Holiday Reminder: My Father is a Sociopath (Part 3)

To: Dad

From: Me

Date: December 30, 2014 at 8:51AM

I had a hard time sleeping last night. Your email upset me, but I suppose that was probably your intent. When I woke up next to my kind & endlessly supportive husband, to the sounds of our sweet son chattering to himself in the next room, I felt better. 

I thought about just letting you have the last word. Why bother with giving you another ounce of my energy? But you've already had your say, many times before. Your reminder last night reads as though you didn't bother to read my last note to you in 2012, so I'll paste it in at the end, just in case you can take it in this year. 

You show the true colors of your dark character by cursing my husband to the misery of your relationship with my mother & estranged daughter. I don't have a crystal ball, but I don't see his story ending up like yours. He's a good man who does everything in his power to do right by his family. He supports me in every way. He is present for his child. I have no fear that he'll ditch out while our son is still a toddler, or refuse to take his phone calls as a teenager, or punish him for someone else's financial choices before he even goes off to college. I know that my husband will be there for his child for the entire duration of his life. Because in addition to being an amazing husband, he's a wonderful & loving father. 

I don't think it's the least bit ironic that you had to find others to take on the role of partner & child. Irony indicates that the result is the opposite of what is expected. I don't think any rational person would expect that I keep going back to a well that's so obviously dry, so naturally you would need someone else. You've been married 5 times, so apparently you can reel 'em in, but seem to struggle a bit with keeping them on the the hook once they get to the dock. Maybe this time will be different. I'm not sure whether you've had the opportunity to have a relationship with someone else in the daughter role, but if you're hoping to be more successful, I would recommend a different strategy than what you've used with me. 

Best of luck to you & Sarah. She seemed like a genuinely nice lady when I met her so many years ago. I know the two of you have a long history & I hope that she takes good care of you. 

I'm going to go have breakfast with my beautiful family. Thanks for reminding me of exactly the kind of parent that I don't want to be. 

Holiday Reminder: My Father is a Sociopath (part 2)

From: Dad

To: Me

Subject: Obama plans another abomination!

Date: December 9, 2014 at 6:55PM

[article about Jane Fonda being honored as a Person of the Century despite a visit to a POW camp during the Vietnam War, which many veterans understandably view as treason]

From: Me

To: Dad

Subject: Re: Obama plans another abomination!

Date: December 29, 2014 at 7:18PM

Another butt dial, I presume. 

From: Dad

To: Me

Subject: Re: Obama plans another abomination!

Date: December 29, 2014 at 7:48PM

Yes, I was trying to remove the number from the call log and it dialed again, for which I apologize -- again. I was surprised by your call and the caller ID. 

From: Dad

To: Me

Subject: Re: Obama plans another abomination!

Date: December 29, 2014 at 7:56PM

Why would you have that FB link? I suspect that it would be anathema to you and yours. I've seen it before and sent it to several girlfriends of about 55 year vintage but not to you, I don't believe. If I did, in error, then I apologize for THAT too.

Politics and personal history is and will continue to be an uncrossable chasm. I do not, however, intend to burden you with my opinions. All I can do is offer my most profound apologies for intruding on your life. I should, perhaps, try to expurgate any and all contact info for you. I was not even aware that you actually answered your phone. You told me once that you did not. Foolishly, I believed you.

One last time, my most profound apologies.

From: Me

To: Dad

Subject: Re: Obama plans another abomination!

Date: December 29, 2014 at 9:42PM

No idea why you would send a Jane Fonda link to me, just replying to it. I assumed it was an error & initially ignored it as such, but when I saw a missed call from your number on my mobile phone this evening I made the silly assumption that you were reaching out. I called back from my current home phone because I don't have reliable service on my mobile in rural Pennsylvania. You've made it clear that was unnecessary. 

Message received. Take care. 

From: Dad

To: Me

Subject: Re: Obama plans another abomination!

Date: December 30, 2014 at 12:10AM

I was always willing to talk to you, but your husband put the kibosh to that in our last conversation a couple of years back. He didn't like me the first time he ever met me and I learned quickly enough, that he was rude, dishonest and generally an asshole so far as I was concerned. 

I sincerely hope that he has as much joy of your marriage and your child as I experienced with your mother and you. 

I also despised your making fun, by way of 'edgy' cartoon cards, of my personal situation, a situation that has caused me great pain and anxiety for most of my life. My friends understand that. My daughter apparently did not.

Again I apologize for accessing your email and phone. My phone and email has not changed, nor is it likely to. I did erase your phone number so that I will not inadvertently dial you again. If it is of any interest, Sarah, whom you met at mom's funeral and afterward at the house in 1996 is coming out here to live with me. Her daughter is all for it. She has known me since she was a baby. She actually likes me and wants to be family along with her mother. 

Odd, hmmh? And the tiniest bit ironic I think.

******************************************************

To sum this up, in case it was lost in the threads, after more than 2 years of not speaking, my father sent me a politically charged email earlier this month. I assumed that he included me in error & ignored it. This evening, I missed a call from him on my mobile phone. An email & a phone call without a voicemail suggested, at least in my mind, that he was reaching out. It's the holidays. Maybe the sentimentality got to him. 

So after the boy was in bed, I called my father back from the house phone. He was friendly when he picked up & I identified myself. After brief pleasantries, he asked, "how can I help you?" 

"You called me, so I'm calling back."

"No, I didn't. Maybe I butt dialed you."

"Okay, happy holidays."

Then the emails, as detailed above. So now I can't sleep, because I'm reminded yet again that my father actually *hates* me. I try not to pull the Now That I'm a Parent card, but SERIOUSLY, I cannot begin to imagine willfully & repeatedly hurting my sweet son in the ways that my father has hurt me over the years. He can't ever just leave it alone. He has to make sure that he's issued a painfully obvious decree of what trash I am to him. Every time. 

My biological father is cruel & I feel sorry for him.  He obviously has some dark storms in his head.  Since he's almost 72, I don't hold out much hope for the clouds parting.  I've simply made the choice to not be his lightening rod. Good luck & best wishes to him, his lady friend Sarah, & Sarah's daughter. They're going to need it. 

Holiday Reminder: My Father is a Sociopath (part 1)

From: Me

To: Dad

Subject: Re: Your mailing address ...

Date: May 23, 2012 at 12:19AM

Hello again,

You have the correct Starbucks email address, but I didn’t receive yesterday's CC there.  My filters have your addresses listed as 'safe', but I had also issues receiving something from a vendor last
week.  We just received a message from our security team about phishing yesterday, so the Postini team has probably applied a finer mesh to the company filters.

Alas, we had to move from the East John Street address in mid-March due to sketchy building management, so our new physical address is as follows:

16th Ave

Seattle, WA

My contact info as you have it listed:

Eva Anne
206-XXX-XXX1 ...  Old work mobile phone that was cancelled when I went on Sabbatical
206-XXX-XXX2 ...  Mobile phone
206-XXX-XXX3 ...  Office phone

724-XXX-XXXX ... Eva Anne's husband

The phone numbers are also correct across the board (with the one cancellation), although the spelling of my original middle name is not.  As one of the two people who named me, I’d think that you’d know that it was Ann without an E (very unromantic according to Anne of Green Gables) on my birth certificate.  I went the Dorothy Kline route when I got married, taking my maiden name as my official middle name.

You certainly have my permission to list me as your next of kin, but that is your decision.  My only requirement is very clear documentation about your wishes.

Now on to other business...

Despite the fact that you seem to think that you know me very well & can so easily compartmentalize all of the characteristics that you seem to dislike – your liberal yuppie feminist daughter [insert
eyeroll here] – I’m afraid you missed the mark on the constantly checking my mobile device & email part.  I’m all over my work email while I'm at my desk - M-F, 6AM-4PM - & then I go home for the day.  I do stay tuned into Facebook most of the time because it amuses me, but that’s pretty much it.  I don't allow notification push & most of the time my phone is on vibrate. Even when my phone is sitting in front of me, if I don’t recognize the number on my phone (i.e. it doesn’t map to a contact), I don’t answer because 99.9% of the time it’s a robocall (thanks for nothing, Do Not Call List).  I unplug & check out because otherwise there’s too much noise.  I don’t have a desire to stare at a glowing screen or listen to rings & chimes all the time.  I got into the habit while we were in Belize because we had no other choice & ended up preferring the quiet.

I truly missed your recent messages in the vast sea of advertisements in my gmail.  I did a search on your name & found this request (with 3 messages in an hour).  Looks like you got yourself pretty worked up in no time at all.  I’ll put it to you like you put it to me when I was about 11 years old & rather hopefully asked if you missed me: you’re not the only thing that I think about.  You are literally the only actual person who still sends me emails here.  Everyone else that I care to keep in touch with is on Facebook & interacts there.  Just last week, I directed my loyal best friend of 24 years to my work email because she told me I'd missed something important.  I sincerely explained how I missed your emails & you basically told me that I’m a dumbass for not telling gmail how to take out the garbage. I check gmail once a week or two to scan for legitimate stuff, but obviously I’m not perfect & do miss things.  Pointing you back to my (apparently impenetrable, *shakes fist at Postini*) work email was
meant to be helpful & welcoming, not circuitous or contrary.  Things change.

I read your response to my husband.  Once.  That was enough.  Such venom in the terribly hateful things that you say.   It does seem like you’re enthusiastically embracing a new reason to fly into a rage & discard your daughter for the 3rd time in 19 years.

!!!  You made sure that my husband knows that you weren't interested in getting back in touch with me or repairing our relationship in 2009.  That's absolutely not what you said at the time & I have the
emails to prove it, but I suppose there's no time like the present for telling the truth ... although we probably could have avoided some of this ugliness if you'd have just bluntly told me to fuck off in the
first place.

!!!  You didn’t trust me when I first reached out to get back in touch with you because you thought I would launch into "another tirade". Huh?  Unwarranted nastiness is your specialty, not mine.  I think
you're confusing me with my mother.  Again.

!!!  You think I conspired with my mother throughout my childhood to keep you away.  Are you fucking kidding me?  I was 2 when you & my mother got divorced.  TWO.  I talked about you constantly & BEGGED to spend more time with you.  I wasn't allowed to call you ("long distance costs money & your dad doesn't pay child support!"), I was discouraged from sending letters (see the prior refrain, just replace long distance with stamps), & certainly couldn't drive myself to Ohio. When I broke through to puberty & could actually think for myself I started calling collect & asking to live with you, with my mother intervening again & asserting sole custody.  Seriously, that is delusional horseshit.

It was about money in 1993 & 1996, when your misplaced anger & cruelty that should have been directed at your 5th ex-wife, the adult who was at the root of that issue, rather than your child.   Considering that you immmediately went to child support in your response to my husband & claiming
that you’ve always had to take care of yourself, I have to wonder if your problem isn’t about money now.  I am a yuppie after all, makin’ that corporate bank.  Or maybe it’s the misplaced anger again, since you’ve mentioned your absence from my Mother’s Day blog twice in your most recent rants.  Mother’s Day is about MOTHERS.  Family photos aren't like Getty Images; they don't require a copyright.  I respect that you’ve lived your life as a female for many years, but the biological reality is that you are my father.  Had you not decided to unload all of this jealous drama, you probably could’ve looked forward to a similar post on June 17th because, remarkably, I have fond memories of you, but I think that ship has probably sailed.

For the record, you can blame the great State of Ohio for your loss of Inheritance, since that’s who ultimately filed the lien for back child support.  My mother’s lawyer told her that he couldn’t take her money for the case because the Department of Health & Human Services had beaten her to the punch.  Do you think that Grandma never talked about your delinquency at work?  You’d been on their radar for YEARS.  I also spoke to Aunt Debi & Uncle Jack on the subject in the following year & neither of them held any ill will toward me or my mother.  Your defense of your brothers is unconvincing, since you were the one who wanted the money the most.  Further, your claim that our portion - $20K to cover what you'd missed from 2 through 18, I saw the check - was fully half of Grandma's legacy is bullshit.  Due to the wonders of public records, I am aware that Grandma's will basically said to sell
it all & divide the proceeds 3 ways.  I do math for a living.  Don't piss on my shoe & tell me it's raining.

You have neglected to consider how much I hurt during the 12 years after you LAST told me that you wanted nothing to do with me & as I've just learned, had absolutely no regrets or qualms about ditching me altogether.  Despite the fact that I initiated contact, busting through all that baggage is much harder than I thought.  Reconnecting isn't a piece of cake, despite best intentions.  Am I above criticism? Nope.  But I sure as hell won't be blasted for being a bad pen pal by the very person who has told his only daughter to get out of his life on multiple occasions.  In the past 3 years, you've randomly unloaded your toxic shit on me at least 4 times.  I've NEVER responded in kind or torn into you about how worthless & unwanted you've made me feel since I was 13.  I'm a forgiving person, but I never forget.  Vicious words have always implanted themselves deeply into my memory & you've
offered up a lot of them with no apology, only self-righteous justification & deputization of responsibility.  It's never your fault.  According to you, I'm responsible for how I feel AND how you feel.  You've shown no recognition of the fact that I am, by nature, a supremely sensitive person.  Since it seemed that you saw that trait when I was a kid, I have to assume that you're willfully ignoring that detail now & just don't care.  I understand that you don't feel that I communicate as much as you'd like me to.  You need to understand that I will give you what I've got.  I have emotional boundaries.  Take it or leave it.

I grew up in an abusive household & as a result have a pretty strict No Abuse policy.  You've crossed the line.  So let me be perfectly clear: I will not be treated, spoken to, or about, in the way you have
over the past few days.  If you've already made the decision to write me off again, so be it, but I will not engage in this garbage any further.

The only thing I’d like to apologize for is the e-cards from last Father’s Day.  I intended for them to be funny, but I clearly missed the signal that they were very poorly received & upset you.  Had I realized that at the time, I would have apologized immediately.  That was insensitive & I am sorry.