It took some time to figure out. When I was 8 I moved back to my dads'. He had married a woman from town and I could see she made him happy. She had 3 kids of her own and we sorta were the local version of the Brady bunch without the happiness. His wife (I will never call her 'mom') and I began stepping on each others toes almost from the beginning. Her style was to intimidate and shame and at 8 it really rubbed me the wrong way. I didnt get all that superiority stuff. Things went from bad to worse. It was like she was night and I was day. I was happy, she was always frowning. It was a battle of personalities and as the kid I always come up on the recieving end. She managed to convince myself and everyone else that I was the problem. At 18 I left. I was emotionally bruised enough to not return for many years and I lived without contact with my dad for many years while I tried to sort out what had happened to me. In my head I felt like a zombie where I had once been vibrant. It took a lot of years before it became obvious to me what had taken place in my childhood and how permanent her mental condition was. Thankfully mine was not. How freeing it was to finally make this realization.

When I was about 30 I married a girl who promised to love me forever. She didnt understand the depth of my depression and after about 6 months she began pulling away. She began having secret relationships, hiding things, lying. This made me angry and my anger pushed her away completely after just 3 years, taking my son and going into hiding. She also made several accusations about me that I worried might be half true. I was still trying to understand my mixed up feelings from the past and I half believed the things she said. It wouldnt have been so bad but we had had a child together and she was keeping me from seeing him.

I hurt for a long time. I waited for our child to grow so I could finally contact him as an adult and attempt to put things straight. When I was finally able (I wasnt ready but knew it needed to be done for his sake) he rejected me. This hurt tremendously.

During the past summer my dad was in the rest home. Little chance of going home and his mind was failing. My step mom put in orders to prevent me from seeing my dad. After years of staying away she wasnt yet satisfied and needed to pour vinegar on the wounds. This made me pretty angry and I was able to get the order lifted but it showed me the vindictiveness she was capable of and also her true nature. Because of this I was finally able to release myself from more than 30 years of confusion and depression.

With my son I couldnt understand how he could think so low of me, I hadnt been around. Sure he could be disappointed with that but there was an anger that didnt fit and I understood that during the years his mom had run my reputation into the dirt. He wasnt just angry that I'd been gone, he believed I was psycho. I sent him an email telling him about my own parents divorce and how afterwards I didnt choose one over the other. I loved them both. I rationalized that there was something fundamentally wrong with not loving a parent (unless that parent has abused) and that it was his flaw, not mine, that we would not have any relations after all.

Its been very freeing. Was it an ideal outcome? Not at all. But it is resolved and I can move on. 37 years all together. I am wiser, stronger. I will be ok.