Wow!! I could have written this!! My stepmother was so abusive when I was growing up from age 8-14 that I stopped my summer visitation with my father. Then later on my father had nothing to do with me for 12 yrs. She died in 2002. I went to her funeral and they eulogized her as a wonderful woman who was on the board with the cancer society. I cried harder than anyone in the church. I still have a lot of self esteem issues due to her.