What happens when nearly everything you've ever wanted from your father actually is given to you?

Think about it.

Most of my issues with men and in my relationships come from my relationship (or lack of relationship) with my father. I have trust issues, abandonment issues, and deep insecurities due to my father. No, I am not blaming him for everything.

I am saying when your father does one thing constantly to hurt you then it creates a pattern of reaction. And for me, it made a wall to protect myself from him and any other man as I got older.

However, I cannot say my relationships suck because of daddy issues anymore because...my dad and I have confronted everything over the years. And...I still feel traumatized by it?

When he says he's going to do something, I cannot believe him. When he does do it, I am surprised. When he says he's going to drink, I expect him not to come back or ending up wishing he hadn't.

I am still traumatized even though he has proven time and time again that he is not that man anymore. Why is that? Did I miss the transition? Why can I not trust that he is going to be good and everything can stay this way?

It seems like my walls never came down. I cannot trust anyone and I believe in the worst in people.

I always hope for the best but try not to be just anybody's fool.

The cynicism in my soul is raging against the optimistic innocence I once held as a child.

I still get mad sometimes, I will cry when I see him making plans for his grandchildren thinking, "Why couldn't you have your shit together when I was younger? Why do my future children get the best of you? Why could you not just spare me all the selfishness of your late twenties thinking paying the bills was enough to fill your role as a father?"

The resentment is deep. I want to be better because I know it hurts him when I bring up the past. That's the weird thing...I am the only one still lingering in the past.

Instead of being grateful and loving the man he has become now, I am angry at the man he was not when he was younger.

The only thing that got me through it was when someone said, "How would you like it if someone kept bringing up your past? How would you like to be seen as your mistakes? Never good enough for someone because of who you were not who you are?"

My mom and dad were young. They probably had no idea what they were doing and as I got older, I found out my dad's dad wasn't the best to him either. I guess I didn't think about how that could ripple down into our relationship; but it has. I have decided that it will stop with me. Whatever my grandpa did to hurt my dad and my dad did to hurt me needs to be resolved. My grandpa never really changed his ways and that relationship between father and son will never be at its full potential.

My dad has actively tried to prove he loves me and wants to be an actual father to me. I am grateful for that. He did not have anyone to show him so the last couple of years have been trial and error.

I hope one day to learn how to forgive a little quicker so I won't have so much evil in my soul. It suffocates me and everything I think and say becomes negative.

Choosing to love someone is the harder path (for me) but it has been the most rewarding.