For as long as I can remember, my father hasn’t always been the warm type. In fact, he posses a lot of flaws that I actually hate in a person. Abrasive, inconsiderate, cold, dense, detached…Like you know how everyone has flaws and there are some you can manage naturally, but there are just some that you absolutely HATE? Yup, that’s how I feel about him.

I hate the fact that he hit me as a little girl, over stupid shit like getting a math question wrong. Those days of him self-teaching me math were horrible, as if school is the only fucking aspect of life.

I hate the fact that the only time he’d ever apologized for something he wrongly did towards me was when his friend was standing there.

I hate him for the times I’ve seen him treat my mom sometimes. I remember as a child my mom was crying over a picture of her dead father whom she lost at the age of 13. And I remember him saying something along the lines of, “What are you doing, fooling around like that?” wanting to fix the TV instead. Some childhood memories never fade…

I hate that he can be so sloppy and inconsiderate of when my mom cleans the house. Just messing it back up with his bad habits.

I hate that he can be a closed-minded, controlling jerk that thinks it’s okay to boss around a 25 year old about the way I want to live my life.

I hate that he uses his loud voice to assert himself and use as a weapon to invoke fear.

Lately, I’ve been ruminating about how much I can hate him. I ruminating about getting into a physical fight scenario where I beat the shit out of him and he never treats me like a 5 year old again.

I always internally vow to myself that I will NEVER end up with someone like him. I deserve someone who’s warm, attentive, and understands the meaning of life.

Looking at the adult family members in my life, to be honest I can’t think of a good example of what a real healthy relationship should look like. I feel like deep down my mom thinks she could’ve done better, and my aunt feels the same about herself.

Now, my dad has done a lot for me. I’m debt-free from college because he paid for everything, bought me games when I was little, and other things a parent should do, but….I still feel it’s just not enough, otherwise I wouldn’t be resenting him the way I do. Even the sweet moments just weren’t enough for me.

I am bitter and resentful of the family dynamic I’ve been born into, and I feel a lot of the bitterness comes from the way I feel about my dad. I even catch myself sometimes behaving like him sometimes towards other people, and I bothers me a lot.

I don’t know what to do. This hatred in my heart can’t stay and fester. I label myself as weak and someone to be bossed around because I feel I don’t know how to stand up to him. The way he treated me is the reason why I’ve always been lacking in assertiveness skills, and I let people treat me however they want.

And it doesn’t help I still live under his roof. I ruminate a lot on not having a place of my own, not living like the free adult I want to be, and being subject to the opinions of my parents. I feel stagnated and sad.