I wrote this for someone on reddit a few minutes ago because they're going through something shitty with their father, and despite not knowing circumstances, I think it's an important thing for everyone to know regardless.
- Don't be afraid to remove toxic people from your life. They do not deserve your time or energy no matter who they are.
My dad was an abusive fuck. He was a worthless piece of subhuman trash. I haven't talked to him in four years, and I should have completely cut him out before that, but felt I had some duty or requirement to make peace with him because he's my father and that's socially required of people. Respect your parents and whatnot for raising you. But you know what?
He was a fucking terrible parent and father.
He didn't raise me, he merely made me force to question every last thing I learned as a child and determine if it was a true fact of life and important value, or his fucked up, disgusting worldview that he ingrained as truth. I like to think I've become a good person, and I have retained nothing he ever said to me. It became world's easier to find that out after getting him away from me. It became easy to recognize more of what he did was abuse as well. I didn't even fucking notice that I was a fucking hostage of his for the majority of my childhood until maybe two years ago. And I'm a goddamn adult. That's the power parents have on us. So if they're shit, vile people, they deserve nothing from you. We had no choice in being born, so we shouldn't be made to feel that we owe them shit.
For me this becomes something like "don't be afraid to distance yourself from people proportionate to their level of toxicity." My parents aren't bad people. But they can be really negative. Any subject, they jump to the worst possibilities and point them out almost gleefully. I haven't cut them out of my life and don't feel I need to. But I have cut them out of any difficult decision making (e.g., difficult or expensive vacation plans). I just inform them after the fact, and we're all happier.
It's pretty insufferable during the mania. My uncle has it, and it, coupled with him not being the most pleasant person anyway, is pretty tasking. You don't even have to live with him, there will be countless urgent phonecalls and visits, and he'll be just running around town ruining the day for everyone weather he knows them or not.
Well, it's a mental illness, there's no rational reasoning. His arrogance reaches new heights. He has all these great ideas that he has to implement immediately. He has all this energy which would be great if he could channel it correctly, but he can't and he just does everything rushed and half assed. He always needs help for his crazy idea of the day. He becomes delusional, imagining things, convinced of things that haven't happened. He's accusing people of things that they haven't done. He's intimidating people by telling them things that he himself hasn't done (but not even lying, because he probably believes them). Alcohol doesn't help.