I apologize in advance for some foul language.

December 17 is coming up.

There are many feelings I have about this date. Lets start out with the least important, I have 44 DPS due on the yearbook then and I'm personally responsible for quite a few of those so its stressful. However that's the least important one.

See December 17, 2007 was the day my mother and I answered the door to see a large military officer (huge man prob 6'4 and 300 lbs or so but it was all muscle. We'll call him Rob) and looked at us and asked if my fathers name was Pat. I asked why he needed to know and my mother stepped in. For the next 20 minutes or so my mother talked to this man while I stood, shocked, at all of these things he was accusing my father of. At one point I just collapsed. Rob was saying what my mother had been suspecting. My father was having an affair with Rob's little sister.

Rob's little sister knew that my father had a wife, 2 children and she had 2 children of her own( although much, much younger ). My father was also doing drugs, drinking, and was trying to start fights with Rob.

When my father got home the next day, after lots and lots of yelling, he came up to me and my little brother and attempted an apology. I remember it like it was yesterday. It went like this " I'm sorry that I had to resort to seeing that woman, BUT if YOU TWO weren't bickering all the time and stressing me out then I wouldn't of gone to see her." My brother accepted that 'apology' ( I use the term loosely) but I didn't. I knew better. I stormed out of the room and told him that if he wanted to sleep with a whore than that's on him, but there is no way in hell this is MY fault!

He hasn't spoken to me about it since.

But what really prompted this post (besides the date getting closer and closer) was just now when my brother told me that my dad has been drinking (and not like casual drinking, like getting drunk 3 or 4 times a week) because of me. Hes my father, I will give him that. But he thinks hes 20 and hes going to be 52 this month. He cannot take responsibility for his actions. I know all of these things because he thinks out loud without knowing. So he will say something simple to me like go wash the dishes and i will tell him to give me 5 minutes and i will go, but he turns around and within ear shot I can hear him insulting me, saying how I will never make it in the world on my own, how I'm a slob, how I'm just this overall bitch and how he cant wait a year until I go off to collage. And I'm not gonna sugar coat it, not this one. Things are bad in my house and I have been sugar coating them, but not with this one.

It is said that school aged girls in America only speak an average of 20 minutes with their fathers per day. I would be lucky to get that in 2.5 weeks. We don't talk. I hide from him and from the rest of my family. I cant talk to them. If I do, bad things happen. Violent things happen. So I go into my room, and pray to the good Lord that no one gets hurt today in a physical or emotional way.

I live in a dysfunctional family in every aspect of the term. This week alone I have talked to Dr. R 3 times and there is a good chance that I may be paging her again tomorrow, who knows.

In my house ( I would say family but see were more like room mates that happen to share DNA ) your either hugged or slugged and no one can predict it.

So i lay in bed repeating to myself
I am not what caused him to cheat or drink
I am not what caused him to cheat or drink
I am not what caused him to cheat or drink
I am not what caused him to cheat or drink
I am not what caused him to cheat or drink
I am not what caused him to cheat or drink

And maybe, just maybe I can convince myself of that