One for the lads - how close are you to your Dad?

Not very close tbh.

How old are you, New_Departure06?

DubGuy wrote:

Not close at all really...never do stuff together and never have.

Would never say it to him, but it is one of the main disappointments of my life so far.

More than likely, he feels the same way.

New_Departure06 wrote:

I had an appallingly negative relationship with my father when I lived with him. Endless shouting at each other followed by keeping our distance before then sortof getting on for a while before it all started again. My mother was also subject to being yelled at for stupid reasons and it affected her health so much so that she collapsed and had to spend some time in hospital, during which she was unable to wake up and we were fearful she might die. However it turns out there was no prospect of her dying. She was just in a deep clinical depression. Eventually she came out of it but her behaviour when she was awake reflected what I have said e.g. she thought her sister was still alive (she died in 1997). She forgot what year it was. And when I tried to leave the hospital later she grabbed my arm and burst into tears and asked me not to leave. Thankfully this eventually sorted itself out with the right medication, but she blames dad for what happened, and I happen to agree. She eventually moved out as she could take no more. He never hit her, but psychologically it was hard to take such a difficult man as dad.

I also moved out. He has actually hit me in the past, and flew off the handle for stupid reasons. He resented my lack of masculinity and accused me of being gay (which I am). Consequently he would nag me to "act normal" in terms of talking more "manly" etc. I eventually also moved out, though I didn't tell him this was the reason. Relations with him are actually now quite okay. I put this down to the absence of opportunity for argument. But I would not go as far as to say we are friends.

that can't have been easy.
i lived with an uncle for a while after my mother died. he was a complete prick. i know all about mental torture.

as for the gay thing, my father thought i was gay for a while because he never saw me with a woman. he was cool with it though. although he was happy when he caught me with a woman on the couch one night.

Myself and my Da are very good friends... Always there for me etc etc.

Yeah I don't know if its an Irish thing or worldwide thing, but even though i'm relatively close to my dad, the physical barrier is always there. There wouldn't be a lot of hugging and so forth. Its funny because its like the old cliché that you come to respect your parents the older you get. I finally realised for me anyway this is because as I grew up, all the good traits of my father I assumed where normal for every older man and all I could see was the bad. But now in retrospect I see that most men don't have the good traits of my father and the bad was purely meant to discipline me. My dad is very tight lipped, and would keep most conversations on surface matters but where he shows his affection would be in doing things without question for his children, he will always drop anything to help out or offer support. He's of the old fashioned Irish man ideal that you work hard, support your family, and that is all. All other matters concerning the children is looked after by the mother.

I think this is why a lot of people coming out of families with parents who grew up in the 50-60's will probably have a cool relationship with their father as the work to build that relationship wasn't there. A lot of Irish men now would of been moddey coddled by their mothers, and a lot of ex girlfriends of my friends have said that they always felt they where competing with their boyfriends mother for attention. But i'd say the generation that grew up in the 60-70's are the ones that have a better relationship with their fathers as woman began to work and men began to take more of a role in the household.

Its funny, I remember an interview with Bono before about his relationship with his father. When asked how come he can approach world leaders, Icons and religious heads and ask them questions no one else would dare and yet he could not build up the courage to ring his own father and say hello he said "its just the irish way, thats the way things are"