Why do I feel so much better now that my dad is dead?

[Nickerdoodle]

I didn't expect that at all.  My narcissist mother dies a couple of years ago and I never shed a tear.  Dad died almost two months ago and I grieved and cried and felt awful for about three weeks.  Then something strange happened.  The grief started to lift a little and I started thinking about the past with him.  I have had memories of abuse from him but I never let myself fully feel them until now.  I always felt mother was the primary abuse giver but I knew my dad was as well.  Now I am examining just what was his role and the impact he had on me and that is all good.  I feel lighter and happier about my life going forward.  I sure didn't expect that.  Has anyone else had their abuser die and find they feel better about life? 

[Notwendy]

I am sorry for your recent loss.

I don't have abuse memories from my father. My mother has BPD and she's the one who is emotionally and verbally abusive. Dad was the one who acted more as a parent to us, and I was more attached to him.

But there was another side to this relationship- Karpman triangle dynamics. My father was a rescuer and emotional caretaker to my BPD mother. While my father provided for us, and our basic needs were well met, emotionally, BPD mother took priority. A main "rule" was "do not upset Mother" -- no matter what. We were expected to comply with her requests and also to not acknowlege her abusive behavior- we were expected to tolerate it.

Saying "no" to my mother would upset her. Boundaries with her were unacceptable. So here was the triangle: I wanted my parents' approval. All kids do. However, it was not possible to please my BPD mother. To get my father's approval, I had to go along with the "family rules". If I wanted to feel accepted- I had to be a doormat to her, not say no, and tolerate her behavior. If Dad got angry at us, it was usually because somehow she claimed we upset her.

When Dad passed, I felt a mix of emotions. Predominantly grief and loss. Then also anger, anger that he let my BPD mother treat us like she does. Then, odly, a sense of relief, which didn't make sense to me because I was grieving. I missed him. I still miss him. To me, he was the main parent.

The relief was that there wasn't a triangle with him. I could have boundaries with BPD mother. She would still react but I didn't have to fear upsetting my father.

The relationship between my parents was complicated. Probably for yours too. While one parent may appear to be the one with the disorder, there's also dynamics between them. People who are abusive aren't always abusive. They can be loving and caring at times too, which makes these relationships confusing. People who are abusive also can be victims of abuse. If both your parents were abusive, they likely were to each other too.

I think we are going to feel what we feel- and to not have judgment for whatever that is. There aren't any rules about how you feel at this time. For me, the feelings are felt at different times. Sometimes you will have a memory you need to process.

[Nickerdoodle]

Wow.  Thank you for that response.  It feels familiar.  I find myself periodically angry with him for not stopping her and then joining in from time to time. 

The relief was that there wasn't a triangle with him. I could have boundaries with BPD mother. She would still react but I didn't have to fear upsetting my father.

That is something for me to think about.

[zachira]

My mother with BPD is deceased. My father who enabled my mother passed away many years before mom did. Having both parents gone has allowed me to see how abusive the relationships with them were while allowing me to feel sad for how hard they tried to be the right kind of parents and just did not know how.

[Notwendy]

There aren't any rules for how to feel when losing someone significant to us. There also isn't a time line for how long we have these feelings. For me, it feels more like they come and go and with longer periods of time between the feelings. It's also been several years since my father passed away. Two months for you- that is still soon. While you may feel better now, don't judge how you feel either way. If sad feelings are there- then they are. If they don't happen, well then they don't.

Even if there are different and conflicting feelings at the same time- I think we can both grieve the loss of someone who both cared about us and also had their own struggles. I also feel that processing my BPD mother's behavior is less complicated than my father's.

[Notwendy]

BPD mother passed away last week. It's felt like an odd state of dissociation. I haven't even told a lot of people around me yet. Even talking to people seems to take effort.

I think a part of this is that, cognitively, I knew she was mortal. Everyone is. Emotionally though, I didn't believe this was possible. She seemed so powerful in our family, all controlling. We kids thought she had magic powers.

This doesn't feel similar to how I felt when my father passed away. I was despondent. There was a certain grief. I cried a lot. I've cried a few times but it's more like feeling ovewhelmed.

[Nickerdoodle]

Wendy Lady,

I don't know if I should say I am sorry or be excited at the release I suspect you are going to experience. You see, when I wrote before that I was surprised that I felt much better about my dad's death after only three weeks of him passing, I knew it was significant because I usually bleed over everything and feel sadness more intensely than what I suspect others do.  I don't feel that way for my family anymore.  In fact, I have been experiencing a justified anger at the crime scene of my childhood and even my adulthood.  He is dead now.  Three weeks almost exactly of feeling such sadness that he was gone but the body has a way of healing a bit after a time. For me, three weeks opened the door.  It flung it wide f'ing open.  I hope it does for you.  I am letting myself go through this angry stage.  I will not get stuck in it as it isn't my actual baseline.  How about that?  A wonderfully silly wet Labrador Retriever with a red lolling tongue running in the grass survived!  For now, however, this anger is mine and I trust it will serve a purpose as I spit it out.  I want to know this anger inside and out so look out.  Here it comes.  I will be posting a lot.

How are you feeling today?  I will be watching for you. Dr. Ramani says a lot of us can't be free until they die.  Happening for me.

[Notwendy]

I understand the anger- I also felt anger after my father passed. Sad, angry, relieved, grief, all at once or alternating.

It's only been a short while. Mostly, feeling numb and a bit spacy. I went back to work and while it is good to be back to a normal routine, it's a process. Each day feeling a bit more "normal".

"crime scene of your childhood" that's profound.

I think it's still soon. I'm processing it.

[zachira]

My mother with BPD has been dead for several years and my father several decades. I now realize that I did not get empathy or mirroring from my parents or most of my large extended family, which really has delayed my developing into becoming a person in my own right. For most of my life, I had no clue about what was wrong with my disordered family members though I knew something was wrong, and I shouldered the blame of being one of the many family scapegoats. The last few years, I have had many moments of so many mixed emotions: confusion, anger, sadness, appreciation for the people who did treat me with kindness.

Nickerdoodle and Notwendy,
Most likely you will be processing the feelings about your parents for a long time. The recent deaths seem to bring up the most intense feelings for long periods of time, followed by less periods of intense feelings yet some real intense "aha moments" as the years go by. My heart goes out to you both, as you now have the freedom to see your parents for who they were without the fears that they can ever hurt you again.

[Nickerdoodle]

Well, this has been just awful trying to sell a home with my siblings.  In numerous ways I fortunate to have answers to questions from dealings with them.  However, I found myself mired down in anger. I felt poisoned by it and just did not know how to free myself.  I did something a few nights ago.  I have heard that we as Christians are supposed to pray for our enemies or those we feel wronged us.  I just could not pray for my siblings I was so enraged.  Then I did it anyway.  I said something like Dear God, I don't even know if I mean it but I trust you when you say I should.  So with that said please show your light to my family.  Please engage with them if that is your way.  Please help me with my anger that has taken control of me.  Amen.  Next night I prayed Dear God, please show my siblings  your light.  Amen.  Next day felt so differently.  The sun is brighter.  I feel lighter.  I feel more optimistic.  I don't hate them anymore.  I have hope like a little girl.  A little girl I didn't know could exist ever again.    How about that?  Nothing happened inside the family.  No contact.  For all I know they are harboring the same ill will I once had for them.  Or, maybe God is working on them. I am just a little surprised He came in and rescued me for the asking and for my willingness to do His will.  Don't get me wrong.  I still have to do a lot of work on these resurfacing memories but I don't feel so alone in it and God won't drop me.

[Notwendy]

Next night I prayed Dear God, please show my siblings  your light.  Amen.  Next day felt so differently.  The sun is brighter.  I feel lighter.  I feel more optimistic.  I don't hate them anymore.  I have hope like a little girl.  A little girl I didn't know could exist ever again.    How about that?  Nothing happened inside the family.  No contact.  For all I know they are harboring the same ill will I once had for them.  Or, maybe God is working on them. I am just a little surprised He came in and rescued me for the asking and for my willingness to do His will.  Don't get me wrong.  I still have to do a lot of work on these resurfacing memories but I don't feel so alone in it and God won't drop me.

Or-- maybe God is working on you Giving you more peace and more grace and light.

(God is working on them too. Your family has their own spiritual path- between them and God)

I am glad you found prayer helpful to you.

[Nickerdoodle]

I had the misfortune of having two abusive parents.  BPD?  Don't know but bad all the same.  In my initial post I wrote that I felt better now that dad died.  I grieved something awful for about three weeks and then something happened.  I felt better and realized I didn't want to feel the intensity of that pain anymore. It was too reminiscent of my childhood pain.  No one seem to care about that when I was young and I don't think I can grieve over crappy parents anymore. I guess people even in healthy families might grieve off and on but I stopped after the four week mark.  I will tell you that from time to time I felt a little guilty about my negative feelings towards him and wonder where they came from so acutely.  I've always remembered a lot of the awful stuff he did but I guess in order to survive I had to minimize it, excuse it, gloss it over and decide just not to look.    I was listening to Dr. Ramani talk about how sometimes children from these types of homes can't ever get on until the abuser dies.  Bingo!  That is what has happened here for me.  I kind of thought that might be the case but to hear her say it was the nail getting hit on the head. You see I am not afraid of him anymore.  He is really quite sincerely dead.  I can speak the truth and that is quite helpful to me.  My dad was a wife beater.  He was and we all knew it but never have we ever spoken of it let alone called him that.  We would say things like  He works hard and mother picks on him until he explodes.  I am sure he is sorry.  Wanna guess what Dr. Phil would say about that?  He would say dad was wrong and we were brainwashed and lived in danger.  Dad wasn't sorry enough to quit it.  I remember coming home from about the 7th or 8th grade to find all the new furniture destroyed and dad sitting on mother on the floor with his hands around her neck say Die you devil die.  I want you to die.  I slapped at his back and tugged on him but got nowhere until I told him I had to call the police.  We were just relieved no one died and we ate dinner and threw the furniture out.  Only today do I find myself thinking Oh sure dad.  You don't want to be embarrassed with the police and lights for the neighbors to see but you sure were not embarrassed in front of your kids.  It is sick how we came up being so numb but I guess we had to be to survive.  My dad was a wife beater. He was not the head of the household.  He was a bully.  He was an angry child.  He was a wife beater.  I also figured out why I was the scapegoat.  First, I moved away so I couldn't really defend my reputation and I certainly developed my own problems for them to point at.  The biggest reason is that they saw a light in my open face and big blue eyes and it reflected back to them how horrific they were and they couldn't have that reflection. No sir.  Kill it.  Kill it. Dad used to pick up the edge of the kitchen table when were all sitting down to dinner and toss it at mother.  Mashed potatoes, roast beef with gravy and big glasses of tea everywhere.  We were all left to clean it up with him in the other room watching tv.  Sorry my ass.  I wish I could have picked up the leftover beef and hurled it at his head but I couldn't.  I will say though I got one in on him later in life and I am glad I did.  It would have been sometime in the last ten years and I told this man/bully that I thought mother had two fingers up his snout and has been manipulating and leading him about by it for eons.  He said I assure you that is not the case.  I got off the phone and thought a little light heartedly that maybe he doesn't know what the word assure means.

Anyway, I guess I still sound a little angry but it doesn't feel like my old misguided, murky and displaced anger.  It doesn't really feel like anger at all. Every time I take these past events out and look at them I find myself seeing them very differently and that is quite freeing.  A little disconcerting too because just how ill did I have to be?  Actually, not ill.  Just brainwashed for survival.  What is that thing they call it when you convince yourself you love your abuser to survive?  I keep wondering was great revelation will I have next.  They are coming fast and I welcome them. It is like getting a new puppy.  I discovered that I am quite brave now.  I wasn't when this first started happening in December.  These thoughts and new ways of seeing jumped out at me like BOO HA.  Sho did last a short time though. I am proud of myself now for being able to do this.  I don't feel to blame for events I had nothing to do with.  Far from it.

Daddy was a wife beater. Daddy broke up furniture as a threat.  Daddy threatened to take all the money and leave us so we would die.  Daddy threw mashed potatoes.  Daddy hit his kids.  Daddy told us we were dumb. 

Oh one last thing and I hope you see my humor returning.  The house is now for sale.  It  has wall paneling in the kitchen.  A very dated look that needs to be dealt with.  Looking back I guess I should have been grateful for it.  At least when the mashed potatoes and gravy landed on it we could just wipe it off.  Hey!  Is there meaning there because I feel like I am finally wiping myself off, too.

[Notwendy]

You see I am not afraid of him anymore. 

Anyway, I guess I still sound a little angry but it doesn't feel like my old misguided, murky and displaced anger.  It doesn't really feel like anger at all. Every time I take these past events out and look at them I find myself seeing them very differently and that is quite freeing. 

Oh one last thing and I hope you see my humor returning. 

I get it. We don't have to grieve an abusive parent in the way people "expect" us too. I think there is a process- for lack of a better word- or maybe a unique type of grief- but I agree, it is different.

It is different with my BPD mother than it was with my father. I was  more attached to my father as a parent.

With BPD mother, the main emotion in our relationship was fear. It would make sense that I don't grieve the loss of that fear of her.

I can relate to feeling anger at times, but in a different way, but I did notice, almost immediately at BPD mother's passing. that the feelings of anger were less. I wondered at the time if I was a reaction to the suddeness of the situation, as it seemed surreal but the feelings do seem different now.

I am glad for you for your new adjustment. Perhaps what happens is that now that there is less fear, less feeling of the need to survive the situation, you are now freer to think and feel different things.