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Dear Jean: Hi. I am a 19 year old college
student. I feel as Jean responds: Hi, I am sorry to hear that things with your father have become so bad that you feel in despair. I think your idea of counseling is an excellent one; you do not have to have your father go with you to benefit. You sound pretty depressed, and I think you should explore getting help. Don't try to carry these burdens alone. If there is no counselor at your university, find a sliding-fee counseling agency in the community and get someone to see you. It does sound as if your father is often unfair and perhaps emotionally punitive in his withdrawal and his use of power over you. I understand that you feel you could not afford to move out, but I would suggest that you work with a counselor, perhaps at your university, who can help you to plan how to get out on your own, perhaps by working parttime. Your father has a certain power over you as long as he is paying for your expenses. Hope this helps a little. Feel free to write again. Jean. Disclaimer: Ms. Walbridge's
response to your question is |
though my father is not fair as a parent. Often he threatens
me by saying that he'll take my car away, stop paying for things,
or kick me out to the street. For example, today he found some
beer cans under one of the beds in our house. I told him that
they were mine. He wouldn't talk to me. I asked him to listen
to me, and hear me explain why I was drinking, but he would not.
He just simply turned the volume of the television up and didn't
say a word. I begged him to communicate with me and he wouldn't.
I told him that the problem was that we never resolved our problems.
He speaks and then as soon as I start saying something, he interrupts
and puts words in my mouth. He never lets me explain. I've told
him all these things before but he does not listen to me. It
feels like he never listens. He has this attitude that he's always
right, no matter what. I don't even know if giving him a guide
to effective parenting or showing him the research on good parenting
that I have done will help anything. Sometimes I feel as though
I'm trapped. I told my dad that I want to go to counseling so
we can actually work through our problems by discussing them.
But he doesn't care, in fact he doesn't say anything. He gets
up and leaves and stays mad. He never talks to me and he makes
me feel like I'm a piece of crap. He doesn't respect anything
I have to say. I tell him that we need to communicate and that
he's not good at solving problems that we have because we don't
communicate. Even then, he doesn't say anything. He thinks that
I think of him as a moron. And in a sense, to be honest, I do,
simply because he always always thinks he's right. No matter
who says something to him, it could be the best psychologist
in the world, and I don't think he would care. He's not fair
either. He just threatens and threatens and doesnt expect me
to get mad because of that. He tells me he's going to kick me
out to the street, and not pay for anything, like he did to my
older brother. He calls my brother names in front of me, he tells
my brother that he's an idiot. He just doesn't care about our
feelings. He treats me like a dog most of the time, never respecting
my feelings. He's so demanding and yells and then when I speak
to him, he tells me that I'm yelling and then stops talking to
me. Please, if you can help, at all, please do. I'm crying as
I write this because I don't think that this cycle will ever
stop. We never make any progress. No matter how nice I try to
be, or how softly I try to speak, he just becomes stubborn and
doesn't listen to anything I have to say. If you respond to all
this and I show him and tell him any advice that you may have,
I still don't think it would matter. I don't know if anything
can change his ways, or help him to help me change if I'm doing
something wrong. It's become the most frustrating thing in the
world. And I simply can't deal with it, he makes me feel so terrible,
and doesn't care.