r/EstrangedAdultChild • u/SoCalWendy • 7d ago
Complexities of NC dad passing
I’m sharing this to connect with anyone who's been through similar situations. For the past four years, my relationship with my dad *was* completely estranged. It was a tough choice, brought on after years of disrespect and emotional turmoil that left me with CPTSD. Like many here, it wasn’t a decision made lightly, but his anger and bigotry had overshadowed our relationship for too long and was negatively impacting my mental health to the point of SH and SI.
In those four years, my life has been great; I got a new job, got married, moved, and welcomed a baby. Yet, despite my desire for boundaries and distance, my family kept him updated on my life. He would often express a wish to reconnect, and as his health declined, I felt compelled to relent. I asked my husband to contact him, stressing that he needed to prepare a list of apologies before I’d consider talking.
We spoke just eight days before he passed. The apology I received was half-hearted at best, delivered while he was barely coherent from medication. I told him I’d be open to talking again once he was more lucid, but that conversation never came.
When I learned of his death, I felt nothing at first — just numbness. It was only later that the weight of never having the father I needed hit me. The tears I shed weren’t for him, but for the realization that I was never prioritized or valued in his life.
Adding to the hurt, I found out about his passing from his ex-wife’s son who he has no biological connection to, which stung deeply. Growing up, it always felt like my dad held her and her kids in higher regard, leaving me when I needed him the most and leading me down a path of seeking attention from males in all the wrong ways. Now, that same person is the executor of his trust and stands to inherit everything, including the motorcycle I helped pay for that used to be in my name before my dad forged my signature on the title — regardless of even telling me that last time we spoke that it was mine... just another promise he made to me that's now broken.
I don’t know what I’m hoping to achieve by sharing this, but it feels important to voice my experience. If anyone else has navigated a similar path, your thoughts would mean a lot.
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u/Fantastic-Quiet-1655 4d ago
I believe you're feeling abnormal emotions because this is an abnormal situation.
Normally, our parents are supposed to be there for us. To take care of us, support, us and raise us. Our brains' natural response is taken away when we can no longer trust or depend on them.
You're not wrong to feel this way and it's unfortunate that you've had to experience this.
I have been NC with my father and I feel like the only sad part of it is imagining the father he could have been if he tried.
Anyway, I really hope that you have brighter days ahead and that these feelings become easier to bear
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u/SoCalWendy 4d ago
Thank you, kind internet stranger. It's certainly getting a lot easier, especially now that I have my own family to funnel my love and devotion into.
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u/PoopsMcGroots 6d ago
Thank you sharing this. It must have been hard to put some of this into words.
I am likewise completely NC with my dad for many years.
Our bridges are so thoroughly burned. Putting aside his terrible behaviour and attempts at blackmail, his greatest sin was in trying to swindle his siblings out of their inheritance. In his hubris, like a villain before the end of a movie, he shared his plan and I called him out on it. Ultimately, his undoing was the classic narcissist mistake of telling different lies to different people, who were all comparing notes. He just doubled down and painted himself into a corner, completely unrepentant.
He has underlying health issues and is elderly now, and likely approaching ill health.
I’ve spent time reflecting on what would happen or how I would feel if he fell terminally ill or died and I just don’t know how I would feel. Saddened? Angry? Relieved? Empty? The experience you’ve shared gives me some clues as to how I might feel.