After Mum passed away, our father seemed to lose all restraint. The quiet force that once softened him was gone, and the man who had at least pretended to respect our boundaries suddenly became a tyrant—shouting, issuing ultimatums, and wielding his favourite threat: “You’ll get nothing! I’ll cut you out of the will!”
I’m twenty-nine. My brother is three years older. We’re grown, independent adults with our own lives, relationships, jobs, and plans. But Dad acts as if we’re wayward teenagers, and he’s the last bastion of wisdom on earth. If it were just advice, we might have endured it. But it wasn’t. He demanded. Ordered. And if we resisted, he’d twist the knife: “The flat won’t be yours.”
Yes, the flat is nice—a three-bed in central Manchester, not some cramped postwar build, fully renovated. But good grief, how meaningless it became compared to the pain we endured under his thumb.
My brother once broke free. Lived on his own, peaceful, built a life. But Dad started calling, guilt-tripping him—”I’m lonely, a son should be near.” Eventually, he gave in. Returned. And immediately stepped back into a cage: “Home by eleven. After that, the door’s bolted.” More than once, he slept in his car or at a mate’s after missing curfew, showering at the gym the next morning. After months of that, he packed his bags and left again. Cue the usual: “That’s it! You’re cut off!”
When my brother left, Dad turned to me. I was, in his words, “mixed up with the wrong sort.” My then-boyfriend rubbed him wrong from the start—wrong tone, wrong look. Dad’s ultimatum: “Drop him, or you’ll get not a penny.” I silently packed my things and moved in with my brother. Later, I rented my own place. It was hard, but I managed. Because nothing could be worse than living under that pressure.
After a while, Dad seemed to cool off. Called. Made up. Family, after all. We thought he’d come round. But no. The next outburst came when my brother announced his wedding. His fiancée didn’t suit Dad—too bold with her humour, too polished in her dress. He demanded the wedding be cancelled. When my brother refused, Dad forbade me from attending. I went anyway. Because that’s family. At my wedding, my brother stood by me. Dad didn’t. He missed them both.
Now he’s back. Aging, unwell, and suddenly insisting my husband and I move in. “I can’t manage alone—look after me,” he says. We offered help—visits, groceries, a carer’s wages. But living with him again? No. We won’t do it.
And so it starts again: “You’ve abandoned me. Ungrateful. The flat will go to strangers.” My brother and I just exchanged a tired glance. It doesn’t hurt anymore. Doesn’t even anger us. We’re just exhausted. And if the price of peace is his inheritance, so be it. We’ve paid too much already for the right to be ourselves.
When you lose someone close, the rest of the family is meant to grow stronger. For us, it was the opposite—Mum left, and with her, we lost Dad too. We’re done living in fear of being “unworthy.” We want our own lives—no threats, no humiliation, no begging for scraps of love.
If Dad thinks respect can be bought with bricks and mortar, he’s wrong. We won’t be heirs who trade freedom for a deed. Better to walk away—maybe without his gift of a home, but without the weight of his control, either. True worth isn’t measured in property, but in the courage to live on your own terms.