Breaking The Cycle

Father's Day, unlike Mother's Day, has a different set of emotions for me. I'm not sure if it's because men and women are different, but for us, on our current path, NYEBoy isn't nearly affected by the infertility as I am. Yes, he wants children, but he has never worried about us not having them nearly as much as I have (do). I don't say that because "there's always adoption", but rather, he doesn't think we won't have biological children. In his eyes, treatments are going to work, maybe not the first time, but eventually they will. I believed that at one point, too. Nearly 6 years into this journey and watching other couples go through treatment after treatment, I'm a bit more realistic. So, although I grieve for my infertility on Mother's Day, I don't grieve the same way for Father's Day.

Having said that, I hate Father's Day. I hate Father's Day because I didn't have a father-daughter relationship like the cards and quotes say. I don't even have a stand in father. There was no step dad, uncle, or grandfather "father" figure in my life. I just got what I got and it was what it was.

Growing up, my father physically abused me. He's was and is an alcoholic. My mother and him divorced, among reasons, because of the physical abuse he had towards her. Once they split, it was like I filled his beating void. Sometimes my brother would fill it, too. But never did K. I'm not sure that he ever laid a hand on her to be honest.

As per the divorce papers, we had to visit every Sunday (and some holidays) until we were 14, then we could decide if we wanted to continue going. As soon as I hit 14, I didn't want to go any longer. For about 7 or 8 years, we didn't have much of a relationship. If he called the house and I answered, I'd give it to someone else. If I gave it to my mother, I would call him her ex or her sperm donor. When Christmas and Birthday's came along, I would have to do my obligatory zip-mouth for one day. Otherwise, we kept our distance.

About six years ago, the relationship between my father and sister began to sour a bit due to Thugboy entering the picture. Once she became a pregnant teenager, it got worse. My dad's always held a special place in his heart for my sister, so I know he was hurt by this.

Once A was born, I noticed Thugboy was keeping K and A away from my father. So, being the good daughter that I am, I snuck A over to visit my father frequently. I decided to put our struggles aside in order to forge a new, adult relationship. I know we can never go back to my childhood. He can never go back and be there for me. But, perhaps he was going to make a better grandparent than he would ever as a parent.

So I did that. I continued the sneaking A to his house every week or so for a few hours, until NYEBoy and I moved down to Fl0rida. Even then though, I would have weekly, sometimes daily conversations over the phone with my father. Things we were getting better over the two and a half to three years.

Then last summer came. And K and A moved in with us. My relationship with my father began to crumble. Apparently with K moving out here, their relationship began getting better. And better. And better. And our relationship began getting worse. And worse. And worse.

He's always telling my sister (she tells NYEBoy) that she needs to take care of A more because I'm trying to act like her mother, when he doesn't see K going out every night, blowing money, and not providing for her child. And when K is with A, she's not motherly. She's bitchy.

Last week, the shit hit the fan. My father called me yelling at me demanding to know where K and A's cards were that he mailed. There was no, "Hi, Hello. How are you feeling?" (he knew I was sick) it was just full on attack mode. (He doesn't realize, every time he sends a card to A, K spends the money.) So, I hung up on him. I was sick as hell in the midst of the viral infection and truly didn't want to hear him spew his bullshit. After I got off the phone I started fuming. So, I called him because and went off on his answering machine about how he didn't even have the fucking courtesy to ask me how A or I was doing, but instead chastised me about a fucking card I had no idea about.

I told myself I wasn't going to call him on Father's Day and I didn't. Instead, I will sit down sometime this week and write him a letter. I'm going to tell him how NYEBoy and I have done nothing but open up our home, wallet, and heart for these girls. I'm going to tell him how if he doesn't get his shit together, he will not be walking me down the aisle one day and he will not have a relationship with any grandchild NYEBoy and I have. I'm going to tell him how I've not done anything bad for our relationship and that before the girls moved down here, we were starting to form a new father-daughter relationship, but somehow, over the past 11 months he's completely undone anything we worked on in the previous three years.

I know I can't go back and make him not beat me because I didn't eat the green beans. Or because I knocked over his wild turkey. Or because I didn't hear him calling my name because I was born without part of the insides of my ear due to a birth defect. Or whatever the reason he had... but fuck.

Life is short. You don't get to choose the family you have and I would really like a relationship with my father. But it's up to HIM. It's HIS choice to be a good father. I've been a good daughter. It's his turn. But I'd be lying if I said that I wouldn't be affected if something happened to him before we were able to have a better relationship.

I want to break the cycle. I want my children to have a father who never lays his hand on them. I want my children to have a grandfather in their lives. I'm never going to get the family relationships like they show on television or make the cards for, but maybe my children will.

Maybe the cycle will get broken. I hope for it. I pray for it.