Ask Lemmy

Jfc some people got some fucked up dads in the comments here, leaving, slamming people through doors and table legs. My dad was okay, he had a bad attitude but I think he understood dedication and hard work and taught me to love it too. Haven't spoken in years, but I think about him now and again.

When I was in boy scouts, my dad at one point made a comment to me that our Senior Patrol Leader was "just like me, but older"

What he meant was that our SPL was an immature little shit and I shouldn’t rely on him. What i heard was "Your personal role model is just like you, and you can be as awesome as him if you put the work in."

I don't have many happy memories of my father growing up. All he knew his entire life was hard work and he leaned into that, because his dad died when he was eleven. I am grateful to him for a few things he did that made a major impact on my life:

• He and my mom got my eyes fixed when I was four years old, before which I was legally blind.
• He put the first $1000 I ever saw in my hand to pay a college tuition bill so I wouldn't have to quit.
• He made sure I had everything I needed growing up in terms of material needs.

But there are a wealth of shitty memories too. He was drunk for most of my childhood and adolescence and verbally abusive. There were times he'd show up to my baseball or soccer practices and games and beer cans would be falling out of his truck. (Never had an adult intervene there, though.)

Most annoyingly, he and my mom have "borrowed" my car for a year to work for DoorDash. They're too old now to get jobs anywhere else and have to survive.

The best thing I can say about him now is that I know he regrets all of it. On the rare occasions I have him over he always has a gift of some sort. It's usually something small, because they're very poor. Last time it was a container of oatmeal. It's his way of saying sorry, because his stoic, 1940's and 1950's upbringing produced a man who doesn't know how to actually say he's sorry.

The only one I can think about are financial advises: 1. Do not ever spend more than you have and 2. Never sign something on the street or a the door.

Both have been very useful in life.

I remember when I was very young, maybe 3 or 4 so this would've been like 1975-6?, sitting in the truck with my dad waiting for something. A song came on the radio, and I looked over and realized that my dad was crying. It was the only time I've ever seen my dad cry, but when I asked him he didn't try to hide or deny it, he just said 'You'll understand one day.' I listened to that song over and over again for years as I grew up, and slowly understanding dawned and it really made me value my relationship with him (and with everyone, really), and made me realize that it's okay to feel stuff even if society tells you that 'real men don't cry' or whatever.

His misogyny.

When he grabbed my by the throat and lifted me up a wall. Because i hit a door jam with a table leg, while moving it from the living room to the kitchen so he WOULDNT get pissed.

I've had a few" landmark moments" with my dad over the years. A lot of my experiences growing up with him were not positive. I think the most important thing I learned about him was that he wasn't a bad person. He genuinely wanted to do the right thing. He was (and to some extent still is) a broken man who's own father completely destroyed him. That realization made it easier for me to forgive him and work towards repairing our relationship.

The most important thing I learned from him was that anger is a cancer. If you can't learn to let it go, it will metastasize. It rots you away from the inside out; physically, mentally, and spiritually. Robbing you of joy and cutting you off from the people you love while doing nothing to resolve the things you're angry about.

I am extremely thankful that I learned that lesson at a relatively young age and before I had kids of my own. By the time my dad figured it out the damage was already done.

I love my dad, but I can only really think about the time he slammed my head through a wall when I was a teenager. I don't even remember what I did that pissed him off enough to do it. It's the only time he ever laid hands on me.

"It's ok son. Don't listen to her. Your mother is fucking insane."

To this day I still can't tolerate the smell of cigarette smoke.

It killed him in the end, of course, but we'd lost contact for several years by then. I wouldn't be surprised if it kills me too, even though I haven't directly smoked a cigarette in my life; my lungs definitely accumulated enough crap over my childhood to kill several grown men; couldn't breathe properly until I was an adult.

I don't think he ever quite readjusted to civilian life after his time in World War II. He talked of it constantly, watched documentaries and war pictures.

I'll never forget being around 12 years old and hearing my dad address another adult by Mr+surname. It was Mr Palmer who organized the little league I grew up playing in and my dad coached. In school we were forced to address teachers and staff as Ms, Mrs or Mr but at that instance I realized treating others with respect is a choice

His fists.

I thought that my Dad always killed flies with extreme force, until I saw him releasing them outside from his fist.

When I was lime 6 or 7 he told me that he broke a gay guy's nose because he hit on my dad at a rest stop bathroom.