Dealing with Abusive Emails from Father

In my blog, I have mentioned the difficulties of dealing with my abusive ex-husband and also my abusive father. Obviously my relationship with my father had a lot to do with my selecting my abusive ex-husband. My relationship with my dad was very unhealthy, and it was the only example of a relationship I had during my childhood.  So when I met my ex-husband I had no point of reference for a healthy relationship. 

Today, I received a hateful poem from my father (see screenshot). I only included the first few verses, and that is a perfect enough example of the rest of the poem. My father sends this poem to his daughter to send to his ex-wife of nearly 40 years?  He has been saying hateful statements about my mother sine I was five years old. Inside the email, he says; “I hope this answers your big question. Daddy”. Even that statement is dripping with sarcasm.

My father is mentally ill, has vascular dementia and has diabetes. So he is not doing so well but that is no excuse for his bad behavior. He is currently living in an assisted living home near my Aunt’s house because the police picked him up one night driving aimlessly and was involuntarily committed.  He believes my Aunt plotted against him, and everyone else (doctor’s, police, judge) are all wrong and he is perfectly fine.

His poem was a clever rhyme about my mother being a whore. Funny, I probably shouldn’t feel angry after all these years but I wish he would move on.  It has been nearly 40 years now since they got divorced, and he can’t get over that.  He is now twice divorced because his last wife couldn’t take living with his abusive behavior.  She has sent me letters saying how much respect she has for my mother because she know first hand how my father can be.

Anyway, I do feel some old feelings of anger. My aunt expects me to take care of him? When I was sixteen years old, I had very little contact with my father by choice.  I just didn’t want to hear this hateful stuff about my mother anymore.  I don’t care what happened when I was a little kid.  I know he was physically and verbally abusive, and perhaps she did have an affair.  Maybe she was seeking kindness from someone else.  Knowing my father, I can hardly blame her.

He is mentally ill, and I can ask him not to send things like this to me, but he will do it again.  These past two days he has sent me all sorts of bizarre emails with titles like; ‘honor thy father and thy mother’, ‘the real war’ and ‘prayer to the holy spirit’. He often gets religious in his bouts where everyone is going to hell if they don’t repent.  Of course, he never means that he should repent for the things he has done. Always somebody else’s fault and somebody else to blame.

Sorry to rant, but that just made me mad.  I am supposed to send a card out for father’s day, and now I feel like sending ‘Happy Father’s Day, Asshole’ to him.  Just as I did when I was a child, I will keep this poem (comment) from reaching my mother. Mentally ill is no excuse for his abusiveness.

Perhaps an abusive (man or woman) will truly never become less abusive.