I’m facing a difficult decision.

There are certain things about my life I have never blogged about. A few people that read this and actually know me know part of the story. A couple may know almost all of it. But I am not sure anyone really knows the whole thing. But I need to kind of write this out to help me think through something.

First, I have to explain something. If you read my blog you may have noticed sometimes I refer to my dad and others to my father. That is intentional and it references two separate people. My father is my biological father. My dad is the man my mother married me who adopted me when I was 9. One of the two was with me most of my childhood. The other basically disowned me so he wouldn’t have to pay child support.

For a long time I kind of avoided dealing with a lot of realities about my father. What little I remember of the time he was married to my mother is not good. Don’t get me wrong. Like most children I loved my father. But that doesn’t mean that love was deserved. I was crushed when they divorced even though I was a very small child. I remember distinctly crying my eyes out because I could not understand why he wasn’t there. But, looking back, I also remember a big part of why they divorced. And I also remember what it was like the brief period after the divorce where he actually had me visit him.

Basically, about the time things got screwy in my life, and I divorced for the first time, I gave a lot of thought to what I wanted from a relationship with my father. Yes, even though he disowned me and asked my step-father to adopt me he had wanted to be in my life, pretty much on his terms. As a kid you just adapt to that, mostly because you do not want to face the fact that your father doesn’t really want to be your father. I don’t even know how to describe what role he wanted to play in my life but it certainly wasn’t parental.

And I also faced the reality that every single psychologist I met with reached the same conclusion about things I had blocked out of my memory, and that I may never be sure of everything, but there is something there.

So I decided I did not want this man in my life. When I had spoken to him about what I did remember he denied he had ever done anything wrong and said he had no idea what I was talking about. Given the fact that there are more than a few people who remember some pretty bad shit, it’s obvious that he’s either in denial or too big a coward to own up to his past. Either way, this is not a man I want in my life. He is a big reason why my address and phone number are not easy to find. I don’t want so much as a birthday card from this man.

When all of this happened I received a card from my step-brother. Keep in mind he is not my father’s biological son. But his mother is married to my father, so they are in touch. The card talked a great deal about forgiveness. But this isn’t a matter of forgiveness. Even if I forgive the man I am not going to have him in my life. The memories are bad enough without dealing with a man who pretends nothing ever happened. So, as a result of his decision to act as an intermediary between my father and me, I made the choice to cut my step-brother out of my life as well. Frankly, anyone that close to my father is not someone I want around me.

Now, several years later my step-brother has reached out to me again. This time he did not reach out to me on behalf of my father, but for himself. But I have to be honest. I am not sure what to do. The reality is that he is still close to his mother, and anything I say to him is likely to get back to her. I guarantee anything she hears will get to my father. I do not want him involved in my life even tangentially. I don’t want him to know what I am doing in my life. I don’t want any back-channel communication from him. I want to do as much as I can to be insulated from him.

So now I have to decide how to handle this situation. I could just send my brother a message explaining why I am doing what I am doing, but I am afraid that even that will end up getting my father, or possibly my step-mother, to again start their efforts to find me.  While I want to believe I can communicate with my brother without any of it getting back to my father, I am not sure that is even possible.

I have enough going on in my life without dealing with that man again, and I really have to decide if the risk is worth it.