Advice? Tips?Encouragement? This will be a long one.

So long story short- My dad and I have had a bit of an argument.

Background: My dad is a generous person but has difficulty communicating (he expect people to mind read and gets frustrated when they don’t) When he does communicate to tell a story or something it can be difficult to follow as he goes into microscopic details not essential to the story and off on tangents and loses this thread and spends long periods trying to think of what he was trying to say. (He’s 74 - but has always been like this although has got worse with age) He has difficulty managing his emotions which can make him quite a prickly person to be around let’s say.

The argument: the last time I saw him, the last time I texted him and then the last time I rang him he has been angry and rude to me. For example I sent him a message asking if everything was ok and his reply was “No… leave me alone!”

So when he was rude to me again on a second phone call… I asked what is wrong? Every time I speak to you, you speak to me like I’m a piece of sh*t?”

He said “well you always ring me when I’m busy and when I want to talk to you, you ignore me!’

I found out that basically I interrupted him when we were out for a meal on my sons birthday (which I did… my mind wandered and I said something but realised apologised and listened to the end of his story)

Anyway he put the phone down on me after I asked if he was Pissed with me and he replied yes I am.

Now my instinct is to just avoid him now… I find communication with him hard anyway he has an explosive temper over minor things and it is easier for me not to.

However I do realise he is a man struggling to communicate his needs… what he really needed was to feel heard and being a more healed person I really should be the one to repair… especially as he does feel I wronged him… even though his behaviour since has been far worse then me Interrupting him… he doesn’t know how to communicate in any other way.

So how do I have a conversation with him to make things right?

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