I believe dad has some issues mentally that keep him from being able to see the world around himself like we do. Whether it was from the wreck he had as a teenager or if he was born that way, I do not know. I will give a little explanation of what I see with a huge disclaimer as to the accuracy of my observations. I think it's wrong to assign motives to people and say why they do the things they do. That said, I will attempt to explain what I see as some issues that make it hard to deal with dad and explain why I think he suffers even more than he makes us suffer.
1. Black and white thinking: What I mean by that is that he seems to think either he is of God or he is not. If he is, then his thoughts and dreams must be of God also. If we do not accept him then we are rejecting God. His measure of our walk with God is whether or not we obey and honor him. If he is not of God then he must be doomed to eternal hell fire and be completely unworthy. This all or nothing thinking makes it hard to get him to accept his own mistakes and admit his failures. It keeps him from seeing himself as okay and loved by God, even though he makes mistakes just like anyone else does.
2. He has difficulty reading other people's body language, facial expressions and other subtle cues most people get, that lets us know when someone is uninterested in what you are saying or maybe even angry. This causes him to seem much more obnoxious than what he means to be because he really doesn't get it sometimes. That become clear to me when we were in the hospital in Arkansas with mom. As he talked to different people there and they tried to deal with the issues going on, he didn't seem to realize when people are really angry or when he was getting himself in trouble. When someone was nice to him, he felt like they were on his side. When they ended up not taking his side, he felt betrayed. It damaged his sense of trust. It made me think of a blind person in a room full of people that were hitting him. He really couldn't see it coming.
3. He appears to have a lot of paranoia related to the medical profession. I don't know exactly why but I think it could be from his time in the mental hospital and them strapping him down and giving him shock treatments. What ever it is, he is truly afraid of doctors and hospitals. He will not sign a normal "consent to treat forms" for mom because he feels like he is giving control over to the doctors to do anything they want. It doesn't seem to matter that I explain to him that they would have to get another consent if they were doing something like surgery. He clearly doesn't trust them.
4. He seems to use religion as a way to keep from dealing with his emotions. He cannot simply say. "I am angry" or "I am sad" or "I am jealous". We have learned a long time ago to be very careful what we gave mom because it would backfire and he would make her life more stark. We feel like this is because he gets jealous of the attention given her. We gave her a new washing machine, he turns the electric off. We got her a new mattress, they slept on the living room couch that folded out into a bed. We call her too much, he had the phone turned off for her birthday (all this in Arkansas). Of course in all this he would claim it was the leading of God and not his own idea. He cannot accept that he has jealousy or anger or pride. As I said in #1, his black and white thinking does not allow him to have these feelings and still be a child of God. I wish he could know that to have those emotions is a very human thing. We can forgive him for them, and God loves him in spite of all that. When he will not talk about or accept them then they can't be dealt with and we cannot reassure him that he is loved and okay even with his failings. We all have problems with these same emotions. That is why God's grace is so amazing. I'm humbled by the fact God loves us even in our weakness.
5. He is extraordinarily strong willed. He even controls his own body and does not allow it to get soft or in need of luxury. He will tell it what to do. Not the other way around. We all need some of that but I think he takes it to the extreme. He also does not listen to anyone else tell him what to do. Once more. See #4 for how he deals with that one. He has told us over and over that we need to be humble and obedient (to him of course) when we point out that he has never listened to anyone, not preachers, not parents, not even the law at times. He brings up Moses or Jesus and seems to feel he is special case that answers directly to God and doesn't need to be subject to any man. Maybe I could accept that if this just pertained to spiritual things. But he doesn't want listen on the way to do a job for someone else if he thinks he has a better way. He doesn't want to listen to me about how many goats he can have on our property ect. After he moved up here he told me one time. "I don't WANT anyone telling me what to do." In the same tone a two year old might use. Yeah dad, me neither. ;)."
With his increasing age, dad seems to be having trouble controlling his emotions. He comes to tears much more quickly and he makes angry pronouncements that he doesn't keep. Like: "I will not come back over to Susie's house. You will have to bring her back over here if I'm to see her again." but then he only stays away a day or two and he's back. He used to never do things like that and always tried to keep his word. He also tells things that simply are not true. I do believe he is getting some dementia so I certainly do not hold that against him. I just wish he could feel Gods love and know that it is unconditional. God is not sitting up there watching dad, waiting to squish him underfoot like a bug if he makes a mistake.
Dad has made the statement a few times lately. "Hope has almost earned my love." (he told mom's lawyer that) In regards to me trying to meet his needs and let him know we really cared and would respect him where we could. Of course, as a parent myself, that takes me back a bit that he puts it that way because I hope I can love my kids unconditionally and they don't have to earn it. I will take what I can get. Dad does not really express affection and love to us. I believe he loves us but somehow he cannot express it.
