Comment by petesergeant

I had both a very similar and very different experience with my father.

To me the main difference is the role of the other parent. My mother was always very protective of us, and as far as she could would sympathise and not try and make us see a person who clearly wasn’t there, or mythologise about a parent who could have been. My older siblings forgave my father (and had memories of him when he was more normal), but I never did, and, I think most importantly, nobody asks me to. Fuck that guy.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that this may be much more about the other parent. The author’s father is in deep denial and isn’t trying to protect his kids, and is the core of this problem. Let the kids grieve the mother they never had, rather than endless apologism.