I Have a Bad Dad

The Dr. Laura Podcast

Dr. Laura Schlessinger & SiriusXM

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4.6 • 6.3K Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2025

⏱️ 6 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Christy resents that the father who was never there for her as a child wants her help now that he's sick and old. Call 1-800-DR-LAURA / 1-800-375-2872 or make an appointment at DrLaura.com

Transcript

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0:00.0	Thanks for listening to my call of the day podcast. You can hear my live radio program Monday through Friday from 2 to 5 p.m. Eastern Time on Sirius XM Triumph 11.
0:11.5	Christy, welcome to the program. Hi, thank you for taking my call. You're welcome. I am calling about a bad dad who was not involved very much in my life when he divorced my mom when I was 12.
0:29.6	He basically divorced me too and just sort of wanted to live his new life with his new girlfriend.
0:36.6	And as a child, I had to beg him to spend time with him.
0:42.4	So over the years, I've had a very limited and distant relationship with him.
0:50.5	He recently became ill in this January and fell and broke a leg and had to be hospitalized
0:59.7	and put into a skilled nursing facility for about two months while he was trying to walk again.
1:06.5	And so he reached out to me to ask for my help to help him with paperwork and coordinating his care
1:14.7	with his doctors and such. And I felt a little obligated to do that just because he was my
1:23.2	father, but I was very resentful about it because he's never been there for me. Well, just a second, two
1:28.7	things, the word resentment. No, he wasn't your father. He was the sperm donor, so he wasn't
1:34.4	your father. That was the point you brought up. And in terms of resentment, I don't think people get a
1:40.3	pass on being crappy to other people just because they're older sick. You're not
1:45.0	obligated. You can take that upon yourself and most women in your position tend to because
1:50.2	women are caretakers by nature. That's why we have the breasts in the universe. We're the
1:54.4	caretakers. So you're taking on a responsibility that is not yours. I mean, he found a new
1:59.8	woman. He made a call to you, not because he
2:02.6	gave a shit about you as his daughter. You're saying he's my father, therefore I owe him. You were his
2:07.9	daughter. He didn't think he owed you anything. But now he wants something because he needs something
2:12.5	and you're a sucker. But you can continue doing that because you'll have something, but not what you think you're going to get.
2:22.1	Don't be resentful about your own personal choice, dear.
2:25.1	You don't have to make this choice.
	...

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