I just want to share my personal experience with grief and forgiveness. If you're in pain due to emotional and or physical abandonment, I can relate to those feelings. I can remember having so much resentment toward my alcoholic father for how he treated me and our family. I was the scapegoat in the family during my growing up years. Sometimes the disease of alcoholism can show favoritism and yep, I was it. If it weren't for me, all would be just great in the household I was often told. I'm sure I don't have to fill you in on the emotional wreckage that causes to a child's psyche. But this post is not mean't to promote a bashing of parental mistakes. I found this program, found recovery, healing and understanding of myself and my father. Through Alanon I learned more about my part in our relationship.

I made a conscious choice before Alanon to have a relationship with with my father again and forgive him. My father was growing old, didn't drink any longer because it simply didn't physically feel good to do it. He had no program but he did have a belief in a hp. It was pretty simple for me, I wanted to know my father as an adult child and make my own decision about his place in my life. Up until that point, that decision had been made for me in my family of origin. Interestingly, the same way my father had used me as a scapegoat for all that went wrong in the house, we as a family held him responsible for all that was wrong in the house as well as with us personally. He caused it all.

I didn't expect nor feel it was important to get an apology from my father just to leave things open to converse and be in one another's company. I had not spoken to him for many years aside from cursing him out when I got old enough and he was in my face. I got lucky. I was entirely ready for something new and so was my father.

When he gave up drinking, my father began to change. He'd always had a hp and whether it was a spiritual awakening of some sort I'll never really know but what I do know is he was getting older, not as strong physically and his life was winding down. We never talked about how it had been in the house in my growing up years. I never made amends to him for any of the disrespect I'd shown him. We just moved forward in present time and acceptance with gratitude of the time we were being given with one another.

Looking back, I feel in my heart that his relationship with my exah was a way of making amends to me. What better way to say you love someone than to fully show love to the one they love. I suppose some might say well naturally two A will hit it off. That can also be a fact but there were other things only related to myself that cause me to believe my father was making amends to me. I think his shame ran so deep, it was hard for him to find the words so instead he took actions. My recovering abf and I have discussed this concerning his own kids and what he has shared strengthens my thinking that this may have been how my father felt inwardly. He began to do nice things for me. When I would visit, he would say I know you needed this fixed or thought you would like this so here. I'd simply say, "Thanks Dad that's nice of you." I didn't gush, run and hug him. I would have liked to but I loved him enough to respect his comfort level. 

At this point I was in recovery and knowing I am not standing on a pedestal of perfection at which others should gaze and imitate, I accepted with gratitude any and all kindnesses from my father. I didn't need my father's help to resolve the wreckage of the past. My higher power lifted that from me when I worked the Steps and gifted me with compassion, forgiveness and acceptance. I was able to give to my father and say things to him I wanted to say. My biggest fear had been that if I would approach him to begin a relationship again, he might reject me. This was a really big abandonment issue. Somehow my hp even before Alanon and my hp gave me the courage to risk it. It may have come as a relief to my dad because he was receptive. Perhaps he had had wanted this but not known how to begin.

Honestly, there are no words to describe the feelings I feel now that both my parents gone from this world. You hear it likened to being an orphan in the world. I use to think that was maybe a bit overstated.  We are adults I told myself, we can take care of ourselves and go on. Of course you go on but no matter what kind of parents, no matter what mistakes they have made, the world seems to be a changed place without them in it.  I think it may be because they are the roots from which we came and at least for me anyway, in some unexplainable way, a part of me has died with them. And though I am not longer able to lean on them on ocassion for something in this world, my hp is caring for me each and every day and helping me in my life. 

I'm glad that my father and I were able to come full circle and have a loving relationship. It was unique. It was one of a kind. It was loving. It was honest. In the latter years, I gave as a child to their aging parent and my father as parent having maybe gained more of life's wisdom with the help of a higher power. We were "us."  It brought closure for me and peace as I continue on life's journey and I hope it gave my father serenity in his last moments here on earth. I'm grateful to my hp for helping me to find the courage to risk to know my father and myself more. Thanks for reading my post and for letting me share with you.  ((hugs))) TT