According To My Dad. . .

My dad recently told me that "your mother was so bad with finances, I was actually able to save more money going through the divorce than I ever was when married."

I found that interesting. Not because I didn't know my mother was a poor bad and impulsive with her money but because of the childhood through the divorce that I remember, that I have journal entries about.

Everybody knows about food stamps and ramen noodles, but the things many others don't talk about is walking to the laundromat with trash bags of clothing, boiling water for baths and lighting candles because you couldn't pay electric. I remember when coming home from my dads frequently, we lived with each of our parents every-other-month/weekend, and the lights at our moms wouldn't turn on. She would say "Let me call the electric company right now!" I now realize my mother lived without electric the weeks she didn't have us. Some don't know about second hand clothing or hang drying laundry all around your house because you could barely afford to wash your clothes let alone dry them. Or heating the kitchen with the oven and we'd all sit on the floor in blankets.

But my dad could saved more money during the divorce than any other time? Oh yeah, he wasn't paying child support. He didn't know the shame or hunger I had in middle school when the "Free meals" from school weren't enough and I put extra on my tray, but my account didn't have enough, so I had to put it back.

He didn't care that he stopped paying for my mental health care. My mother asked the receptionist to turn her screen around and show me when he stopped paying and why we weren't allowed to make another appointment until he did. The woman made eye contact with me and then showed me. Anger and tears boiled through me and down my face as he lied to me that my mother spent his child support on a boob job instead of helping me get care. (if you saw my mothers breasts, you would not think she got a boob job. lol) He told me my mother was brain washing me. When infact both my parents brainwashed me into the mormon cult and aren't anywhere close to as educated as I am in scripture study and "church doctrine".

So when people say "I'm happy to see you are working on your relationship with your father" or "I wish I still had my dad around, you're so lucky", please know that just because he bought me expensive $600 chairs as a house warming gift, (and we chose the second to least expensive in the store by $5) that it just a step in the direction of making up for these traumatic childhood memories.

The most interesting part is, that both of my siblings and me chose the way of life my mom lived over living with my dad when we each turned 14. That's when the judge allowed us to chose and the other parent not be held in contempt. And that's when I stopped visiting my dad. We choose food pantry dinners, hours playing in the laundromat with quarters we dug out from our own piggy banks, over dish network, my own bedroom to myself and a fridge full of food. I chose that, because of how my dad treated me as a child. I saw what he was doing. I recognized his spite and anger towards me, the child most like my mother. He hated me.

While driving my dad to the airport yesterday so he could go out to Colorado and visit my brother and his family for the holidays, there was traffic was stop and go per usual from 70 to 270 with some stupid semi trucks in the left lanes. He is vocal about his road rage and said "the old me would have gotten infront of that semi and slowed down so much it would have taken him all week to get up this mountain. The new me just gets to where I'm going." I didn't have anything to say about it, but the car went quiet for a moment as I pondered just how much, if any, my dad has changed since when I was a kid.

I decided to tell him I got my tubes tied last week. I saw him Sunday at my grandma's but wasn't ready to share than. I wasn't sure if I was going to share it with him at all, but figured since I moved out 4 months ago, we really haven't caught up much. He was asking me how I was doing, so I told him I was recovering from surgery. His intimidate reply was "Really? I always thought you wanted like 5 kids. (the magic umber was 7 lol) What made you decide to that?" I told him I could still biologically have children if I wanted to, but it was 100% impossible now to conceive through sex. And he pressed further "You really wanted this done? Is there a reason why?" And I told him it was self care to heal from my sexual assaults. The conversation got more serious and we briefly talked about it more detail. His tone was kind but he asked the same question before- he just didn't listen to the answer before. "Did you go to the authorities and report any of these things?" I told him one of my assaults was by a female police officer. And it was during a mental health crisis. Where was I suppose to go for that sort of thing? But I told him I did have courage enough last year to report my rape, and I was told there was not enough evidence and they would not be pursuing it. And I began to cry. He told me "if sharing this information is going to make you too emotional we can change the topic. There are other people who can help you with that."

I've heard my dad joke with his father about the #MeToo movement before. Laughing and slut shaming women. I can't say sharing that information with him made me feel better, espeically since he was wearing his red trump hat. But now he knows. And maybe the person he is today is someone who wants to understand, even if he can't.

Do I love my dad? No.

Will I ever? I don't think so. But we stay cordial. Distant, but cordial.

The rest of that trip he gave his unwanted or needed advise on Sean and I's life. Including how we moved into this apartment too early, we paid double rent for 3 months, even though he kicked me out in June. What the fuck was I suppose to do? He asked me to make a list of things Sean and I need for our home for Xmas. But mentioned something about exchanging gifts as a family get together. He knows how I feel about family togethers all at once. Convenient, but not my style. And if that is the requirement or bribe for Christmas presents, like he did when I was a child I pass on Xmas all together. I don't *need* him anymore.

And that's my dad, according to me.