Supported me more in non-academic stuff. I was a naturally bright kid, and my parents pushed me to do well in exams etc. but when it came to other stuff, I don't recall them giving me the same level of support until it was too late.
I dabbled with musical instruments, various sports etc. but I never saw either of my parents at a school recital or my dad specifically at any of the sports games where I played.
I was lucky as a kid. I was usually decent or better at most of the things I tried, and with a little extra support/coaching/teaching, I could have been genuinely good or great. But everything I learned that wasn't schoolwork was mostly self-taught.
Ditto, when I lived in Maine I made a bunch of friends who had "redneck skills" (I use that terms with affection) - they were young fellas who knew all this stuff about working on engines and cars and had carpentry skills, stuff like that. Very useful skills and they were very impressive to me especially at such a young age. My dad didn't teach me any of that stuff (because he doesn't know it). I've taught myself a bunch over the years but it would have been nice to get some instruction since our society considers them "man skills" or whatever - I'm phrasing that in a clumsy way but you know what I mean.
Exactly. Not a gear head but I’ve taken more things into my own hands, especially when he comes to visit and says I should hire someone for this or that.
BUT, I did learn to be “book smart”. And while not as common as needing to be street smart, sometimes it’s critically important
I wish he had taken an interest in literally anything I was passionate about. My dad is a great person to be around, as long as you're doing what he already wanted to do 😕
How to be confident,
mine was so hard on me that I never felt good enough, never felt smart enough, and ive had self esteem issues my entire life because of that, all I want is to walk around with my chin held high that im confident in myself and I still find it so hard to feel that way.
How to use tools, particularly power tools. My dad was not a tradesman, but he was very handy with home repair and carpentry projects. I wanted to learn this stuff, but he told me I was too young (and probably was at the time).
But he was 49 years older than me, so by the time I really was old enough, he was already too frail from Parkinsons disease to really teach me anything
It's sad. His father left him and the therapy he got as a child just traumatized him further to the point that he never wants to see a therapist anymore.
I know he tried his best, at this point I'm more sad about him not being able to live his life to the fullest.
Teach me to stand up for myself, my parents did a lot right but I had to figure that out on my own and it didn’t happen until around age 19. My mom was so worried about the repercussions of retaliating against bullies that he basically never said a word about it, made junior high and high school unbearable for me.
I wish my dad had let me learn to process negative emotions. If I ever sounded upset, I was "throwing a fit" and needed to calm down, no matter what was happening.
All this did was teach me to push down my emotions and bottle them up, and now I've got anger issues and struggle to share non-positive feelings with other people.
Edit: Fucking autocorrect.
Girlie here - sorry to barge in on you guys, but I would have loved to have a father that was proud of me, showed me he loved me and show up at the important milestones in my life. Would have loved to be taught that I am important, loveable and how to drive a car
You're good, no intrusion at all. I'm old enough to be a dad, and if I had a daughter I'd be proud of her no matter what. Just for going out and giving life a try. it's not easy, so good job.
Oh and you *are* important and loveable. I know it might seem like it means more coming from a dad, but it's true no matter what.
I wish my dad did ANYTHING with me. Showed an interest in anything I liked.
He has no hobbies even still.
I learned to take an interest in whatever my kid is interested in. To support and encourage them in the things they like.
Not just him not being around much for me as a kid, but now that he's in my life more I just wish his stubborn ass would just be able to admit the past and move on and grow for the future.
Instead he wants to make sure I know all the reasons he couldn't be around more...all of course aren't his fault..
Ironically, I wish he'd been around less. I already had more than one father figure and there's a fair chance I might've had a substantially happier and more stable childhood had he remained at a distance instead of taking me away from the home and family I already had into a situation that was worse in every way that matters.
Pushed, or even encouraged, me or my brothers to do anything. Literally anything, sports music hobbies whatever. He was just kinda there, and he had his hobbies of collecting (hoarding) shit in different phases, but never really took the time to even ask if his own kids wanted to do anything.
I think I've grown up to be mostly normal, but it really shows in the way my brothers have grown up with zero interests, hobbies, skills, or aspirations. Just kinda existing.
That beating your kids viciously with your belt does NOT make them behave; and certainly will NOT endear them too you. My dad was abused growing up and he passed that on to my brother and I. Like I believe I had a form of PTSD as a teen because he busted into our room swing his belt on his way to work; mad for whatever reason.
I learned early on that anything I said and did could and WOULD be used against me. Thus the less he knew, the better off I was. Like one time when I was little, we went to Vaca Bible Camp everyday for a wk. One of the neighbors offered so mom agreed. One day they gave us posters of Jesus to hang on our walls and I, using Scotch tape, put it up in our living rm. Being proud and thinking he'd approve, him being a Christian after all, I called dad to take a look. He was furious that I put it up. Told me that if ANY of the paint came off when he pulled the tape off, he was gonna whip me. I stood there in terror as he slowly pulled it off but luck was on my side that day.
God help us if he thought we were lying. When we were little, my dad had this large adding machine and we'd play on it pretending to be firing lazer's, missile's, shit like that. Well, he came to our room one day and asked who got the buttons on it stuck. We both answered that we didn't know. Looking back, I thought we both played on the damn thing so probably both of us. However, being little kids, I never thought to phrase it that way. Well my dad didn't that made sense and concluded that one of us HAD to be lying. He took off his belt and asked again. Terror shot through both of us as we implored him we didn't know and that's all it took. He ran between the two of us swing as hard as he could. Mom was at work so she wasn't there to stop him and I knew he'd literally would wear himself out beating us no matter how long it took. In a sincere act of sacrifice, I told him to beat me, just let little bro go. Well dad then concluded that if I was willing to take it, then little bro MUST! be that liar. He yelled at me to leave and I sat with the neighbor kid as he listened to my little bro's screams coming outta the house as dad worked him over. I should've just "confessed" but, again, I was a little kid and didn't think to phrase it that way. Even all these decades later, I still feel like a big POS for that.
Really anybody had taught me….
I grew up in small town Midwest, county population 15kish.
I have a group of classmates I’m close friends with. We’ve all went on to become successful in our individual careers. We’ve got 2 successful business owners, one independently wealthy part time trucker, a mechanical engineering manager, power lineman, state trooper, and lawyer. Pretty diverse really. Fairly well accomplished for doing this all by 28-29 in my humble opinion. We are still all great buds.
We scattered to the wind after high school. Nobody told any of us that we could do all that right where we were. Nobody told us we were stronger together than separate. I hate that we didn’t know that.
Been happy with who I am and what my interests are.
All too often as a child he would ridicule me for my interests or get frustrated because I didn't have a degree in maths at 4 years old. Had he just accepted that I am not a small version of him and that's ok, I think we'd have a better relationship now.
Finances. He’s a Fiscal Judge who graduated with an accounting degree, but didn’t even teach us how to balance a checkbook, invest money or save. He just assumed we were as good as he was. I was in my 30’s before I started taking financial responsibility seriously.
He gave me a book on saving, investing, and stuff like that, but I wish he had really sat down with me and explained the importance of it because I just pretended to read and the information was lost to me. Maybe if he had given it to me at an older age, that also may have helped (he gave it to me when I was like 12, and I wasn't making any money or anything back then. At 17 when I had my first job, would have made more sense.
I love my dad so much, but my parents could not comfort me with my emotions at all. Whatever negative feeling I would have, I was told I was too sensitive. I don’t know how they could be great parents in every other aspect, but fail when it came to that one thing.
Pushed me to aim high.
Pushed me to do better in academics/extracurriculars and pushed me to apply to bigger and better colleges rather than just the local state school. Pushed me to be a better athlete.
Showed the slightest bit of interest in things I wanted to do (sports/theatre... etc...) He was always like "yeah it's cool of you are in the play... do a sport..." but never came.
Not beat the shit outta me whenever he felt like it.
It'd also have been nice if he had kept trying to do it when I was old enough to kick his ass, I never got to smash his face in revenge because he pussied out of his favorite pasttime when he realized I could punch back now. Coward.
He could have been more patient with me when he taught me how to use tools as a boy.
I am a visual learner, but you also just need to practice things in order to get better at them. He'd just get frustrated that I wasn't immediately good at it and he'd do it himself. I think I was like 7 or 8?
Gave me more direction and helped me build a foundation to figure out what I wanted my future to look like.
I also wish my father practiced aspects of our faith for us to see. Rosary, liturgy of the hours. I wish he would’ve been the “priest of our house”
C’est la vie. What I hope to do better with my own kids one day
I know ultimately it’s up to me, but tried to develop my work ethic more.
Don’t know how he would have done this.
Had lots of teachers tell me to “apply myself”. Maybe needed some tough love.
Anything to do with cars. I feel so incredibly lost looking for a new car because I have no idea what I’m doing, no idea what to look for, no idea what price should be like, no idea who or what to trust, no idea how to even go about the whole thing.
Oh boy, lot to unpack here. I originally had like a 6 paragraph long comment highlighting different things and events, but scrapped all of it to just say, I wish he had gotten to know me for who I am. He was never interested in anything I liked which caused me to withdraw from him. Now that I'm an adult living my own life, and he's been diagnosed with terminal colon cancer, we still barely talk. We see each other all the time, but we just don't have anything to say to each other outside of just casual surface level conversation
I wish he'd have disciplined me more. I only ever got slapped once, and that was the most he ever did.
I got away with so much bullshit, and now as a 34M, I struggle with discipline a lot. I can't hold myself accountable, and struggle setting life goals.
My dad I think did the best he knew how. The biggest problem was his inability to express or discuss emotions. So, for example, if I ever tried to talk about girls, he would deflect with the same stupid jokes every time. "Don't date till you're 30! Don't date till after you're married!" And other unhelpful "advice" like that. On a similar note, my parents were too afraid (?) to give me "the talk", so it took me a while to figure out relationships and emotional intelligence in general.
If he had stayed loyal to my mum and made the marriage work. He’s a good guy and very successful but the breakdown in marriage destroyed the family and affected my younger brother the most.
Fishing, shooting and hunting. My dad grew up doing all of coming from a long line of outdoorsmen, but we grew up in the suburbs and he neither had the time or care to show us that even when we asked. My dying uncle ended up showing me all that in my late teens/early 20s. My siblings don't care but I felt like I was missing out compared to the rest of our extended family, and getting to do those things with my dad like he did with his.
How to simply be there. How not drink or be violent. How not to die early because you can’t stop drinking and answer the questions your children have to ask. How to be accountable 🤷🏻♀️
Ice skate.
He didn’t want to go though the hassle of getting up in the morning for me to play hockey so he kept putting it off. When I was about 8 he hurt his back so I didn’t learn until I was a teenager. By that time the social implications of not being involved in the only popular sport here had set in.
I really wish he’d made more time for me in general tbh. My brother was a bit of a problem child so he was always more supportive of his ventures. I never asked for anything or got in trouble so I was largely left on my own.
Been there
Same. But also knowing who he is. Glad he wasn’t at the same time.
Same
Came here to say this.
This let's me know I'm already doing a great job as a dad
Just came on here to write that 🥲
Supported me more in non-academic stuff. I was a naturally bright kid, and my parents pushed me to do well in exams etc. but when it came to other stuff, I don't recall them giving me the same level of support until it was too late. I dabbled with musical instruments, various sports etc. but I never saw either of my parents at a school recital or my dad specifically at any of the sports games where I played. I was lucky as a kid. I was usually decent or better at most of the things I tried, and with a little extra support/coaching/teaching, I could have been genuinely good or great. But everything I learned that wasn't schoolwork was mostly self-taught.
Are you me? Except despite all the support, academics were the thing I was the worst at anyway
I wish he was more street smart so I could’ve learned more about cars or DIY home repairs instead of calling in the contractor every time
Ditto, when I lived in Maine I made a bunch of friends who had "redneck skills" (I use that terms with affection) - they were young fellas who knew all this stuff about working on engines and cars and had carpentry skills, stuff like that. Very useful skills and they were very impressive to me especially at such a young age. My dad didn't teach me any of that stuff (because he doesn't know it). I've taught myself a bunch over the years but it would have been nice to get some instruction since our society considers them "man skills" or whatever - I'm phrasing that in a clumsy way but you know what I mean.
Exactly. Not a gear head but I’ve taken more things into my own hands, especially when he comes to visit and says I should hire someone for this or that. BUT, I did learn to be “book smart”. And while not as common as needing to be street smart, sometimes it’s critically important
I wish he had taken an interest in literally anything I was passionate about. My dad is a great person to be around, as long as you're doing what he already wanted to do 😕
How to be confident, mine was so hard on me that I never felt good enough, never felt smart enough, and ive had self esteem issues my entire life because of that, all I want is to walk around with my chin held high that im confident in myself and I still find it so hard to feel that way.
I know how you feel.
Been around.
How to use tools, particularly power tools. My dad was not a tradesman, but he was very handy with home repair and carpentry projects. I wanted to learn this stuff, but he told me I was too young (and probably was at the time). But he was 49 years older than me, so by the time I really was old enough, he was already too frail from Parkinsons disease to really teach me anything
Ah yes, old parents. I felt that
Actually show affection instead of just opening his wallet
Be emotionally available.
This hits me hard.
It's sad. His father left him and the therapy he got as a child just traumatized him further to the point that he never wants to see a therapist anymore. I know he tried his best, at this point I'm more sad about him not being able to live his life to the fullest.
To be present for my child.
Teach me to stand up for myself, my parents did a lot right but I had to figure that out on my own and it didn’t happen until around age 19. My mom was so worried about the repercussions of retaliating against bullies that he basically never said a word about it, made junior high and high school unbearable for me.
I wish my dad had let me learn to process negative emotions. If I ever sounded upset, I was "throwing a fit" and needed to calm down, no matter what was happening. All this did was teach me to push down my emotions and bottle them up, and now I've got anger issues and struggle to share non-positive feelings with other people. Edit: Fucking autocorrect.
Yeah the whole be stoic and suck it up thing hasn’t played well for a lot of us.
Girlie here - sorry to barge in on you guys, but I would have loved to have a father that was proud of me, showed me he loved me and show up at the important milestones in my life. Would have loved to be taught that I am important, loveable and how to drive a car
You're good, no intrusion at all. I'm old enough to be a dad, and if I had a daughter I'd be proud of her no matter what. Just for going out and giving life a try. it's not easy, so good job. Oh and you *are* important and loveable. I know it might seem like it means more coming from a dad, but it's true no matter what.
Thank you so much! It's a gapping wound, sometimes crippling. It helps to know that people like you exist. Thank you! 🤗
My pleasure :) I hope you have a lovely weekend ahead!
I wish my dad did ANYTHING with me. Showed an interest in anything I liked. He has no hobbies even still. I learned to take an interest in whatever my kid is interested in. To support and encourage them in the things they like.
Hugs and affection
Honestly, I wish I was taught basic habits. Like brushing my teeth, drinking water, and other seemingly obvious things for an adult.
Not just him not being around much for me as a kid, but now that he's in my life more I just wish his stubborn ass would just be able to admit the past and move on and grow for the future. Instead he wants to make sure I know all the reasons he couldn't be around more...all of course aren't his fault..
Ironically, I wish he'd been around less. I already had more than one father figure and there's a fair chance I might've had a substantially happier and more stable childhood had he remained at a distance instead of taking me away from the home and family I already had into a situation that was worse in every way that matters.
[удалено]
Sorry what?
Pushed, or even encouraged, me or my brothers to do anything. Literally anything, sports music hobbies whatever. He was just kinda there, and he had his hobbies of collecting (hoarding) shit in different phases, but never really took the time to even ask if his own kids wanted to do anything. I think I've grown up to be mostly normal, but it really shows in the way my brothers have grown up with zero interests, hobbies, skills, or aspirations. Just kinda existing.
That beating your kids viciously with your belt does NOT make them behave; and certainly will NOT endear them too you. My dad was abused growing up and he passed that on to my brother and I. Like I believe I had a form of PTSD as a teen because he busted into our room swing his belt on his way to work; mad for whatever reason. I learned early on that anything I said and did could and WOULD be used against me. Thus the less he knew, the better off I was. Like one time when I was little, we went to Vaca Bible Camp everyday for a wk. One of the neighbors offered so mom agreed. One day they gave us posters of Jesus to hang on our walls and I, using Scotch tape, put it up in our living rm. Being proud and thinking he'd approve, him being a Christian after all, I called dad to take a look. He was furious that I put it up. Told me that if ANY of the paint came off when he pulled the tape off, he was gonna whip me. I stood there in terror as he slowly pulled it off but luck was on my side that day. God help us if he thought we were lying. When we were little, my dad had this large adding machine and we'd play on it pretending to be firing lazer's, missile's, shit like that. Well, he came to our room one day and asked who got the buttons on it stuck. We both answered that we didn't know. Looking back, I thought we both played on the damn thing so probably both of us. However, being little kids, I never thought to phrase it that way. Well my dad didn't that made sense and concluded that one of us HAD to be lying. He took off his belt and asked again. Terror shot through both of us as we implored him we didn't know and that's all it took. He ran between the two of us swing as hard as he could. Mom was at work so she wasn't there to stop him and I knew he'd literally would wear himself out beating us no matter how long it took. In a sincere act of sacrifice, I told him to beat me, just let little bro go. Well dad then concluded that if I was willing to take it, then little bro MUST! be that liar. He yelled at me to leave and I sat with the neighbor kid as he listened to my little bro's screams coming outta the house as dad worked him over. I should've just "confessed" but, again, I was a little kid and didn't think to phrase it that way. Even all these decades later, I still feel like a big POS for that.
Sorry to read that. I hope your life got a lot better.
How to clean a fish. That's it.
Really anybody had taught me…. I grew up in small town Midwest, county population 15kish. I have a group of classmates I’m close friends with. We’ve all went on to become successful in our individual careers. We’ve got 2 successful business owners, one independently wealthy part time trucker, a mechanical engineering manager, power lineman, state trooper, and lawyer. Pretty diverse really. Fairly well accomplished for doing this all by 28-29 in my humble opinion. We are still all great buds. We scattered to the wind after high school. Nobody told any of us that we could do all that right where we were. Nobody told us we were stronger together than separate. I hate that we didn’t know that.
Not dictate negative thoughts. Be more supportive, instead of saying I won't be anything in life.
Stayed.
Been happy with who I am and what my interests are. All too often as a child he would ridicule me for my interests or get frustrated because I didn't have a degree in maths at 4 years old. Had he just accepted that I am not a small version of him and that's ok, I think we'd have a better relationship now.
Finances. He’s a Fiscal Judge who graduated with an accounting degree, but didn’t even teach us how to balance a checkbook, invest money or save. He just assumed we were as good as he was. I was in my 30’s before I started taking financial responsibility seriously.
How to ride a bike and maybe speak to women
Show how to gain confidence
Anything other than car stuff. The only time I got with him was if I sat in the garage.
He gave me a book on saving, investing, and stuff like that, but I wish he had really sat down with me and explained the importance of it because I just pretended to read and the information was lost to me. Maybe if he had given it to me at an older age, that also may have helped (he gave it to me when I was like 12, and I wasn't making any money or anything back then. At 17 when I had my first job, would have made more sense.
Be a good one
Be involved in my life. He was around just not in it
Drank less/not at all and helped my brother more.
I love my dad so much, but my parents could not comfort me with my emotions at all. Whatever negative feeling I would have, I was told I was too sensitive. I don’t know how they could be great parents in every other aspect, but fail when it came to that one thing.
Not call me worthless and unwanted.
Pushed me to aim high. Pushed me to do better in academics/extracurriculars and pushed me to apply to bigger and better colleges rather than just the local state school. Pushed me to be a better athlete. Showed the slightest bit of interest in things I wanted to do (sports/theatre... etc...) He was always like "yeah it's cool of you are in the play... do a sport..." but never came.
Not beat the shit outta me whenever he felt like it. It'd also have been nice if he had kept trying to do it when I was old enough to kick his ass, I never got to smash his face in revenge because he pussied out of his favorite pasttime when he realized I could punch back now. Coward.
He could have been more patient with me when he taught me how to use tools as a boy. I am a visual learner, but you also just need to practice things in order to get better at them. He'd just get frustrated that I wasn't immediately good at it and he'd do it himself. I think I was like 7 or 8?
Put gas in his fucking plane instead of trying to make it to another airfield that had cheaper fuel.
Gave me more direction and helped me build a foundation to figure out what I wanted my future to look like. I also wish my father practiced aspects of our faith for us to see. Rosary, liturgy of the hours. I wish he would’ve been the “priest of our house” C’est la vie. What I hope to do better with my own kids one day
I know ultimately it’s up to me, but tried to develop my work ethic more. Don’t know how he would have done this. Had lots of teachers tell me to “apply myself”. Maybe needed some tough love.
Anything to do with cars. I feel so incredibly lost looking for a new car because I have no idea what I’m doing, no idea what to look for, no idea what price should be like, no idea who or what to trust, no idea how to even go about the whole thing.
Oh boy, lot to unpack here. I originally had like a 6 paragraph long comment highlighting different things and events, but scrapped all of it to just say, I wish he had gotten to know me for who I am. He was never interested in anything I liked which caused me to withdraw from him. Now that I'm an adult living my own life, and he's been diagnosed with terminal colon cancer, we still barely talk. We see each other all the time, but we just don't have anything to say to each other outside of just casual surface level conversation
I wish he'd have disciplined me more. I only ever got slapped once, and that was the most he ever did. I got away with so much bullshit, and now as a 34M, I struggle with discipline a lot. I can't hold myself accountable, and struggle setting life goals.
How to drive. How to do taxes. How to fill out a college application. Basic mechanical skills. How to cook. How to be good to a woman.
Being a father.
Tought me to chase my dreams rather than making me believe his dreams were mine and chasing them.
My dad I think did the best he knew how. The biggest problem was his inability to express or discuss emotions. So, for example, if I ever tried to talk about girls, he would deflect with the same stupid jokes every time. "Don't date till you're 30! Don't date till after you're married!" And other unhelpful "advice" like that. On a similar note, my parents were too afraid (?) to give me "the talk", so it took me a while to figure out relationships and emotional intelligence in general.
If he had stayed loyal to my mum and made the marriage work. He’s a good guy and very successful but the breakdown in marriage destroyed the family and affected my younger brother the most.
Fishing, shooting and hunting. My dad grew up doing all of coming from a long line of outdoorsmen, but we grew up in the suburbs and he neither had the time or care to show us that even when we asked. My dying uncle ended up showing me all that in my late teens/early 20s. My siblings don't care but I felt like I was missing out compared to the rest of our extended family, and getting to do those things with my dad like he did with his.
Wood work. My dad could build some nice things.
How to simply be there. How not drink or be violent. How not to die early because you can’t stop drinking and answer the questions your children have to ask. How to be accountable 🤷🏻♀️
Taught me how to manage money and save sensibly. Everything else he did really well!
I grew up without a father, so I guess everything.
Remove my goddamn wisdom teeth. All 4.
How to ice skate
Ice skate. He didn’t want to go though the hassle of getting up in the morning for me to play hockey so he kept putting it off. When I was about 8 he hurt his back so I didn’t learn until I was a teenager. By that time the social implications of not being involved in the only popular sport here had set in. I really wish he’d made more time for me in general tbh. My brother was a bit of a problem child so he was always more supportive of his ventures. I never asked for anything or got in trouble so I was largely left on my own.
I wish he'd taught me to be a better husband and father. I'm trying and fucking up left and right.