Up to 10 years, I thought that my father loves and understands me more than my mother, but when I was 12, we left and did not see each other anymore. My father did not even talk to me, did not explain the reason for the divorce. I thought it was a matter in me, that I was bad, and therefore he found another family.
When I was 37, and my father 72, he came to us, said that the old, sick and poor. Left his phone and address to resume relationships. I could not push him away, but every call was very difficult for me. Nine years have passed, but communication with him is still a burden, I very rarely call and come to visit, and because of this I am gone to a feeling of guilt.
Irina, the situation is really difficult. To lose his father, and even at such a vulnerable age, is a very severe trauma for a teenage girl. Especially when you thought for a long time that relations with him are better than with your mother. I am very sympathetic to you.
From your letter we can conclude that you were ignorant of the reasons for the divorce and all your grievances and claims are faced mainly to the father. But there was also a mother who could tell her version of the reasons for the breakup and somehow console you, especially since you stayed with her. Moreover, having become older, you could show the initiative yourself and maintain relations with your father, or at least talk to him about what excites you.
Apparently, it was very painful and offensive to you, perhaps you expected that he himself would appear and
explain everything, because the responsibility for the relationship first lies on the adult. I suppose that this is why you began to communicate with your father when he suddenly appeared: you still wait for him to do this-finally he will tell everything, sincerely ask for forgiveness, tells how hard it was all the time because of his cowardiceAnd looking for a meeting with you.
But, given how you are burdened by these meetings, he is in no hurry to do this and behaves as if nothing had happened, and you do not ask about anything. If so, I recommend trying to bring my father to a frank conversation – of course, of the most delicate, not accusing the manner (your father is already at old age), talk more about his feelings and expectations both in the past and in the present.
I also want to say a few words about guilt. Typically, the family system has one main negative feeling: wine, shame, anger, anxiety, despondency – which moves and controls all. Some of its members impose this feeling to others, place in some of the loved ones-usually in a child. And someone from the family “selects” this feeling, guided by the principle of “who, if not me”. And the feeling of guilt holds the palm of the championship among the rest.
In my opinion, something similar happened to you. But you have every right to your feelings, to your unwillingness to communicate with your father-despite the fact that you sometimes do it, out of respect for him, obligation or out of pity.