Daddy issues.

So today I spoke to my father for the first time in a few weeks. I should explain, my dad and I have something of a tense relationship. For the most part he was supportive of me, he told me to stand up for myself, watched out for me, did everything he should. He helped me with my homework and taught me to ride a bike. But he worked on the other side of the country, which means he commutted for two hours each way every day and I rarely saw him. And he had red hair and the temper that traditionally comes with it.

He and my mum argued a lot. I rarely took it in to be honest. Then they seperated and my mum re-married. As I got older my dad started to make comments about how he wasn't paying any maintenance for me, and tell his friends he could reduce me to tears over the phone if he wanted to. He was proud of both of these facts.

When I got married my father wanted to give me away, he wanted to be on the invitation as a host of the wedding, though again, he paid for nothing. He came to the wedding, got drunk, made a 20 minute speech about himself, got drunker, made advances at my mother, in front of my step-dad, wrapped himself around my older cousin for half an hour telling her how much he misses our family, then hung himself off me on the dancefloor while I was trying to say goodbye to my guests. He eventually passed out, on the floor of the supper room, and two of my older cousins and the best man lifted him, put him in the emergency evacuation chair and got him down to a taxi. He later claimed to have not been drunk, but to have been tired and emotional.

Since then he has planned to visit me and cancelled more times than I care to remember. He came up for my graduation and actually behaved himself, though my mum and I drank a lot of wine. He still has never offered any help, taken much of an interest in my life or even spoken to my husband in the nearly four years since my wedding day. I began to distance myself. Easier that way.

Today he called me and complained that I'm never home when he tries to call, this is despite the fact I tried to call him on NYE and he didn't answer. Moving on. He then asked for a copy of my shifts so he'll know when to call me. I told him about the house and said we were trying to buy somwhere new. He told me we can't afford another house, that everything I was telling him about was too expensive, sided with my mother over a house we've been looking at that needs fixing up and then moved on to tell me he's retiring in December.

So I'm left upset, again, because I've had many conversations over the last few days about how we can/can't afford certain houses, about how we do/don't want to live in certain areas and about how we should/shouldn't buy a house that needs work doing to it. After days of discussion I was feeling quite good about the decisions we'd made. Only for my dad to come along and put me right back at the beginning, doubting myself.

I know I shouldn't let things affect me the way they do, but he's my dad. He has affected me so much that my first serious relationship was with an abusive fool who treated me the way my dad does, and I let him, for a year, until he assaulted me and verbally abused my best friend. Turns out though that like all bullies, when I stood up to him he collapsed in a wibbling heap. Literally. He left me a voicemail of him having a panic attack. About 18 months later one of my best friends, who knew him first, met him on a bus. She told him I was getting married and she was going to be my bridesmaid and he burst into tears there and then.

I still let the mindset get the better of me sometimes. I was talking to a step-cousin last night and he said "You don't give yourself much credit, do you?" I thought about it and knew exactly why. It's because for the first twelve years of my life there was a real person telling me I wasn't up to it, not just a voice in my head. My husband and I have a great relationship, we talk things through and for the most part will eventually come to an agreement. I spent a lot of time when we first got together thinking he was going to leave me, I still have days where I'm convinced it's all going to blow up in my face, and I've started to realised that the majority of the times we fall out it's because I've started a fight pre-emptively to avoid being blamed for something that he wouldn't have blamed me for anyway, or to avoid an argument I start an argument about something else. Now don't get me wrong, he's not perfect, and he has his moments that make me want to kill him with a pillow, but that's a male thing, right? ;)

But while thinking about all this earlier and trying to tell my husband what had been said I had a sharp memory, and one that suddenly eplained to me why I've been so reluctant to just go for the house I want most, ignore the work it needs doing and just make it work, the way other people do. It was something my dad said to me when I was about seven and had broken something. "You don't deserve nice things."

So with that in mind I am making an appointment to view the house tomorrow. And I'm going to budget, and work towards getting our perfect house, because really, what's the worst that can happen? We don't get solid wood floors and a conservatory. So what? We'll get something else. So until the next time, always look on the bright side of life *whistles*