I have read this and am now crying! My mum wouldn't let me near my father because she believed he'd abuse me. He didn't. She became an hysterical banshee whenever I wanted to spend any time with him, and kept us both essentially isolated from each other. We were a "family" of married parents with 2 kids. Then when I was 10 he got cancer and eventually died when I was 12. My mum kept telling me Go Away so I ended up standing, moping, in the hosp corridor for a few hours until he died. I was alone in a hospital corridor when he died. I was not given any chance to say goodbye. I was sent to an aunt and mum turned up nearly six hours later, by which time I, and my aunt & uncle were convinced she wasn't coming for me; she didn't even phone to explain her absence- nor did she explain at any point.

Some "bad" fathers are in reality the mothers who are bad and at fault, as in my case. I cannot and do not see God as any sort of father at all, unless a father is cold, distant, unfriendly, makes no contact with their child despite seeing them daily, hurtful, rejecting, frightening.......

And people wonder, and ask me, why I have a problem with God being "my father".

I will pray for both of you..