So I had a veryy interesting night last night. My FI and I recently moved up our date to this November. We haven't told anyone really except for our closest family members and the BP. My two MOHs have decided to throw me a bridal shower and posted something about it on Facebook. Well, they tagged me in it, so it showed up on my page. My stepmom saw it and started questioning about it, saying things like "wedding shower??? care to explain?" I honestly didn't want to answer, because my friends literally just decided this the day before...and my stepmom/father will not be invited to my wedding.
Backstory: Well, I haven't really been close to my dad for a while...a long while. My parents got divorced when I was 4? close to that age. But I remember they being married...and it wasn't good. My dad has a lot of anger issues, and I mean, a lottt. I remember him punching walls and breaking brooms and ripping clothes and even shooting a cat with a beebee gun. All of this before I was 4 years old. My mom was always kind of afraid of him. They barely even knew each other before they got married. They met in August, engaged in October, and married the following May. So less than a year.
What made my mom decide to leave him (well, the FINAL straw) was this incident: My mom decided to go back to work (working night shift in a nursing home) whenever I was about 2 years old. She had always tucked me into bed and read to me, and then went to go do laundry or whatever it was she needed to do after we (my sister and I) were asleep. Well, she was wearing work clothes and getting ready to leave, so I knew something was up. And I wouldn't stay in bed. My mom and dad both told me repeatedly to go back to bed, but I just wouldn't. I just wanted to know where my mom was going, ya know. Well, eventually my dad got REALLY mad, and he yelled "Get back to bed you stupid little piece of **** !" I don't remember that incident happening, but my sister does. She always thought my dad was calling her that, which led to some problems of her own later on. But that's a different story. That night, my mom said she went to work and decided she would start saving money to leave him. and she did.
When I was 7, my dad met my stepmom. At the time, he was in the military in SC and we were living back in OK. He was getting out of the military, so he had a choice as to where he could move. My stepmom said she would not leave her family in PA, so if he wanted to be with her, he'd have to move there. But she told him that he should make the choice to be with his kids. Well, he didn't. I mean, I'm all for making yourself happy. But he constantly gripes (or did) about not being apart of our lives and not being there for things. Well, he had the choice. He chose to move away from us when he had a clear opportunity to be near us. And some might argue that he had better job opportunities in PA. Not, he worked at a grocery store for the first...2 years I think? So no. He chose love over his own kids. Which realllly pisses me off and always has. So needless to say, gradually over the years that I was forced to go visit him by the courts, I never really enjoyed it. Especially when I got old enough to where my friends got to go play sports and go on vacations with their families, and I had to go visit my dad for 6-8 weeks. With no friends, only my stepmom's family (who most of them never even bothered to learn my name!). So I pretty much hated it there. My dad wasn't a horrible dad while we were there, but he never tried to be our dad when we were home in OK. Like, he'd never ask about our lives/school/friends, or when he rarely did, he wouldn't act interested at all. So we'd usually just say "oh nothing" or something like that. Another thing is child support. Our child support was determined when my dad made $20k a year, back in the '90s. Well, now he makes more than 4x that amount and has for at least...8-9 years. But he never paid more than $340 a month for both my sister and I in child support. Because the amount was never adjusted for his new salary. Granted, my mom could've taken him back to court to get it raised, but she never had the money because it's always been just her...and she just couldn't afford it. So all of that, and plenty more small instances have made me NOT like my dad. And cause me to not want him at my wedding.
So back to my stepmom. She was asking me about the wedding shower and if that meant I was getting married...duh. They knew that already. And whenever she asked me when, I told her we wanted to keep it private because we really did until the invites went out. We're not inviting that many people and we realize that with such short notice, most of them won't be able to attend. But we understand that and it doesn't hurt our feelings. She then asked if I was inviting my dad and when I said no and explained how I never really felt like I had a dad, etc., all hell broke loose. In the conversation, she accused my mom of influencing negative feelings about my dad in me (false, she's done the exact opposite actually, trying to get me to move passed the bad feelings I have for him), accused my mom of cheating on my dad (I'm guessing my dad told her that...yeah, right. never happened), and said that I needed to think for myself and stop letting others "pump me with crap". Yeah? But she's the one sitting there saying all these horrible things that my "dad" has pumped into her mind. But that's different than me saying what my mom has told me? She's ignorant beyond all get out. There's a lot more to the conversation, but I just can't think of it right now. It was a lot, and I mean A LOT.
What really pissed me off was her bringing my mom into it, like my mom had done something bad. My mom has met this woman maybe twice? And never said bad things about her. She has NO RIGHT to bad talk my mom, having never even taken the time to get to know her or even TALK to her.
Side Note: My grandma and aunt on my dad's side have both reached out to me, but seem to be taking my dad's side. So I'm not 100% sure I'll have any family at my own wedding. Besides my sister, mom, and my other grandma. So that really stinks, but then again, if they want to act immature and miss such an important part of my life because I finally stood up and spoke my mind about my feelings toward my father. Feelings I have been harboring and pushing aside until I was legally an adult and wasn't forced to have contact with him anymore. To be honest, my mom has been both of my parents since...I was born. (my dad was not there whenever I was born due to military deployment). He didn't have a choice about that, but he could've been a dad once he returned home. And he just never really was. He's a great dad to my little sister (half sister), and I'm glad for her. Because everyone deserves a dad.
Rant complete, I think lol.
the reason it hurts so much to separate is because our souls are connected. ~nicholas sparks<3</center>