How the Children of Alcoholic Fathers Can Let Go of the Bitterness

One Tuesday afternoon I sadly listened to a fellow-member of my writers’ group share a bitter article about her alcoholic father. Evelyn's childhood experiences were similar to my own, for I, too, had an abusive alcoholic father. 

My mother, my sister,  and I never knew what to expect when my father walked in the door each night. If he was sober, which happened rarely, life would follow the  pattern of most of the families in our small town. If, instead, he had stopped by a bar on his way home, we had learned through experience to stay as far away from him as possible. 

As the night progressed, arguments between my parents usually got louder and louder, and seldom ended without some kind of violence or threat of violence from my father. My sister, Carol, and I often cowered in our beds until long after midnight, praying that something terrible would happen to my father so we wouldn’t have to be afraid any more. 

Of course, nothing did happen to him, and the bitterness and hatred I felt for him only increased as I grew older, and I vowed, that someday he would get what he deserved. What he deserved, in my opinion, was pretty horrible; the more painful, the better. Hanging, I thought, was too good for him. 

After I grew up, married, and started raising a family of my own, I visited often with my parents, but seldom saw my father drunk, even though my mother informed me that he hadn’t changed, and often related tales of his latest drunken exploits to me. More and more, I found myself dwelling on the evil deeds of my father, allowing the bitter memories to fill my mind whenever I thought of him. 

Sitting there in my writers’ group meeting, I wondered just how many times had I spoken my bitterness aloud as my writer friend was now doing? It was like looking into a mirror, and, by the time she had finished, I finally realized the futility of going over and over things that cannot be changed.