(no subject)

[felicula]

My dad was drunk again. The lights were on, but nobody was home. You know it's bad when mom tells him to sit down five times in a row and he just blinks at here, bewildered. When he's drunk it doesn't matter who's in the house. If his routines are interrupted he'll get belligerant. Heaven forbid I should sit in "his" chair and have a different channel on the television. He'll stand there and insult me until I fight back or leave the room. It's easier to leave the room. He's like a stubborn, selfish, impetuous five-year-old. Even my overactive and willful son is better behaved than my drunken dad.

He wandered down in a bathrobe one night, clearly checked out of reality. He walked right past my mom, stared at my husband in "his" chair, and said, "Dear? What's going on?" He wandered away slowly, repeating the same phrase and not seeing any of us there. My husband retreated to the living room. My mom and I cried.

He was supposed to light a fire in the fireplace for us all to enjoy. His hand shook, the match wouldn't light, and he just looked up like a sullen child and complained about the quality of the matches. My mom ended up telling him to get away from the fireplace and to let me handle it. The match lit on the second strike. I got the fire going with no problems. This was the first time I got to do the honors, and I love fires in real fireplaces, but it shook me to my core that my dad was so out of it he couldn't even light a match.

He barely eats when he's like this. He's lost weight because of it. With little inhibitions, he wanders out in the hallway in his underwear briefs that hang off him like they're several sizes too big. His pants look like they'll fall down any moment, when he's wearing them.

My mom closed their bedroom door so she could chew him out for it. That was a mistake. At 3:30 in the morning, having no connection with reality and being sleepy as well, he walked full-force into the door on the way to the bathroom. It sounded like someone was shot. (Good thing there are no guns in the house.) He just emerged with the same confused expression on his face, repeating bemusedly, "the door was shut... the door was shut?" They have a night light on in the hall every night. Even someone sleep-ridden could have perceived the door as shut.

I asked my mom why she stays with him. She replied that she asks herself that a lot. She said that if she had a means to support herself, she'd be out of there pretty quickly. She seemed calm as she said that, but body language betrayed her agitation. As she went to walk away she fell hard to the floor. I wouldn't have thought it possible by its shape, but she says she tripped over the leg of the boxy upholstered chair she was walking past.

I just hope he doesn't try to apologize to me again. In the past, every time a visit would go like that he would try to apologize. I am sick of hearing it because there's always a next time, no matter how many times he says there will not be one. It has been over a decade since I could tell him that I sincerely believed his apologies. To me, they're just a cherade, a cover-up.

I asked my mom if he's ever been treated for depression. She said he'd never agree to talk to someone about it. Well, I don't think AA is helping him. I think the mental department would have to be addressed before he has a shot in the dark at real recovery. I don't call those week- or month-long stretches of sobriety between days, weeks, or months of drunkenness recovery. They're just forestalling what has become the inevitable.

Comments

[mechanchaos.livejournal.com]

Boycott Families Now!!!

Vote on Holiday MMO Fest!!!

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

Does this mean you don't want to go to Christmas?

[hbbtrbbtbcnbt.livejournal.com]

*hugs, hugs, and more hugs*

I am SOOOO sorry for what is happening. I don't have much to say that would be of help, other than I love you guys, and I hope hope HOPE that your dad can get some true help, and that your mom will do what is best for her so she can be well, and that you and John and Aidan can be strong and be able to handle when you need to, and able to back off when it's needed also.