we dont row at all now! | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 11:20:27 AM | There is a wonderful book called Homecoming by John Bradshaw, which deals with inner child work and childhood trauma.Another is The power of Now by Ekhart Tolle.Abuse in childhood affects the ability to bond,to connect, trust and attachment.Living in constant fear creates anxiety disorders and profoundly lowers self worth.We crave what we do not have and so these kids end up craving approval, love and affection.Parents of this ilk are so unpredictable,a kid has to constantly monitor its environment to check mood and body language. The abused kid is forever watchful.
The saddest thing is that the child grows up with a misplaced guilt, thinking there was something wrong with him/her.Looking like the abusive parent, is just a result of genetics, but as someone said, it made them feel bad.I know people who are ill from the stress of old anger/ bitterness and pain. High BP, stomach disorders, anxiety , you name it.Holding all this anger, does not affect the one abusive one, it affects the victim.One is continuing the abuse, by abusing oneself.It is sad people are often taught to hate themselves and to believe they are worthless.They believed the lies, and the putdowns, because the person who taught them was supposed to love them.
I think all who posted here, know this for the outrageous lie it was.It seems to have created compassion, empathy and loving kindness in you, qualities that only exist in the infinitely valuable and loving heart.They were weak, but you are strong and getting stronger.Much love to all of you.Let it go Op and start living your life as the real you, free from bitterness and pain. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/10/2008 8:43:12 PM | OP - I know how you feel. My mother died 15 years ago and when I think about what she did to me day in and day out for 18 years I just cry. I have done very well in my life despite that, but now that my father just died a few weeks ago, it has all come back when I ask him now why he didn't save me from her knowing what she was capable of. Child abuse is forever - you don't just "get over it" - it is imprinted in the very core of your being. You need to be around people (friends) who understand, accept you the way you are, and aren't afraid to listen or cry with you when you want to talk about it.
It makes dating much more complicated. I used to have a boyfriend who got very irritated when I told him anything about the way I grew up. He didn't want to hear about it so I had to pretend that my childhood and past didn't exist. My next BF was much more compassionate and said that it was remarkable that I turned out so well. I remember one night driving by the cemetary where my mother was buried, and bawled my eyes out all of the way home, asking her why? How could she hurt a little child? How could she show so much contempt and hate towards me? I have chronic pain from old injuries. She would yank my waist length hair and backhand me across the face constantly - I now have 3 disks removed and a titanium plate in my neck. She hated children and yet I was the last of 5. She threatened to sterilize me with a broom handle so I didn't get "knocked up". Im 45 and to this day I haven't let a man get me "knocked up" because I'm so fearful that it will ruin my life like it did hers - thanks mom for making it near impossible to have a healthy, trusting relationship with a man.
I paid a psychic at a Ren Fair to see what she said - she says "Your mother says she's sorry" - Well - I'm telling my mother it's way too little too late. Burning in hell is too good for child beaters.
OP - Don't let people tell you that feeling anger is not ok - it means you're human - it means you're normal. Just don't take your anger out on others or you will end up like him and not even realize it. A child deserves to feel safe, protected, and loved, and not hurt by the very hands that are supposed to supply those needs. I'm sorry we didn't get that and it should give us all the more compassion and understanding to children who are suffering from abuse. I also know that I am much stronger than some little whiner who thinks they were abused because one of their toys were taken away. I don't need to numb myself with drugs or alcohol, I'm soft spoken and hate violence, never been in prison or rehab, make my own way in this world, I'm kind to children and animals, so if I need to vent to the proper source or reveal my mother's dirty little secrets (something she would have hated) and have a good cry once in a while so be it. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/12/2008 8:39:47 AM | Sorry for your loss first of all. Death can bring about different emotions. There are different stages of grief. So don't feel bad about maybe being angry at him for dying. As you must feel you should have resolved things with him before he died. Did he ask for you before he died ? Sometimes that puts quilt on a person.
Don't go to his grave unless you feel you want to. Don't worry about what people will think. Its all about getting things resolved in your heart with your dad.
Sometimes too much hurt keeps a person from healing after a death.
Good luck in whatever you decide. Just be a better father to your own children. Show your dad that you became a better person than he ever was. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/12/2008 8:51:04 AM | I think I understand OP.
When my mother died it was a mixture of grief, sadness and....relief? I found that I had been released from her judgement, but still kept all the things she had taught me. My mother was always so busy trying to fix people, me especially, that she never got to know them (me especially, her eldest child). Her death was my freedom from her always oppressive opinion of how I lived my life.
Now I feel nothing but love and empathy for her. I miss her.
Forgiveness isnt about the one you forgive, it's about you. Do it for yourself, OP. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/12/2008 9:00:12 AM | | You have your feelings and no one can change them. If we said yes your wrong would it change the way your feel inside about your father???? no it would not. When or even If you are over the anger against your father is the only time you're gonna go see his grave. no one here can change that. That comes from within you and only you. I hope that you will one day forgive your father and visit his grave. But thats a chioce you make by what you feel in your heart. The only gurdge you should have is that you never made up with your father while he was alive. Ya know I belive the deceast can hear us and see us both. Why dont you go to the grave and speak what you feel to your father, forgive him, and move on with your life. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/23/2008 6:28:18 PM | I'm going to go at this from a different angle.
I always tell people that you can hate the "action" without hating the person who committed it.
I am guessing that despite the abuse (the "action") the OP loved his father, just as most of us love our parents. He still wants his father's approval.
I saw this so much with my husbands family. The children do not approve of something their father does, and state categorically they hate him. Yet I would always see the two of them vying for his attention in small ways. From each of them I would hear how he favoured the other. To show emotion in front of him was apparently a reason to be ridiculed.
I think those of us raised by two loving parents we can't criticize are in the minority. There is so much family dysfunctionality out there.
Counselling might help the OP deal with his feelings. Going to the cemetary can be a healing time - it is as close as we can get to those who have left us for a better place. I still talk to my husband. I have his ashes waiting to be buried in the spring when we can plant an oak tree for him.
OP, your feelings are not wrong. Your father may not have been able to show his love for you, because no one ever made it safe for HIM to express love, and he may not have had an example to follow. It is up to you to break the cycle and learn to show love openly...so that your children can follow your role model in the future. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/23/2008 7:58:54 PM | Hi Gilly,
In answer to your question, it is this...you haven't forgiven your father for what he did to you as a child. Everyone carries around some degree of anger and regret about something or another, it is when we consciously choose to let go of the anger that the good things in life can begin to happen.
My step-father was a nightmare and used to beat our entire family.....I grew up scared of most men and hating him for what he did to us. Fastforward to 17 years later and I get a phone call that he died of a heart attack....did I feel bad, not really, no love lost. I did however realize that I had to forgive him for being the monster that he was before I could begin to really live again....does that make sense?
I spent most of my youth and part of my adult life carrying around this anger and harboring a lot of hatred and once he died, I felt like a chapter had ended and I could breathe again. I made my peace with him once he died and have since moved on to the bigger and better possibilities my life has to offer.....he is gone and can't hurt me anymore so that's how my story ended.
One story ending and a new one begins...hope this helps and you need to forgive him and yourself and allow yourself to grieve and move past this all....it will only serve to help you with this anger and moving past it all. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/23/2008 8:04:47 PM | | I noticed one thing throughout the whole thread....not a one person even said "Heck yeah...go to the grave and pee on it!" I've known some who would do that kind of thing....and some who would be on the "deserve list" IF I did that kind of thing! Guess a lot of people have that string of respect for the dead adhering to us. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/23/2008 8:13:47 PM | Unfinished business, ..let people go that have gone to the grave and you have to find forgiveness...as that is the only way I can let the ghosts go from my past...My father who never said he was proud of me, in his own way , I have to believe he loved me. We didn't get on, but we were so different. And I can't change it now. And the truth be known I was a bit of a nightmare for him too.
I have to believe that, especially at Christmas time. We learn from others mistakes, and not to pass on any of that toxicness to your kids. | |
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| why am i still arguing with my father 4 years after we buried him ?
Posted: 12/23/2008 8:53:24 PM | | My belief is this; Your father is not there so why go. You can still talk to your father on the other side. To each their own visiting gravesites for some is comforting. Me personally I don't like them. Little story ; I had an issue many years ago with my brother and we were never able to deal with it so to speak. He was tragically killed a few years back in a house fire and we were never able to deal with the issue. I had a dream one night and he came to me through the dream we were finally able to resolve the issue and now I have complete closure with him. So try it you just never know what miracle can happen. Good Luck | |
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