Posted by Dinah on November 8, 2004, at 22:10:47
Another call from my parents. My father had fallen and couldn't get up. He had fallen so that my mother couldn't get out of bed and let emergency personnel in. They weren't going to call emergency personnel.
I reiterated that I was not able to get my father up by myself (my mother is unable to help - in a wheelchair) but that I would be happy to call 911 and wait there for someone to come. They said they didn't want that and hung up.
I called back and my mother kindly relayed the message that my father had said that he hated me, that I was a horrible excuse for a daughter, and that he no longer wanted me in his house. That he no longer had a daughter.
I went over there anyway. He was still on the floor. Still determined not to have 911 called. Asking me to do this or that to help him up, only to ask me to wait while he caught his breath, or to fall again and hit his head on this or that furniture. I watched with a curious detachment as he lay on his back flailing about as he called me a m_____f____ and similar things and threatened all sorts of things should I call 911. I tried unsuccessfully to imagine my husband's parents calling him those names under any circumstances. I tried unsuccessfully to imagine myself speaking like that to my son under any circumstances. I remembered how my mother had done the same - screamed at me how I was no longer her daughter because I had caught her stealing from me. I wondered how many people had this sort of relationship with their parents. When he started yelling that he had broken something, I quit even halfheartedly trying to help him up and called 911. My tears were still streaking my face from my mother's kind sharing of my father's words. They spoke kindly to me about older people. But the truth is that my parents aren't like this because they're older. They've always been like this. I just was never the target in my father's case before. My mother and brother were.
I told my father to be careful what he said to me because I just might listen to him. I told my mother to please not relay messages like that from my father because I just might listen to them. My parents thought that was horribly unkind of me.
I feel kind of numb about it.
poster:Dinah
thread:413527
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/relate/20041106/msgs/413527.html