I am a grown man but had a rough childhood. Although my father never rose above the position of counselor in the ward Sunday School Presidency, he was super, super strict about everything. In many ways, I was emotionally and physically abused.

For example, I was the only person in my high school who had a missionary haircut. My father would cut my hair every two weeks. This was during the 60's and 70's when boys wore their hair long. As a result, I could not find a girlfriend. No high school dates for me. No Senior prom, etc. All of my classmates were non-members and were having a great time without me and my uber-LDS standards.

The only school my father would pay for was BYU. Not that I minded going all that much because I had to get out of the house. At any rate, my father did not like Dallin Oaks at all because he was "way too liberal." So, you get the idea.

My parents had a horrible marriage, and my parents would fight through the night regularly during my youth. I could never have friends over because a fight might, and usually did, erupt. At any rate, my mom divorced my dad and left.

My dad forced the Boy Scouts on me, even though he knew I hated it. He said it was the program of the Church. Then he sent me on a mission. Eventually, I married -- because I was indoctrinated by TSCC, was starving for sex, and needed to get away from my father, to be quite honest.

At any rate, when my father turned 70 or so, he became totally inactive in the Church. He stopped attending church, would not pay tithing, stopped wearing garmies, and told the bishop he didn't want any church contact. He learned to make friends with the neighbors, had several girlfriends, etc.

For the first time, he was really enjoying life although he was getting on in years. I should be happy for him, right?

So, here is my dilemma -- although I am happy that my father found happiness in his later years, I am still struggling to find mine. He imprisoned me in the LDS Church, causing me considerable psychological harm. By the time he found his freedom, I was trapped in a Mormon marriage and am unable to experience the freedom and liberation that he enjoyed.

Don't get me wrong -- my father meant well and was not evil. In some ways, he was a very loving father.

But should I resent him for screwing up my life?

This Be The Verse
BY PHILIP LARKIN

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don’t have any kids yourself.

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/178055

That's a good poem. Thanks for sharing.


P.S. I hate my father for all the extras--uncountable and unnecessarily painful episodes of added torture.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/11/2014 07:44PM by donbagley.

The part about the "extras" that especially stings is that they are "just for you." It implies that had you been different you might not have received them.

That's how I lived for too many years, believing my "extras" were justified, deserved even.

Exactly. I like the way you think.

Don't should on yourself. Sounds like you DO resent him. I can certainly understand why. Resentment is a main reason we all come here. It's painful. We want peace. Good luck on your journey. My only advice is to accept your feelings as valid. No should or shouldn't, just there.

I tend to be too blunt here because of time constraints and my culture. Sorry if I hurt feelings.

Resentment or hate is a poison we drink that we hope will hurt the other person.

I don't want to say grow a pair, but really, you need to grow a pair.

You dad fed you, groomed you (gasp, out of style), housed you and gave you reasonable disciple (for a TBM). oh and offere to pay for your college education (no way! how awful).

He did the best he could with hte information he had, he though he was called and you were chosen and special.

At one point, as adults, we need to stop shifting our dissapointment that the world was not perfect not our parents. We all resent we grew up and were not as atractive, smart and gifted as we hoped or had been told. We usually, without knowing, shift this dissapointment to our parents.

Unless you left out that your dad noodled you, sold you, burned you, broke bones or told you you were worthless, then move on. Even if had abused you that way, you still need to grow beyond your circumstances and stop being a victim.

Become the bigger person, Become a man.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/12/2014 01:35PM by erictheex.

And here's the opposite approach. Stuffing your feelings might be the best way. It works for a lot of people.

its not stuffing, its getting past them, learning the lesson and choose to stop being an emotional invalid.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/11/2014 03:11PM by erictheex.

erictheex Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> its not stuffing, its getting past them, learning
> the lesson and choose to stop being an emotional
> invalid.

Being upset because of a lifetime of manipulation by someone who takes no responsibility is entirely valid. Many of us have lost everything or gained a life we are uncomfortable with but now have responsibilities to as a consequence of ill conceived lies from people we trusted and fraudulent institutions that controlled our childhoods in anticipation of profit. "Buck up" and "just get past it" are the last things in the world that an invalid needs to hear. I had MRSA a few years ago and almost died, just get past it is a nonsensical piece of advice. An emotional invalid needs to be told that he's not alone and he can get through it even though it is difficult. Emotions like this are not the kind of thing that you can just greet and pass like a car passing a cyclist. If you do I can promise that you're not dealing with them and one day they will all catch up to you at the same time and you will not have the skill set to process them. Believe me I know.

What the OP posted as is not what people would describe as "abuse". The point of therapy of anykind is to move past things, to interpret things as they really are and make sure they dont control you anymore. Sure, he felt he was terribly abused, but he is asking of he should hold resentment, as if he is making a choice.

My suggestion, if he has a choice is not to hold on to it. whether it takes 70 years of therapy to deal with the fact that his dad would "only" pay for BYU.

I never said his feelings were not vaild or that he should ignore the problem or pass it as a car passed a byclycle. (you are really good at playing victim in your own life, I see).

But all of us need to do whatever is best for us. Hoding resentment is damaging and often becomes an excuse, albeit a good one, to fail in other aspects of our life.

His resentment is HIS to own and deal with. Being upset becuase of a "lifetime of manipulation" as you put it, is diferent that being upset for an entire lifetime, becuase you at that point, you have chosen to manipulate yourself.

We all have to grow up sometime. Not that it isnt hard. If your daddy never bought you new shoes or cut your hair short, really...grow up, it's healthy.

I have a non-profit that does work in some ugly areas of the world. Trust ME, I see people that did not have such 1st world problems and experienced REAL abuse and have CHOSEN to be happy and let it go. It is a choice.

If you want to indulge Nelson Mandela wannabe (the OP) the go ahead, but as for me, there are bigger issues that self indulgence in defeatist attitudes.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/12/2014 02:26PM by erictheex.

What the OP posted is precisely what people would describe as abuse, if it is being describe accurately.

I'm with erictheex.

I am of the opinion that the word 'abuse' gets slung around FAR too liberally on this board. What I read does not sound like abuse, but a father who was involved in his son's life, doing the best he could with the brainwashing he was born into.

Your dad is out of it now. Why don't you revive your relationship, appreciate all the sacrifices he made for you, and laugh together about all the mormon nonsense that you *both* fell for?

>> By the time he found his freedom, I was trapped in a Mormon marriage and am unable to experience the freedom and liberation that he enjoyed.

>> I am stuck in a marriage with a TBM and all that that entails. Divorce is not an option.

You're wrong. Divorce is an option for you just like it is for everybody else. You just need to man up and own it.

I know how you feel because I was in that same boat. I know what it means to be trapped in a marriage with a random incompatible person you only married for religion and sex. I know the sense of loss when you realize all the freedom and liberation you never had and never will have. Guess what? I chose divorce, and all the financial and child custody disasters that come with it. And we're both happier now.

You need to make up your mind. Commit 100% or get divorced, but don't mope around blaming whoever you can for trapping you with that woman. Be a man and end it.

>> I was the only person in my high school who had a missionary haircut. My father would cut my hair every two weeks. This was during the 60's and 70's when boys wore their hair long. As a result, I could not find a girlfriend.

That's just silly. I promise Brad Pitt could find a date, even with a missionary haircut :) But seriously, a father cutting his son's hair sounds like the opposite of abuse.

>> The only school my father would pay for was BYU

Mine didn't even pay for BYU, and I didn't expect him to. I got a job and put myself through school. (And I also paid for my immature TBM wife's school, who wouldn't work and expected everything to be handed to her ... But now we're getting back to that divorce topic again :)

I have similar feelings for my dad who did a lot of things that your dad did to you. While I think it would be great if he would accept some accountability for his actions, I also think that he was super unhappy and trying his best to hide it. When I used to hide my disenchantment for the Church, I would have all this anger inside and even though I do my best not to take it out on anyone, it slips out occasionally. I think you should cut him some slack and at least be grateful that you broke the chains earlier than he did.

Here is my 2 cents. I don't think it is fair to resent your father any more than it is fair for your kids to resent you. Your father did what he thought was right, to the best of his abilities. He learned as he went and always thought he was doing right by you.

It is impossible to determine how your life would have been different if your father had been different. It might have been better or it might have been worse. Since you don't know what the other dimension would have held, you simply cannot hold what might have been against him.

My wife has said many times how much she wishes her childhood were different. She was always afraid of her father. They lived in poverty for much of her childhood. She is one of 12 kids. Her father always lived a very strict version of mormonism. She even was left homeless for a while because her father wanted to teach her a lesson after her brother defrauded her.

I usually counteract her argument by pointing out that that is what made her who she is, and if it weren't for everything in our lives before we met we would not have met and would not have been perfect for each other. We both have met with a lot of success in our lives, have 2 great kids and are very ahppily living outside the mormon sphere. It would have been great if certain things had never happened to either of us in our past but it is what lead us to where we are now. Your childhood and parent are just a base, Once you take over you build your life as you wish.

and find a way to reframe it in a way that will help you make the best of it.

So, be honest about how you actually feel, not how you should or shouldn't feel. Then consider why he acted the way he did, including his motivations, his blind spots, etc. You already said you think he meant well. I know that my parents truly believed what they taught me. That shifts the blame to the church itself. Realizing that goes a long way towards reconciliation. Recognizing the good as well as the bad in your past can also help.

I think at some point, you might need to clear the air with him. Maybe even with a counselor present. If you can tell him how you felt, and he could say he's sorry and mean it, it might heal your relationship.

But ultimately, I do think that it would be really hard to let resentment go if you are not living the life you want and you believe that it's his fault. You said you feel trapped in your Mormon marriage. He certainly put you on that path, but you are the only one who can choose something different now, if that's what you want. I read heart wrenching stories every day here on the board about the hardship of dealing with a TBM spouse and redefining those relationships. So I'm not minimizing the difficulty of that. I know it can feel like you are trapped, and there are real consequences for rocking that boat. But you are the only one who can actually change your circumstances.

Best of luck.

Making peace with your parent usually requires a lot of interaction with that parent. Are you able to do that, or not? If not, then you are certainly entitled to your feelings, but be aware that they will eat away at you. Your dad did the best he could with what he had at the time. When he knew better, he did better. In a lot of ways he was victimized by the Mormon church just as much as you were.

Since I teach urban kids, I could tell you some tales about truly awful parenting. If the worst your father did was force bad haircuts and BYU on you, you got off easily. If it gives you any comfort, my mom always insisted that I get a haircut before every school picture, always with painfully short bangs. I looked like Spock from Star Trek, every time. And I had exactly one date in high school, and it was not fun. Feel better?

I guess the question you might want to ask is, how can you make your life better right now?

Of all the people I could quote, imagine this:

Richard M. Nixon: Always remember: others may hate you. But those who hate you don't win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself.

I know you used they word resent which is much milder, but the principle is the same.

Your father wasn't kind to you, so at least be kind to yourself. Forget him if you can because it will be good for you. He'll never know.

In a similar situation, I wrote to a sibling and laid it all on the line. There was no response, he is friendlier, but in the end it allowed me to forget all that had happened and drop some anger. I am a firm believer that anger needs to be expressed in a calm, carefully thought out manner with a bit of class.

I did this specifically because I could not get past it without expressing myself. I stuffed it down too many times as a Mormon, I turned it off, and all I hurt was myself.

If you express yourself, do not expect any special result. Just do it for yourself. Take it from somebody who can bury things all the way to China.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/11/2014 07:28PM by blueorchid.

To me, being healthy means being in balance. There's time in life to be angry and resentful, and there's time to do other things. Both are ok.

Getting out of balance would be either never saying your angry with your Dad, or the opposite, trying to hurt him in vengeance.

Be angry in balance, and happy about the good things in life the rest of the time when you're not angry.

Yes, Yes, Yes!!!

What's wrong with hating the shit out of a parent?

Are you a Saint?

Maybe? You sound incredibly sensible and well behaved.

But, how can you get past anything in life if you don't look at it the issue truthfully, face it head on, cuss, swear and curse it to death. Don't take action into your hands and use violence to hurt anyone, but I doubt you would ever consider this approach.

Writing letters to your father, Wife, etc... expressing all the negative emotions stored up helps. Send your letter to your pop or don't send it, it's your choice. I keep all mine on file just as a reminder of my rage. Then, I modify my letters from time to time and laugh at most of my remarks. Some of my letters are pretty damn funny and I laugh out loud. Maybe I'm healing?

Don't minimize the anger or resentment you have -- just get rid of it in a positive form.

But, yeah -- parents can really piss a kid off!!

It's understandable and valid, I think, but you don't need to live in that place.

I have a long list myself of sh*t my parents did wrong (I haven't spoken to my mother in 18 years as of May) but I try to let go of as much of it as I can. I can't change it. It doesn't do anyone any good for me to sit and fume about it.

I have looked at my past, examined it, learned from it... but I *try* not to live in it.

Create a life you love, and realize that releasing your father might turn out to be much more freeing for you than it ever would be for him.

You need to feel about him any way you want to. You and I are no

longer in the church . the church is no longer dictating to us

what we should feel and what we should do.

Enjoy your freedom.... you're a man, act like it. Feel how you

want to without asking a board full of strangers how you "should"

feel. Go out and live an authentic life of your own chosing,

because asking others for permission to feel a certain way is

very unmanly. Be you , be who you are. you don't need our

permission.

Never deny the feelings that you have. The Morg made us do that. They are real and need to be faced, for us to become stronger.

You've already given your father too much. Don't give him any more. Don't allow your natural resentment to poison your life. Face your feelings, deal with them (and him) and move on. The best revenge (redemption?) is dealing with your own situation in a real way as best you can. I hope you can find your own way.

Several of those things sound like my Dad, I resented the hell out of the force tube-fed mormonism, I am pretty much over it now, and I am mostly just relieved I get to be my own dysfunctional self. I feel mostly sorry for my Dad now, his options were much more limited than my own, where he grew up I doubt there was a single book within 200 miles that had anything remotely critical of the church. He lived much of his life truly repressed, he never really had much of a chance.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/12/2014 09:02AM by ladell.

Sometimes the easiest way through something like this is to resent away, to embrace your resentment, and to get it out of your system. It may be easier to ultimately move on if you allow yourself ton feel the resentment and not to feel guilty about it. Don't let it take over your life, but validate your own feelings.

Your parents may have done the best they knew how to do, and their upbringing may have been even worse than yours. But they made you be different by forcing a religion on you. You don't have to be grateful for that.

You don't want to be a victim for the rest of your life. Sometimes for the short term, however, acknowledging that your parents screwed you over, even if it was done with the best of intentions, can be a good thing.

While you probably wish the very best for your father, it has to be a bit difficult to see how easily he has moved on while you're still struggling.

I can't tell from your post - is your father still alive? If so, maybe try talking to him about your feelings. Perhaps he realizes all the mistakes he made raising you. Could be he thinks you're living a happy life and has just decided not to say anything about his mistakes because he doesn't see them causing problems for you. No guarantees that you'll have a "happily ever after" sort of conversation. But it might be a way for you to get some closure.

My father has passed on so talking with him is not an option.

BTW, he asked to be cremated, so he was not buried in temple clothing.

As I said, he was a good man in many ways but while he was able to find his freedom, I am stuck in a marriage with a TBM and all that that entails. Divorce is not an option.

This sounds like a job for SusieQ#1 or Annagrammy.

(they both have capes, don't they?)

Should you resent your father? I have no idea what you * should * do; that is none of my business.

Did your father screw up your life? How much of your choices in adulthood -- past age 18 -- were your father screwing you up vs. you making your own choices?

Here's where I draw the line: Do I resent my dad gaslighting me and rewriting history, pretending everything was hunky-dory and not taking any responsibility for any damage he did? Hell yes. Do I blame my dad for "screwing up my life"? No. I am the only one who made my choices after I became of legal age. I am the only one who is responsible for those choices. My dad did not hold a gun to my head and tell me where to go to school or not to whom to marry or not or how many kids to have or not. Those were all my choices. Even if he had offered to pay for school (or a wedding, which NEVER would have happened, lol), but only BYU, I still had the choice to not take that deal and figure out a way to put myself through school. Did my dad advise me what he thought I should do? Sure, sometimes. Did I always follow his advice? No, almost never.

One major factor in my ability to separate myself and my own identity from my parents was the fact that I am not afraid of what will happen to me in the afterlife. Based on mormonism, that decision was entirely taken out of my control when I was raped. Once * I * committed the sin of fornication, I was a dirty, disgusting, filthy whore whom nobody would ever want anyway, so what difference would it make if I married some RM in the temple or some biker from the bar? None. It was clear to me that I couldn't be forgiven by my church (or my parents) even if the sin was totally out of my control. I had already directly witnessed that playing out. I didn't have a choice; I was already condemned. So fuck it, I'll do what I want.

However, if you did not have a major destabilizing event to cause you to question life like that while you were young, you bought into all the scare tactics the church sold you and your parents, so you did everything "right". And now you resent that. I don't blame you, but it's now time to take back control over your life and your choices and to take responsibility for that control. Or, you can continue to pinball your way through life, blaming everyone and everything else but your own actions. You can keep on with the external locus of control or you can adopt an internal locus of control.

I think the only way through this is to really unpack all this and dig deep. It will be very painful but you will have to accept responsibility for YOUR part of YOUR choices. You just can't lay all the blame on your parent(s). And you are completely in control of your choices now (as you have been since 18, even though you didn't THINK you had choices then). So you can choose to allow the path you chose in the past to dictate your way forward, or you can choose to change your life until you are happy enough to suit yourself and are not so miserable.

It's much easier to blame an abusive childhood for our failure to be responsible for our choices as an adult than it is to really take a look inside and figure out how much of that was me.

I take the position that there are no: wouldas, shouldas, couldas, what if's. We make the best decision we can with the information and experience we have at the time.

When we gain new insight, information, expertise, etc, we think and behave differently. It's OK to change our mind. And I have and do, hundreds of times in my life.

My view is to live a life of freedom at all levels. I am in my 7th decade - a widow - single woman. I am free of my childhood, my early growing up years, my early marriage years, my child raising years, etc.There is no value in playing the "blame" card with our past.

I'm free of the past. It's over. It's done. I don't live there anymore. I can recall the best parts as memories I wish to keep.

The only way out is through. I am who I am today because of every single experience of my life. It's all valuable. It's about learning.

I prefer to discard the negative in all forms as much as possible... not always possible, I can engage in some thinking that is not conducive to wellness! :-)

This is my life. I want to live it with love, laughter, music, peace, harmony, etc.

There is a wonderful place that comes from owning our own power. We are free from others interrupting and negatively influencing our lives. Who needs that? I sure don't!