I speak with my Dad daily now that he’s still in the hospital.  He’s had a few setbacks which have delayed him being “dischargeable”.   His mood is not the best, but again, he’s never been the model of optimism.  When Dad is afraid he will invariably ratchet up the passive-aggression to near unbearable levels.  When I spoke to him Sunday after his surgery, the first words out of his mouth were “I’m not doing well at all.”.  He then proceeded to tell me all about how his leg still hurt and how his doctor won’t commit to a discharge date in addition to other issues that vex him.

In all of this, I wonder sometimes if I qualify as a “good” son.  As a physician, I seem to have made my reputation by my bedside manner and my attitude of caring and advocacy for my patients.  As the son of this man, however, it seems that my patience and my ability to give him warmth are limited.  This bothers me.

Searching deep down, I suppose one would start with my relationship with him and how it evolved.   I have written before about how much I idolized my father when I was an early elementary schooler.   I don’t know however, that I have portrayed my adolescence with him very clearly.   This was a problem time.   My father was very much the authoritarian in our house.  There was physical punishment and often, it seemed as though your value in the home was based on your school grades.  Everything seemed conditional on your school performance and even their love and acceptance sometimes seemed tied in to you “doing what they want”.  I often joke that I was pre-med in kindergarten but the sad part is that I really was.  I was typically an A-/B+ student but I think that if my psychological needs were better met at home, I could have been even better.   Nonetheless, I did have trouble in some subjects from time to time. In 8th grade, for instance, I was in algebra.   My teacher was, by all accounts, simply awful.   Half the class was close to failing or failing.  One guy from Denmark had a 100% average but, then again, I think he invented algebra.  My Dad was furious with my poor performance even though the homework took me hours.   He assumed I was lying when I said I was doing the work.  One night in the middle of the school year when I brought home a poor mark…he physically beat me for it.  I wish I could say it was a mere spanking.  It was not.  This was closed fists and belts and kicking me on the ground.  This was beating me…going and cooling off…revving up again and beating me some more.  This went on mercilessly for hours.  Of course, my mother was afraid of him back then.   School was humiliating after that as I tried to conceal the bruising.

Suffice it to say that I have probably never gotten over that.  I lost trust for both of my parents.   I have forgiven them I suppose but on some level the inability to open up to my parents probably has its roots in this episode. 

A less immature adolescent would have just written them off but I could not do that.  I was too dependent on them emotionally.  They always held the financial support that they’d given me over my head and I was too naive or immature to just say “shove it; I’ll make my own way”.    My parents had succeeded in producing a totally dependent child.  While I could never separate completely from them…there were about ten years from ages 15-25 when most conversations with my Dad were either about nothing in particular or we wound up arguing.  That certainly sounds similar to many stories of adolescence that I have heard.  In my mid-twenties though, I had achieved what he thought I could not: a medical degree.  By my late twenties, I was married and had a son.  I felt it was very important to keep some kind of relationship with my father for the sake of my son.  I also felt as though my younger siblings and my mom deserved an intact family unit.

I am slowly watching life leave my father piecemeal as small bits of his independence as a human being are being whittled away by illness.   He was a man who never exercised.  He was a man who never went to the doctor.  While he provided for us, he seemed decidedly lazy once he came home at night.  I have long felt that he did this to himself.   I live in constant fear that what is unfolding in front of me will somehow be my fate.   I don’t know if that’s a nice way to think about things.  I have secretly held that he has had a personality disorder his whole life.  He’s alienated so many friends and colleagues.  In later life, he alienated most of his remaining siblings.   He’s a man who could have been surrounded by so much more support if he hadn’t alienated it. 

As every day brings new word of something that isn’t working quite right and I listen to the words come out of his mouth, I realize that this highly intelligent man is afraid.  I also realize that I am merely listening and offering some advice if he’ll take it but I am not as warm or sad as I could be.  I don’t feel like the cheerleader that’s going to pep him up.  Perhaps it’s because I subconciously feel that he’s beyond that and it won’t work.  Perhaps I am just tired of having him make some declaration about the doctors or the hospital or the illness and have him not realize that I too have become what he’s insulting.  Perhaps it’s a defense mechanism of my own that isn’t allowing him to get into my head and drag me down with him because let’s face it;  He’s most content when he’s dragged our emotions down with his.  Modobs had a post about this type of issue today.

He’s always been a “know-it-all” and while decidedly brilliant…he’s never known when to admit that he’s full of shit.  I don’t like the word “patriarch” but in the end, I feel as though it is passing to me and that’s an uncomfortable feeling to have.  This is one facet of my father and perhaps I don’t do enough writing about the things that he did well in life.  Perhaps it’s an unfair portrayal but I don’t have any other explanation as to why I can’t comfort him.  It could be that it has more to do with him than me and that I just can’t see it.

I just don’t want to realize it after the fact because then it might be too late.

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