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My dad's destructive behavior is ruining the family...

dee_1
Community Member

Hi guys

I need someone to talk to because I'm so lost at the moment. This is going to be a lengthy post.

My dad has some serious anger and control issues and currently it's escalated to the point where my poor mum is considering divorce because he has completely lost it.

From memory dad was always harsh with his punishments towards me and my 2 sisters. We would get the occasional smack across the bum with a wooden spoon or we were told to kneel down onto the bathroom tiles as punishment for being naughty. I dont really remember being so naughty that severe punishment was appropriate for the things we did wrong.

Anyway, when I as 15/16 years old and in high school everyone around me...my friends I mean got their youth allowance money except me. So one day when the 5 of us (mum, dad and two sisters), were traveling in the car going home and I asked dad why I wasn't getting my youth allowance money...he actually got quite ugly with me and told me that when he was growing up in Hungary, any money he earned from his job went to the family so his mother could support him and their family and he only saw a small portion of that money. I said that the fact that my friends got their youth allowance money and I didn't was completely unfair. To which he responded to that with - if I didn't like what was going on in the family I could take my youth allowance money and I can go leave the family and live on my own. He said I wouldn't survive because it was not much money. From this day forward I saw my dad from a different light.

He was always so aggressive when he was in a bad mood. My middle sister, coped it so badly when she was a kid. She was punished severely for not being able to understand how to read and write and do basic mathematics.

At one point my middle sister pissed my mum off so bad when she couldn't write a sentence that she clasped onto my sister's writing hand so aggressively my sister's wrist couldn't move from the pain. I remember her crying in pain from not being able to move her wrist. My middle sister starting pinching stuff from children's school lunch boxes and dad tried to punish my sister over and over again for stealing but nothing was working so my dad...i remember everything vivdly... grabbed my sister's little hand and put a lighter to her hand. My sister screamed and screamed her lungs out of fear and shock I was so worried for her. Dad said he was just trying to scare her...it worked and she never stole again.

11 Replies 11

james1
Community Champion
Community Champion

Hi dee,

That sounds really horrifying. I'm so sorry to hear that but thank you for being so honest with us.

Can I ask if you and your sisters are all still at home and if you are all safe from abuse?

Don't worry - you are safe here and the forums are anonymous. I'm just worried that you are all still feeling very unsafe.

James

dee_1
Community Member

I got it pretty bad from my dad as well. As my mind grew and my curiosity wondered about some of the ethics my parents had in the household as I was growing up from the ages of 16-22 just got me into trouble all the time.

I wasn't allowed to back chat to my dad...he would literally errupt with rage and sometimes slap me for chatting back. He once punched me in the nose with the back of his hand so badly over me and my sister squabbling over something stupid, it irritated him so he hit me so hard I fell back into the coffee table and my nose bled a bit.

At any time he would punish us or hit us for stepping out of line or being naughty he would apologise for his behaviour but would follow up his behaviour with a but...

I forgave him off course but things got really intense when I got out of high school and my parents went back to Hungary to visit their parents. Me and my 2 sisters were left alone which we loved because we did well to take care of each other. My middle sister paid all the bills and we did what we could to maintain the house. When my dad came home from Hungary it was hell...my father and his mother got into a massive argument and his mother couldn't be bothered seeing him off at the airport. They hadn't seen each other for 10 years and they fought over something and dad came home an even angrier man then before. He came home and that very night we went to pick mum and dad up, my sister's and I spent so much time cleaning the house that we didn't have time to cool dinner so for dinner we ordered pizza. My dad was so pissed off about having pizza for dinner her reigned down on us hard and yelled and made us feel terrible because we didn't cook him a decent meal.

Dinner times, lunch times and breakfast times were always a struggle in my house. My dad controlled our conversations all the time. He hated that we didn't speak Hungarian at the table and to this day is always asking us to speak Hungarian when we are in his house and of we didn't we would get told off.

The conversations were controlled to the point at the dinner table that we weren't even allowed to muck around and quote lines from our favorite movies. He said there is a time and place for that and he didn't like it. So we fell quite at the table depressed because we didn't know what to discuss at the table.

If we didn't speak Hungarian it was an issue.

If we didn't talk about things he wanted to talk about it was an issue.

Most things were an issue in my house...it was really boring

dee_1
Community Member

Hi James

I still have so much of my story to tell before it gets really bad. My sister recently moved to Canada and I was up visiting my family just last weekend and my dad was very tense with everyone at the house...he kept yelling at my sister about not spending enough time with him when he had 26 years with my sister and he never does anything out of our own interest to spend time with her. And she's a popular girl with so many friends that love her so much so I didn't see an issue with her going out now and then to see her friends.

He also started really getting snappy with my mother. We all went shopping last Saturday and we told dad we were going out shopping and that we would bring him home snack foods from that Japanese bread top shop. My mother rang my father at 3pm to see of he was awake and he didn't answer the phone so me and my mum and my 2 sisters spent more time out. At 5pm that day we went to my middle sisters house to go pick out a movie to watch which dad requested for us to find and when we were there my dad rung mum and as soon as mum answered the phone...he yelled: why aren't you home??? I'm starving!! Forget about the stupid bloody movie and come home!" You could hear him yelling from the hall way down from my sister's house just blasting his irritation at mum.

So we went home and his face was pure irritation and my mum was having to stress and explain why we were out for so long.

But dad was like...well I'm diabetic you know I have to eat and Denise isn't home I want to spend more time with her! I thought you were bringing home pizza (which was never ever discussed). He just kept rambling and making us feel bad for making him look like the bad guy but I could see on my mother's face that she was flushed from stress.

I asked mum...my god does he always speak to you this way? She said sometimes but not all the time.

But whileI was there for 5 measly days my dad kept snapping and snapping at mum. They dropped me off at the airport and I hugged dad and asked him yo take care of mum...

He did completely the opposite. When I called my sister to let her know I was safe in Sydney mum was crying and stressed because as soon as dad and mum drove off apparently they spent the time in the car arguing and dad was placing the blame on her for us not living at home anymore and for every stupid thing that had gone wrong in his life.

Thats when I wrote my dad and angry letter asking him why he attacked my mother? It got worse from there...

geoff
Champion Alumni
Champion Alumni
hello Dee_'s, I've read your post but can you allow me to reply tomorrow as I start very early, as I'm about to log off, sometimes posts come in at the last minute and don't give me enough time to respond, sorry. Geoff.

dee_1
Community Member
Yes that's fine I was posting in here to eventually get the point where things got really messy and I need help for my mother.

dee_1
Community Member

My dad just wrote this letter to mum:

I read that seven step to save my Marriage.
What Is my wish from my wife to save are marriage.

1. You know how important for me the Hungarian language, when they come home speak only that language. I think it's not something to big for ask? How money time a Denise come home and start speak English and you never say a word to stop it, and when I ask you too to speak Hungarian You just smile and just keep continuing speak English purposely.


2. Clean house, I like where I live that environment is clean, just like my Mum and your Mum. When I was a young boy I always have to help to my mum cleaning the house just like you.

So why you cannot say to you Daughter to go and clean you room. Just remember when I get angry in the Tabari plc in Eagleby when I ask millions of time to Diana to clean her room and I get angry and throw everything in the middle of the room.

3. I always ask you to save some money for me $500. I think is not much to ask and you never to able to do that. Because I like to start my little business. And you know very well I good with my hands to fix things and sell it. But this wish never come true. Even if you just save that money when I give up a smoking that would be a huge amount of money and of the year. Just imagine that money no existence and just put it in a box for Christmas or car or the children's

4. Respect! Big word, what we have to give older persons specially To my Mother and Father!

I never get that from my children's, maybe a little bit from Dolores. But you never teach them to take me seriously and give me the respect what I deserve. You just live everything how it was. And are children's later on they know who to turn and who to love more. I'm now the hatred father.


5. If you do that before we never get in this situations. But you didn't and the endless anger, what was in my mind, pressing my brain and sometime I was furious Like the wild dog. I try my best to teach my children's and I'm sorry if I'm a bad father. I offer you one more time to come home and try it again, but to save are marriage you have to change too not just me. If you want we can go to the marriage counselling. If you say no I will be fill sad, because are 32 years go in to the waist. The decision is yours.

Love from you still loving husband.

This is my dad's mentality and my mum doesn't want to go back to this. What can she do? All her stuff is at their house and she's scared too go back home

james1
Community Champion
Community Champion

Hi dee,

It is very sad to read that letter.

It sounds like your father has been raised in a particular way that does not align with your mother's values or yours either.

I don't really have much advice except:

I know it's to do with your family and you feel in some way responsible for helping it get fixed somehow. My parents divorced because of similar issues.

But this is not your fight.

This is between your mother and your father.

Have a look at the letter - it is not about what can the kids do, it is about what can I (Dad) and you (Mum) do.

A counsellor sounds like a good idea to have someone help protect your mum. It can't be you protecting her - that's not only bad for you, but bad for your mother as well because she may feel guilty for having to rely on her own child.

Perhaps a counsellor won't help fix the marriage, but at least they will help your mum and dad work out whether to go ahead or not.

I know it's tearing you apart at the moment. I still feel guilty for 'keeping my parents together' for 22 years when they should've divorced a long time ago. So the only lesson I learnt really was that it's never about the children. Your parents simply are not coming together in this relationship and they need to sort that out.

James

dee_1
Community Member

Well it makes no difference because my mum after all the nasty letters he sent me, after defending her, after years of dad's severe anger issues that led to torment growing up. After all the stuff my dad said to mum... she goes back to him.

My father for goodness sake said in a letter that he wishes (Because of something I did when I was younger) said he wishes I injured myself and that people would laugh. 

I've cut my mother and father out of my life for the time being. I don't want to talk to my parents. My dad is an a**hole.

You're right it's not my fight and not my marriage but I don't want to have my dad in my life anymore. Mums decision to go back to dad really cut me deep and I need a massive break away from my family.

I feel like throwing up...

james1
Community Champion
Community Champion

hello dee,

it sounds like the family situation is not good for you and I'm glad to hear you're trying to distance yourself from them a bit. Do you have anyone you can also speak to about this in person? Your sister, perhaps?

James