Reddit Stories - Father ALLOWED my mother to belay me for an EXTENDED PERIOD. Later, during

Episode Date: March 21, 2026

#redditstories #askreddit #aita #tifu #familydrama #parenting #relationships #supportSummary: A son shares a story about how his father permitted his mother to belay him for an extended period during a climbing session. This decision led to unexpected dynamics in their relationship, highlighting the complexities of family support and the balance between safety and independence.Tags: redditstories, askreddit, reddit, aita, tifu, family, climbing, belay, parenting, relationships, support, dynamics, safety, independence, experiences, stories, personal, advice, humor, lifeBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/reddit-stories--6816713/support.This episode includes AI-generated content.

I hope you enjoy this story. Father allowed my mother to belay me for an extended period. Later, during our family gathering, he shared with everyone how showing leniency towards those who deceive others can serve as a positive model. Eventually, I reached my breaking point and confronted him about it. Father has always been against any confrontation or arguments. He is extremely passive, refuses to stand up for himself, and avoids any conflict. If someone isn't paying attention while walking and bumps into him, he insists it's his own fault.

If his employer would mess up his salary, he wouldn't bother fixing it. If a mechanic didn't properly repair his car, he would just accept it as is. This unfortunately resulted in a tumultuous childhood with my insanely narcissistic mother. She controlled his every move. She got him to quit his job and be a locked-in stay-at-home dad. She had him do every chore. She insulted him at every step. She cheated on him relentlessly and even brought APs into our home.

She enjoyed making his life miserable every day and he never questioned it. My extended family, God bless them, were there for me so many times as much as they could be. They tried for years to make my father leave but he never budged. When she would direct her anger onto myself, in the form of screaming, insulting or general demeaning, my father never once found the guts to stand up for me or support me. When I was a kid if I cried to dad about something mom did or said to me he would sweep it under the rug or just insist I forget about it. Hell he would even try and justify it.

As I grew older it really set in for me how messed up this was. My mother gladly kicked me out of the house when I was 18 and my father just sat there and looked sullen. Didn't say a damn thing. I joined the Air Force almost immediately and got stationed. on the other side of the country. The dynamic was awful and I could have easily gone down the Encel route if not for therapy and the amazing people I met along the way.

It took years for me to get in a better mental space. I was filled with hatred. My mother left my father two years after I got stationed and utterly destroyed my father in the divorce. She was killed a year later in a DUI with one of her APs. I took a lot of joy in hearing that it took her hours to die and that's when I really knew I needed help to process things. I'm almost 30 now have a girlfriend who is perhaps the best thing to ever happen in my life and fully understands the situation with my family. I have learned to not allow myself to be consumed with anger and resentment by my past or so I thought you'll see and

instead put that energy to my future. I've been extraordinarily low contact slash near no contact with my father since I left as much as I try. I cannot make that connection with him. I recently went to a family reunion and brought my girlfriend with me. My father was there as it was his side of the family. They have many issues with him, but he is family. So whatever I guess I made sure to avoid him. I was chatting with my uncles when I heard my father talk in the background. He was discussing how a coworker of his was going through a divorce

as he discovered his wife was having an affair and was positioned to have a very favorable divorce on his side. My father remarked how his co-worker should work instead to forgive his wife and by his own words set a good example for unity and forgiveness and how he believed he said a great example for me in that extent. I swear it was like a switch went off in my head and I was mentally back to being the rage-filled 18-year-old all these years and he never learned a damn thing. I turned to him and asked if he was fucking serious.

He looked at me and started to stutter. I know the next minute was pure word vomit and I can't relay it perfectly. But to sum it up, I shouted how he was a pathetic father, pathetic man. His family all know he's a disgrace of a human being who would rather his son be treated like shit than defend him because he's a fucking coward. No one would ever see him as an example to live by. His wife would rather fuck half the neighborhood than even touch him and he should never ever believe anyone respects him.

I began to derail and ramble between my shouting and my girlfriend quickly took me out and drove me home. It was insane just how quickly being away from him made me feel better. She just held me when we got back and told me it's okay. Again, best thing to ever happen to me. I was ashamed of how I lost it and I'm now going to resume my therapy. That's a given. However, I'm glad I finally unloaded a always needed to be said onto him. Extended family is pretty mixed with reactions. His brothers slash my uncle said it was time for him to hear it from me. My grandparents are pissed. I did that in front of the entire extended family with some saying I should have done that behind closed doors

instead of everyone comments where Op has replied mesmerizing Taylor. It sounds like you finally got to express the pent-up feelings you've carried for so long while the outburst wasn't ideal. It seems like it was a necessary step towards healing. It's good you're resuming therapy to process this further. Boop. Yeah. Afterwards it hit me that all.

although it was very cathartic, it definitely wasn't the most appropriate way to handle it. Lowell never too much thought. He sounds like a gentle kind and well-meaning person. You directed what is very clearly anger and resentment for your mother at him. It's a bit more complicated than being an asshole or not. You seem to have got some catharsis out of it. I just don't believe he is the one you really wanted to scream at. And from the sounds of it, he was also a victim of your mother too. And while he was the adult and should have known better, he obviously didn't being non-confrontational isn't some character flaw.

It's psychological and he probably needs therapy himself screaming at him and demeaning him actually sounds like something your mother probably did slash would do. And I worry about you if that is something that actually made you feel better about yourself. Goop. Yes, I fully admit he was a victim of my mother. But he was a victim who had a support system he never wanted. wanted to use. He fully let me be a victim my entire childhood because apparently it was too much effort to try. And to this day doesn't believe he needs therapy. Never too much thought.

All I can say is based on your post and this interaction is your anger is deeply misguided and you're failing to recognize the truly horrifying thing. You're behaving like the mother you actually should hate. Boop. Oh, trust me. I fully hate her as well, but she is gone and there is no use in holding a grudge against a dead person. I had hoped, though, after his son making him an outsider in his life his family openly joking face-to-face about his failings as a father and his ex-wife training him for everything he had and making him start over in a one bedroom apartment. His friends slowly leaving his life one at a time out of embarrassment that he would have maybe have at least one moment to reflect and maybe consider he should have done

things differently. Update 1. Thanks for the advice and recommendations even among some of the UTA. However, some of them needed to be addressed because they were either hilarious or cringe-worthy one. Some of them were very angry and they kind of confused me at first until I saw their comments further down or saw their profile and saw rants about double standards or complete non-sequitur ramblings about women. So yeah, not helpful advice and they were great dark reflections about how I could have turned out if not for the support in my life too.

Some attempted to portray my dad as a humble kind, caring, sensitive old man who I'm just being a big bully too. This was a very good insight into how enablers of abuse get away with so much in today's worlds because so many people forget how they are part of the abuse themselves. Three. Some were attempting to mentally dissect me or have a gotcha moment with me to pull apart my story. That was generally asinine and I had to step away from those before they asked for my cranial measurements or something. So it was pretty much immediately when I was up the next morning that I realized I needed to resolve the events of last night. I first spoke to my girlfriend and gave a sincere apology for having her see me like that.

She reassured me that nothing was wrong. She'd known me for years and has always known me to be level-headed and understands why I kind of snapped. She herself has a history of dealing with narcissistic family. So she absolutely understands the dynamic. She only really told me that it would be best to work on spending time around my extended family since my father will always be there. I told her, don't worry. I'm immediately going to talk to them afterwards to figure that out.

So that part's fine. Look like kind of an ass in front of her. But I'm making sure that doesn't happen again. I also informed of her my intentions to resume more therapy just to keep myself steady, which she was happy to hear. I called my grandparents and sincerely apologized as well for putting such a sore dent into their family reunion that it wasn't appropriate. And while I still feel it felt good to say that to him, it should have been

privately and not in front of everyone. I also told them that going forward as much as I love spending time with them, since the family always hangs out in one group that my father will always be in for now until I can handle being around him. I need to distance myself occasionally until I feel comfortable interacting. I told them that I am nor would I ever be establishing an ultimatum or demands of them. And that either way I need to step back. I guess during my apology and explanation, I was kind of just going on a tangent because my grandfather interrupted me to calm down. He told me that after I left, people kind of separated or slowly started leaving and they eventually were able to talk to my father one-on-one. I guess seeing me have such a freak out

resulted in my grandmother having a mini freak out of her own when she started talking to my father, resulting in her kicking him out. While I have a great relationship with both, My grandmother has always been extra protective of me. So seeing me that way must have set off a fire in her. My grandfather then said that it has become a bit of an open family secret. My father's failing. His brothers taught him about it and generally don't have a great relationship with him. And for my grandparents, it's always just uneasy.

Seeing me the other day and how it still affects me so much has really liked in for a lot of people that it was really bad. They began to try and say sorry if they didn't do enough, which I very adamantly retorted that they did more than what anyone could have expected. It was very emotional for a minute, but culminated in then telling me that they have decided to distance themselves from my father for the time being and have given him the ultimatum that unless he has a deep introspective and regularly goes to therapy, that distance may become permanent. My extended family, I've been told, are going to try and reach out or call or whatever, but I asked them if they could relate to them that it's not necessary and that I'm fine and I'm sorry to them as well for ruining the day, which again, they told me I shouldn't apologize for being hurt. Since then, extended family have sent some messages with the general consensus that it's okay with some older members complaining about my lack of respect towards my

father. And finally, I texted my father hoping to meet at a local coffee shop and have a final talk. I met him and he didn't look good. I think his parents tearing into him finally got the message through. I had so many things I could have said, but I instead asked him first thing if the coworker he gave the advice to took it well. He just said that neither him nor several coworkers interact with him anymore. I asked him if he truly 100% believes that every single thing he did for me as a child was for my benefit.

He didn't really say anything. I then finally asked if he has any regrets for how I was treated as a child and if he thinks he ever did anything wrong. He looked utterly defeated and just mumbled that he could have done more. I could have poked and prodded and could have gone on another rant. But instead, I told him this should be goodbye and I hope he gets the help he needs. I think finally unloading my frustrations was what I needed to finally be able to move on and find peace. I absolutely need to keep on track for therapy and admit that a public bitching moment isn't okay, but I should be fine update to things have progressed over the last couple weeks.

And I now have broader context about my family. Long sorry short is there was a lot hidden from me. My father was an absolute asshole to his family and that's why the treat him the way they do. I got a lot of feedback, including the compilation posts. And one thing that stood out was people questioning if my extended family could have contributed to the abuse. And that's why he was so feeble. and since I was trying to work on my relationship with my family, I figured it was tight to ask the hard

questions before going that far. I met with my dad's brothers who invites me out to a popular lunch spot. For context and clarity, Dale is the oldest brother. He is married and has a daughter and a son. My father is the second oldest self-explanatory. John is the second youngest also married with a son. Bill is the youngest married with three daughters. So anyways, we met up and I ripped the Band-Aid off asking about my father growing up what he was like beyond the basics. I know and what really is going on with their relationship. Dale sighed and basically summed up that besides what I know, there is a lot of backstory. I'm unfamiliar with that. They never told me about simply because it was never the tyke nor the place to what I've always known is that my father was

fairly normal. When he was young, a little shy, but fantastic academically, played sports occasionally, had a close-knit relationship with his brothers, and meeting my mom in high school junior year made everything go downhill. What I didn't know was that my father was a guiding figure for his two younger brothers was generally seen as one of the nicest people with a bright future ahead of him. My grandparents adored him and he even became a little bit of a golden child, but no one minded. The reason his family doesn't respect him is what happened to a. his behavior. When my mother got attached to him, it first started simple. My mother acted rude and distant to the family. They weren't huge fans, but my father loved her, so they tolerated it.

She became possessive and slowly isolated my father and convinced him to give up his ambitions and goals. Family became concerned and spent a long time trying to talk to him and convince him to leave. My father didn't budge and began to lash out. When I was born, my extended family tried to talk to my father about my mother's attitude. My father was angry and threatened to report them for harassment. She was in denial about her behavior when Dale's wife was having fertility issues. My mother messaged her appalling and cruel things. When Dale was pissed and went to talk to my father, he told Dale to drop it and even justified it. Dale punched him and police almost got involved. Dale hated him going forwards. John grew to hate him when my

mother insulted his son due to mild physical disabilities. My father cracked a joke about what she said. John hated him. And finally, Bill, who always idolized my father, tried to inform my father that my mother made a pass at him and urged divorce. My father responded with a maddening call of utter hate and relationship-ending words to sum it all up. The more time my father spent with my mother, the more he began to repeat her attitude. When they all signs of abuse to me and tried to intervene, My father threatened to lie, to accuse them of worse things. My mother had money and lawyers and could make their lives hell if they tried and my father would gladly let her.

They were stuck and could only do so much at a time the older members of the family like the grandparents, great un and uncles and such, believe in the traditional mindset of family sticking together no matter what, while the generations further down want to keep a distance from him. They're all stuck between and rock in a hard place there's more they told me out. It was all essentially that my father died on the hill for my mom, ruining his relationship with his brothers in the process. And when she died and destroyed him, he probably had to realize it was all for nothing.

My grandparents seemed to not want to accept the fact that he was lost, or maybe they hope he can fix his life. Who knows? This was a lot to process and was only confirmed by my father himself when he called my to ask about family therapy with us. I curred the chase and asked if what I heard was true. He said yes. I would have agreed to maybe some family therapy, but now I have no idea. Update 3. I came to the decision that it was time to cut off my father for good. The more I learned about how he was the more I came to the realization

that nothing good would come out of having him in my life. I'm also going to put some minor distance between myself and extended family on his side until I can process things more. There's just a lot of things to work through there. I met up with my father one last time in a coffee shop to talk things over. I asked him one last time. Why? Why did he do all this? Why did he let his wife treat everyone like shit?

Why did he treat his family and me like shit for her? Why did he do all this? He tried to weasel his way out, but I absolutely demanded to know and he be basically answered that it was because he loved her. Yep, it was that stupid of an answer. He loved her and just clung on to her no matter what she did, no matter how much she hurt him or others. He was an insecure man who just latched himself on the first woman who showed him attention. Even when she slowly destroyed his life, he thought it was better than trying again. I just got up and told him to fix his life, but I won't be a part of it. And I hope he has the sense

to understand why. No matter how he tried to word it. I had two abusive parents. He didn't say anything. Just stared at me. Which leads to last night. I got a call from my grandparents that the night before my dad tried to call his brothers and make peace. Unfortunately, from what they said, he did it in the most half-assed avoidant way possible, sparing himself any guilt. That didn't go well. After recent events and old wounds being dug up, they gave him a verbal lashing that made mine look microscopic in comparison. My dad hung up and lost his shit. Decimated his entire apartment before packing up what was left before driving off. They only found out because one of the brothers came to check up on him.

From what they can tell from the few texts they have. He's lost his mind after decades of shit and is driving off to the other side of the country to start fresh also. From the minimum communication they have with him, he's acting incredibly vile towards them. And they say he seems to be acting just like my mother edit. Things are progressing slash spiraling very quickly and I'm expecting this whole insanity parade to come to a conclusion within a few days at this rate. Won't make any real update until I have all the facts, but I'm just glad I made the decision to move on update for January 9th, 2025.

For those who stuck around, I'd say it's over and about as wrapped up as can be my girlfriend's and I are getting married later this year. My father is alive. He lost his shit and spiraled, but a couple weeks later came back. His apartment obviously barred him from coming back and are going after him for legal and financial damages. He has no job anymore. He is staying with my grandparents. He has hit the absolute lowest point and has finally taken responsibility for his life, his choices and his damaged relationships. It's too late for a lot of the family, but his parents are seemingly giving some help

since he's finally trying to fix things. However, the extended family as a whole has kind of blown up. My father kind of became a mascot for deeper family issues that have become worse over time. There are far too many to go over when he finally got called out. Everyone figured there was no use in ignoring everything else going on. Minor feuds have formed. Some people aren't talking to each other.

Some have entered marriage counseling and family therapy. People don't want to live by the but family lifestyle anymore. My fiancé and I have decided to distance ourselves. We were kind of disappointed seeing how since her family is insanely toxic. We could lean on mine, but I've come to realize mine has far too many issues to be reliable. We have a fantastic group of friends, so we will be fine. And that's about it. I'm going to be wrapping this up and moving on to a far less bitter lifestyle.

I'll stick around for a little longer to elaborate on anything if anyone wants.