I really need some help

[Joe21]

To this day I do not understand my parents at all, I really don't. I mean I do not know why they're even married. I moved out a while back, but the problem still happened when I lived there and happened again tonight.

 

Problem is this. My mom has always been a stay at home mother, she basically takes care of everything from making sure bills are paid to cooking to cleaning and everything else. If it wasn't for her, I don't know the condition the house would be in.

 

My mom is weak, meaning she takes things more personally than other people. Me, if someone says something bad or yells at me I am like "ahh, screw em'.. they'll get over it" but with her she lets it get to her so she eventually breaks down and cries or if she doesn't she mopes around.

 

If she gets mad, she mopes around and doesn't speak. Kind of reminds me of a child. Her problem is she hasn't worked in at least 25 years, she does nothing, and nothing wrong with that. But it has put her in a lazy state of mind. She bowls twice a week and she gets groceries, she may go to walmart ot something on the weekend and my parents go out to eat but that's really it.

 

My dad asks her to do stuff, and she won't because she either doesn't like to do that, doesn't want to, too tired, or something on TV is coming on she wants to see.

 

My dad is the same way, I'll explain later though I just wanna give you a profile of my mom.

 

My dad on the other hand is selfish, he's like "if I want it I'm getting it". He does a lot for my brother and I, more than I could ever thank him for, but there's things he's so selfish about.

 

As a result, he becomes an a**h*** and verbally abusive and he won't listen to what you say. He'll call you an idiot, and he just yells saying stupid things calling you abnormal, saying you have problems, or flat out tells you to shut up. On top of that, he tells people a this work place things to make my mom look bad... I'll give an example in a moment...

 

So my point is this, my parents only fight over one thing and one thing only.. seriously.. they never yell or fight but once...

 

My dad has a drinking problem, seriously. For the past year or more he comes home from work, showers, then turns his stereo on in the garage so loud that you can literally hear it a block of way. The garage sits like 5 feet from the house so yeah it's really loud.

 

It doesn't bother me much because I'm a night owl so when I go to sleep he's in the house. But he comes home, right when he gets out of the shower he'll start drinking and he'll turn that loud music on. He drinks all evening long by himself on the front porch listening to loud music that you can hear for a block away.

 

To him it seems my mom sleeps alot, fact is when she's in bed at 9 - 9:30 she can't sleep because he has the stereo so damn loud it's just a loud "thump" sound.. their bedroom sits just 5 feet from the garage so imagine what that would sound like... especailly when you try to sleep.

 

My mom has issues with sleeping, she just can't sleep all that well so if she goes to bed at 10 and wakes up at 8 AM.. she doesn't actually get 10 hours of sleep, but maybe only like 3-6 so she is always tired.

 

Well it's nearing 10 PM and the music is still loud and dad still drinking, my dad becomes very hateful when he's drinking.. and he swears up and down he only drinked 2 beers and claims he's not drunk.

 

But my mom will go out there and tell him to shut the music off, he goes off on her calling her names, yelling at her, saying just everything possible to her. And she ends up calling him a selfish brat and blah blah.. I mean it's ridiculous. They don't talk normally, they just yell.. and he even threatened to leave her because she wanted the music off saying, and I am seriously quoting him "she makes my life a living hell". Let me remind you, they only fight over the loud music, because my mom can't sleep at 10 PM and he says that makes his life a living hell.

 

Well going back to my dad telling people, he goes to work and he tells people that my mom goes out there and yells at him because he's just on the porch drinking beer, what he doesn't tell them is that she yells at him because he has music on that's so loud that you can hear it a block away and it's at 10 PM at night and she's trying to sleep.

 

he claims he is just asking people if it's normal for her to sleep that much and still be tired, but I know him and he tells them that she does this. So he tells my mom he tells people at work how she is and he tells my mom that they laugh at her and can't believe she's like that.. this is all said while my dad is drunk and when my parents are fighting about the loud music.

 

So tonight I was over there and they got into a huge ass fight again and I just finally told them that this whole thing is so stupid, and I was like "what the hell is wrong with you guys, every night you guys are down each other's throats calling each other names and saying all this crap over nothing more than the issue of loud music.. if loud music is the only problem with your marriage then you should be thankful cause there's marriages being ripped apart because the husband is beating the crap out of the wife".

 

My dad says "I should be able to come home from work and listen to music and relax". Ok, my response to that was "yes, everyone that comes home from work as a right to work.. however they don't have a right to do something in which that interferr's with another person's life.. we also have a right to sleep and you're affecting the right when your music keeps mom awake"

 

He tells me that my mom makes his life a living hell because she won't let him listen to music, he then became unreasonable and said 'fine I just won't listen to music no more".

 

The whole thing is stupid, I know, but this goes on every damn night and been this way for a year now. My dad is actually a cool guy when he's sober but when he is drunk he becomes a complete ass.

 

At night he sits in the living room watching porn, I'm not joking either, and we live across the street from these apartments where college students live, and they have lots of young women in them, so he has binoculars (sp?) that he uses to - I'm guessing - to try and look through the window of the girls apartment.

 

Here's why I figure.. he opens up the blinds, opens the window, the lamp sits in front of the window so he lays that on the floor or lays it on the chair so it's not blocking the view from the rocking chair to the apartments.. from his chair you can clearly look out. And when I lived there, and my mom says it is the same, you would walk into the living room and he would instantly shut the TV off and then he would get mad because you're in the living room.

 

Him and I always got into it because I would have to pass through there to get to the kitchen, and of course it's dark as hell in there and I need lights to see so I don't trip. I go in there and he would call me a moron, saying I was abnormal, tell me to get a life, would tell me he tells people at work how I am.. which I don't understand I mean what could he say "my son walks through the living room at 11:00 at night to go to the kitchen".. because I know he isn't gonna say "my son walks through the living room and because of that I have to turn my porn off and I can no longer look out the window at the girls across the street using my binoculars and that pisses me ofF".. of course not.

 

I mean my dad is just impossible. They don't ever do anything together, my mom asks my dad to go somewhere with her and he says no.. otherwise he really just wants to stay home because he cannot go a day without drinking beer and getting drunk.

 

It's not like he's busy or has other things, he doesn't, instead he once again sits on the front porch all evening long drinking beer, playing loud music, and getting drunk. So because of that, my mom won't do anything with him.

 

Tonight I told her "you guys need to do things together, seriously" and my mom basically says no because he doesn't do anything with her.

 

So I'm at the end of my ropes.. I mean I love them both but the whole thing is just stupid and I cannot get them to talk to each other and my dad just doesn't want to listen.. he doesn't see there is a problem and thinks what he does is normal.. Any advice?

[Tony T]

Let your parents deal with their own issues. You've got lots of work ahead of you to deal with your stuff as a result of having them as parents.

 

Their life is simply not your responsiblity and none of your business. They are your parents, respect them...but you didn't pick them. It's truly unfortunate that their relationship is totally screwed up but I will tell you the way they relate is not terribly unusual. It's very sad.

 

Move forward with your own life, overlook everything your parents say and do. Don't take it in anymore. You've been contaiminated enough.

 

It would be easier for you to find Osama Bin Laden and collect the $25 million reward on his butt that it would be to change your parents...so don't even try.

[Ally Boo]

Trust me, your parents are not fighting about music. There is something deeper going on here that you don't know about.

[pinkroses]

in an alcoholic home too, so I know what you're going through. My dad would come home from work about 4:30 and drink one beer after another until he went to bed. He kept a trash sack by his chair to put all his crushed cans in. We practically had a second income from the money he made in recycling. He never went anywhere or bothered anyone, but he would get very verbally abusive when he had enough alcohol in him. Most of the time he just watched TV and passed out asleep. My mother put up with that for 23 years. One thing I do resent her for is for not taking my sister and I with her to AA meetings. And then when my dad would get mean and put us down verbally, she'd tell us it was "the alcohol talking". Like adolescent girls with tender feelings are supposed to understand that...

 

Anyway, Tony's right, you have enough on your plate trying to help yourself get through this and go on with your life and avoid that same pattern your parents have shown. It's okay to feel disgusted and angry with these people, and it doesn't mean you don't love them. They are making your homelife unbearable. I took my parents troubles to heart until I ended up hospitalized for severe depression. Don't let that happen to you. Find someone to confide in, and maybe someplace to go in the evenings that is more peaceful. You probably feel you need to be there for your mother but you're not her rescuer. It's the life she chose before you came along, and she'll have to find a way of coping other than you.

 

Hang in there. Try to understand you can't change your parents, and that they are dealing with their own demons, things that aren't your fault.

[Paul]

Joe,

 

Tony's right--we don't have the power to change others, only ourselves. I would highly recommend looking in the blue pages of your phone directory for the local Adult Children of Alcoholics chapter and attend their next meeting. If there isn't one in your area or you're having trouble locating one, contact the local Alcoholics Anonymous group who should be able to point you in the right direction.

 

You can visit ACoA online for more information: http://www.adultchildren.org/

 

Best wishes,

Paul

[mighty bop]

I thought I posted a reponse to this before but I gotta tell ya that is some funny stuff and I wish I could see it. You should get a video camera and record some of it, then show it to them on the VCR. See if having them see themselves act like that makes them think any differently......