It really helps me cope to know that there are neurological explanations for where these existentially horrific thought patterns come from.

Not entirely unrelated, I have recently cut my abusive stepmother off and I purposely gave her no reason for blocking her on social media and deleting all her voicemails without listening. She sent me a text the other day offering to send me money on a prepaid Walmart debit card if I call her back.

I'm going back to WYO at the end of the month to spend some time with my wonder woman of a sister and my very brand new niece and I'm debating whether or not to confront my equally abusive father by inviting him to dinner while I'm there and just seeing what happens. Problem is my angel of a mother (who i will be traveling with) keeps telling me how she's having nightmares of running into him so I wonder if it's a dick move or not to pursue my morbid curiosity about putting him on the spot on our trip. The last thing I want to do is bring drama to my post-partum sister, but it's been 10 years now since I've seen him, and I'm not afraid of him anymore. I'm so curious about what he has to say.

WWMBD?

Once you take out the garbage it doesn’t make sense to bring it back in.

Do you really want to introduce a new baby to drama it doesn't even need to know exists?

Church

No, absolutely not. But so do I try to mend things with my dad or just keep it all separated?

Your mom don’t wanna see him. Your niece shouldn’t be exposed it. It probably won’t go well for you either.

I vote hell no.

As far as permanently - that’s tough to say for another person

For me dropping my dad out of my life was really easy and I don’t have any sentimental feelings about family or whatever. I’m just glad it’s something I don’t have to deal with. Other people appear to benefit from healing old relationships and still having family and all that. It’s hard for me to understand because I don’t feel like that at all. I can’t say for you.

Right but so then I have to pretend it's all cool and she grows up thinking he's chill? Like wtf, this is what the human condition has to offer?

I agree with the hell no. Especially if it exposes you to the danger of him hurting you again. From what see around me no good ever comes from contact with abusive parents.

Also, I often see people who keep having contact with those parents because they want some sort of closure, in the form of explanation or good talk, and I've never seen that happen. Even if people try to confront their ****ty parents, nothing satisfying or constructive came of it. After all, these parents are *******s. It's not worth it

It’s your sister’s responsibility to protect her. I’d say you can talk to her about it when she’s around 13 or so if you need to.

The important thing is she never gets hurt. The truth is a distant third.

Oh I forgot to mention that the most complicated aspect of the relationship is that my sister the new mother worships our father and would sooner cut me out of her life than acknowledge the damage he caused.