Need to Vent - Thanks Religious Assholes

[Jenny A]

I’m not the type to publicly put up a story complaining (unless its a brief sentence), but since there are overtones in religion in this, I felt it may be worth mentioning, and may help explain to some people PMing me a why I may not respond for a little bit. I may be on and off here for a few days to a week, but here it goes.

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I’ve been having problems with my dad most of my life (he can’t get along with anyone that he’s close to). I’ve basically been bullied, along with my family into keeping my mouth shut, unless I wanted a huge fight with repercussions with this ‘person’.

He is a total narcissist, and always gets his way with practically everything, and if he doesn’t, you’ll never hear the end of it. He’s always whining, always complaining, always being negative, and isn’t happy unless he’s in a fight with someone, he’s never wrong, and he knows everything, and if it’s not his radical way of thinking, he’s going to want to have a problem with you. When I was younger, he loved to tell embarrassing things about me to other people that we were just meeting. And, his hypocrisy is through the roof, especially with our last fight. There’s a million examples of that too, like the forgive and forget one, that he loves to say, but feels the need to bring up things people have apologized for in the past over and over again decades ago. I can write for days on end about him, but I’ll just leave it at that for now. I felt I’ve been living at my last straw for about 7-8 years now, and don’t know how I made it through this much of my life. I feel the only reason I’m alive is the crazy amount of love I have for the closest 3 people in my life, and that I know they have for me.

We’ve had many of these fights where he talks 99.9% of the time, and just vents on how hard he has it, although he hasn’t worked in I don’t know how many years, and has practically nothing to be angry at. He should be insanely grateful to his wife, that she didn’t just pack up and leave him. In these recurring fights, he’s known for years how nervous he’s made me, and how many panic attacks and ulcerative colitis flare-ups he’s given me, but still seems to be all over me. There’s many things that he wants to fight about, but won’t drop THE FUCKING RELIGION FAIRY TALE BULLSHIT! After making it kindly known that I don’t believe in it, he still insists I’m the reason why the house has fallen apart (although it was like that when we were all going to church and devout), and that there are problems in it all the time. I felt like I was going to have a heart attack, I packed up a duffel bag in 20 minutes on Sunday, and my grandma picked me up, and now I’m at her house recovering. I’m starting to having a mild flare-up because of him, and my heart rate still hasn’t fully gone down.

I’ve been completely ignoring his, “Let’s just move on, and forget what happened” texts the past few days. I know by now that he’s never going to change, and when I feel a little better I’m desperately going to try to get out of the city and get a job I’m capable of doing. It’s hard because I have back and knee issues, and I’m in therapy for them now as well, and can’t really do labor or stand all day. I also feel sick nearly all the time in this city, because of allergies (which most people think is a joke, but not in my case exactly), so that’s why I feel I need to leave these desert cities with an amazing amount of dust, dirt, and pollen. I felt like I was a new person closer to the beach.

I’m a kind and laid-back person, despite how I may be perceived at times. I may not have been on here, if I didn’t see firsthand what religion is capable of doing. It drives me nuts how people’s beliefs become their identity, and how it becomes the most important thing in their lives. If you’re lying, dodging, or completely full of shit on here, I’m going to call you out, (or I’ll let someone else do it, there’s plenty ready to correct your lying asses) although nothing needs to be said to most of the people on here, you guys have been great. My dad cares more about me believing in what he believes, than me as a person, whether he realizes it or not.. I just can’t take it anymore, and don’t have plans to ever move back in under his roof for any extended period of time. I can’t entirely blame this on religion, because that’s how he is as a person (but didn’t seem to be this type of person until he became “devout” and politically involved about 15 years ago), but see what religion can do? See how evil it can be, and how it can cause people to think? From the millions and millions of these daily experiences, to people killing themselves because they're gay and can't cope with living with people that aren't in reality, all the way to terrorism. Religion, unless kept to oneself, WILL BE detrimental to someone in your life. Thanks for listening and your help. I don’t want to complain, but I feel the need to get some of this off of my chest.

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Kudos to your grandmother.  My problems with my father had to do with lack of communication and quiet and are nothing compared to yours.  My ex-husband had a daddy like yours.  There really is no solution except to be somewhere else and not dependent on him.  If your grandmother will provide that you are very very lucky in her.  And you are right not to see your dad's problem as religious.  He's make an asshole atheist too, I promise.  Stay in touch with him, but out of grabbing range if you can manage it. 

Do you have siblings left at home?