tldr; my dad doesn’t seem able to help himself and see how his negative attitude and behavior is self-destructive. all he does is ask us to do everything for him, complain, nag, and go on random outbursts and it really affects my mom, who then dumps it all on me. Today was the final straw when he went on a verbal rampage to my mom after I said no to helping him call social security for him because he didn’t get his check in the mail. How can I get him to realize he needs help?
I’m going to do my best to paint an objective picture of my dads side, giving insight into why he might be who he is today. Maybe that’ll help come up with a personalized solution.
Some context about family dynamic: he’s first generation Chinese American. Born in Vietnam due to communism. Currently retired at the age of 66, my mother is 56, born in China. My brothers and I are second generation born in US. I am 28M, have an older brother 30M who is currently in prison for the past 13 years (completely changed his life around), had a younger brother 6M who passed away when I was 8 due to a car accident in where my dad was driving. My dad was not at fault. Family life prior to this wasn’t the best but definitely better than life after the accident. Somewhat typical Asian American upbringing – my dad has always been stand-off-ish, never opening up, holds very traditional asian values.
He didn’t have it easy growing up — being the youngest with 8 other siblings. He moved here some 38+ years ago, don’t remember. Despite that, he never learned English enough to hold a conversation. He worked a decent job up until the crash in ’08 and then was in between jobs until he became a lunch lady at a local high school until his retirement. My mom had to step up and work multiple jobs while he was tasked with taking myself and my brother to school until my freshman year high school. This was when I moved out to my cousins/his brother’s due to my house being a less-than-ideal environment to live in, and my brother was incarcerated his sophomore year.
From what I’ve observed, he doesn’t really have friends or anyone to really turn to. The people that do listen to him, more so seem to listen to get him to shut up because when he does try to talk to people about the issues, it’s more so complaining and not really him trying to understand or learn from his own experiences. I used to listen but before I left home and went to college, as a kid, I couldn’t really say much and he wouldn’t respect what I said anyways since I was a kid.
I am not blind to the fact his life experiences must have exacted a huge toll on his mental well-being, and consequently, the way he communicates. However, he doesn’t agree this is an issue or something that he needs to work on. I think this has stunted his capacity to learn new things or do things on his own, almost causing him to act like a huge crybaby when things don’t go his way or when he doesn’t know how to do something.
Growing up, I’ve observed that he has always criticized my entire family, extended and direct, for random things, always bad-mouthing us, etc., saying we never help him when in reality, he always asks me for help. He’s always complaining to us, and about us, behind our backs. Whenever he faces an issue, he’s either unable or unwilling to do his own research and help himself, which has really pushed my family away. I know you might be thinking ‘just help him’ — and I do when I can but sometimes it’s impossible things like today. When I told him ‘no, I can’t call social security on your behalf because I’m not you’, he instantly shut me out and essentially said ‘ok fine whatever’, as if the reason I said no was because I didn’t want to help him, rather than the fact that I’m simply unable to help him.
He also exhibits a deep mistrust for everyone around him. Aside from outwardly saying he’s the best or behaving pompous, he sounds like a narcissist but has never been formally diagnosed.
Throughout my life, he’s had periods of constantly complaining and of course, my mom hates hearing it and she then complains to me about it. The reason why I’m posting today is that today was the last straw — I’m really sick of it and I want to either fix my family or find out how I can give them the tools necessary to fix their own trauma because I have my own trauma I need to deal with.
Maybe this was too much information but I hope this paints an accurate view into what kind of person we’re dealing with.
Thanks in advance.
1 comment
You can’t. And won’t.
The sooner you realize the more freeing it becomes.
You cannot change someone unless they want to change themselves.
I feel for you and understand because I grew up with a verbally abusive father, also from the older generation. Which makes it extremely hard for them to see your point of view.
No amount of explaining and nagging will ever help.
Responding with negativity makes things worse, sometimes you just have to keep it in your heart or write down what ever you want to say to him.
Try not to allow someone’s actions and trauma affect you.
Once you see that they can’t help it and haven’t been given the skills or right parenting you understand that it’s the only way they know how to be.
The anger comes from deep hurt and has been conditioned as their new normality.
Secretly deep down there is shame and hatred for themselves, that’s something that may never be healed, you have to be okay with that and see things as they are, not how you want them to be.
He sounds like he maybe has NPD or bipolar which there’s a lot of videos on yt about how to interact with these type of people. Dr Daniel fox has some good videos.
If he doesn’t want to do therapy or anything then your mom should leave him and have him fend for himself, that’s probably the only way he’d ever start to regret the things he’s said and done.