Hi, I don't know if this is the right place to say this so please tell me and take it down if it is wrong. I'm finding it very hard to write this post because I have so many feelings that I'm not sure how to express, and I haven't been able to express them, so I am sorry if it is a little incoherent.

I am a sixteen year old girl and my father was diagnosed with cancer in 2019. I don't really know the details, but he had a big operation to remove his stomach and has been having other treatments peroidically since then. I struggled a lot with mental health problems from autism and adhd and school from 2019 to mid 2022, especially during the pandemic so I had very little contact with him then, as well as the risk of covid-19 preventing me from being near him. I didn't find it so hard then, maybe because I was younger and more distracted by my own problems but in the last year the whole situation has really taken a toll on me. I feel so guilty because he is the one experiencing all the horrible stuff and my family doesn't really talk about feelings (especially related to cancer) because he is very sensitive to any sort of criticism, so I am afraid to talk about my feelings about it. I'm afraid to talk about it here because I'm worried he'll feel hurt and cause more pain for my family.

I struggle to remember a lot but recently he's become really reactive and really mean. I feel enough resentment towards him for being unable to help in the house alongside working (I know it's unfair and that makes me feel even worse). Because he is reactive and I find it hard to put up with him being mean to my family my mother has said that it's better if I just try to stay out of his way. It is really hard, and I feel so conflicted because I want him to love me because he is my father but I hate being around him because I find his bad traits to be increasingly prominent as he undergoes treatment. It's even harder because it's so unpredictable.

It has been largely okay until recently, he has begun to be more and more abrasive to the point where it verges on verbal abuse to my mother. It is infuriating to see this man berate my own mother, who cares for him entirely and does nothing but show love towards him. It is like having another child in the house. Things she says are okay and then hours later they are suddenly not okay and he shouts at her and accuses her of not loving him and making things up about him and brainwashing me into hating him, which hurts the most because he blames my mother for my personal dislike of him and his behaviour.

It seems he simply doesn't have any capacity to think about anyone but himself anymore. Its so painful because I know it only comes from his own suffering yet it hurts our family so much, but I feel so guilty because he is providing for all of us, so he clearly does love us but it doesn't show in any more of his actions. He has been in more pain than usual recentl

I don't really know what's going on. I want to give examples but I never really know what's going on, all I know is that he makes us all feel awful and like we're walking on eggshells all the time. He takes up so much space in our home, we all have to just breathe in and walk silently around him because he is so volatile and we don;t want to hurt him. I hate that I can't get all my feelings about this across in one forum post. I feel so alone. I don't tell my friends about him or any of my feelings about it until it kind of slips out but there's never any detail. I feel so so lonely because no matter where I look online I can't find anyone who seems to feel like this and I'm starting to wonder if I'm just a horrible person.

There are often times when I wish I could just disappear so I don't have to take any more space up in the house. I feel a weird sense of shame around him. He is often too tired to clear up after himself and I feel such a seething rage and shame and guilt and pain when I see dirty cups and tissues and litter left around the house for my mother to pick up after him. I feel a strange urge to clean up after him constantly. When I see his things around the house I feel so angry.

Every time I speak to him or see him my eating disorder has been getting worse, I have been restricting more and more and I once again feel guilty because this is all my fault, it's all things I am doing as a reaction to him merely existing that's causing problems. I feel so self conscious around him, I dont want him to look at me because his gaze just reminds me of all the things I hate about myself. I am so afraid I will grow up to be like him and I feel so ashamed but the feelings are so strong and I'm scared that I will get to a point where I can't cope, especially when I start A-levels (school is very important to me).

I just hold so much resentment for him. From him simply not talking to me and then being angry that I don't talk to him to being isolated from my friends during the pandemic to the way he speaks to my mother (and the fact that I'm not allowed to feel defensive towards her), its been building for so long. The hipocrisy is the worst part. I remember crying over and over again to my therapist saying I dont understand why a 15 year old girl has to be the bigger person, has to be more mature than an almost 60 year old man.

The day before yesterday my mother said the reason he doesn't love me is because I am mean to him. I don't know what to do anymore and I think when school starts and I experience more stress from that I might reach a breaking point.

I'm sorry that this is just a splurge of words on a page, I hope this isn't inappropriate or hurtful to anyone I just feel so alone and I don't know what to do. I feel so trapped that I've considered suicide, I feel like my life is already over before I've turned eighteen because there is no room for me in my home.

The thing I'm most afraid of is me being wrong about all of this, and me making these problems up to justify my own long standing self-hatred. Sorry for this, I just need to get it out. I hope if anyone else in a similar situation to me sees this that they feel less alone.