My daughter was molested by her grandfather - my own father

Hello everyone...English is not my first language so apologies in advance for any grammar mistakes. I desperately need some insight and advise, this has been dragging on for years and never I knew where to turn to get the help for me and especially my daughter...it is a long story, apologies for that! I don't know how to express myself or how to tell the story without you maybe misunderstanding something. To most of you this will be a very complicated story.

Me and my 2 children were sitting down at a restaurant when she was in her senior year at school aged 18. There was this newspaper with headlines of a man that had molested young children. Now this topic was always an open discussion between me and my children, because even though something is blocking my memory I know something had happened to me as a little girl, so yes I always encouraged them to not keep it a secret should they be victims in one way or another of molestation. This topic was always heavy on my heart and I wanted them to know that they would be safe if the don't protect a molester if ever that happens to them!

So coming back to the news article in the newspaper, my immediate reaction was anger and said that this world is a sick world we live in....and out of the blue my daughter looked at me and said.....well I was molested when I was around 4 or 5 (she was 18 years old then)...I immediately reacted in shock and told her to hold it right there, we will continue this conversation at home.

We went home and I sat down with her in private and told her to tell me everything. Shock isn't the word that I felt when she told me her grandfather (MY OWN FATHER) molested her when I left her at my parents house when my mom were not around. She explained what happened in a graphic way. This she is telling me after 13 years after this happened. I was feeling numb and cannot begin to tell all the different emotions that was going through my mind right then. I have tried to stay calm and be strong for her but was falling apart. (Also to be mentioned, at that stage of our lives we were in a unstable family situation, with her father going through a burn out and a lot of things that was not healthy was going down for us, me and my 2 children were on our way out...we had to, her father completely became almost insane- also a long heartbreaking story on it's own)

While sitting there with her and comforting her (even though it seems as if she is the one handling it better than me) I told her that I am going to seek help, but one thing she must remember, this will stay an open book and we will not allow it to overpower us, we will win this one way or another. She also told me that to her it feels as if it has never happened because I was questioning the time that has passed and would have never guessed this ever happened, because you see, my father was the "soft" parent figure in our household, my mother was the strict parent, and my father was always trying to protect us. He was well loved by the entire family and very popular. Because you see my father had a kind heart and everyone loved him, his nature was of someone that will never harm no one. Well that is what I thought!!!

My daughter told me that this molestation happened for a very short while, and he stopped, so she just coped with it trying to get it out of her head and still having a relationship with my father just like everyone else in the family. (hope you understand what I am trying to say.)

I was angry, hurt, confused, and everything that you can think of that can take one down a path of destruction. My immediate reaction was to get in my car (my parents lived very far from us in another town) drive all the way there and kill him and taking the legal route to prosecute my father!! I was feeling out of control, and my heart was torn into 1000 pieces.... all the while I tried to stay strong in front of my daughter.

I made an appointment at a phycologists and the first thing she said to me is to not take the legal route or to even confront my father, it was too long ago and will torn a family apart. Her advise was to help my daughter to get over this. I didn't agree with her, but didn't know where to turn to or what to do. The next day I decided to inform my 2 sister and 2 brothers. I was at a very low place at that stage, and even had suicidal thoughts, but the thought of my daughter and son that needs me to stay strong, kept me from doing that.

So I called my oldest sister first and said to her that they can crucify me or my daughter and even not belief us but this has happened and it is the truth. To my amazement my sister replied with I do believe you, because of reasons also to long to discuss...it involved friends from my father that has molested my sister as well, and even my father when she was small, he would dance with her on his feet and she could feel he is getting an erection....but that is all she experienced from my father, this time around his friends were the culprits, she even confessed that she was in therapy for this
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I thought at that stage my siblings is supportive and is also in shock and heartbreak of their own and trying to deal with what is known now. My father being old and sick by then, me and my daughter decided to put it aside to take him on legally and just try to avoid in seeing him ever, we will get the help we need by the right person/s sooner or later, but this will not be our "boss" we will still look it in the eye even though it is hurting us. My daughter agreed on everything because as she said, it feels as if this has never happened, and strangely enough still love her grandfather and is not even angry at him. I think this is her way of coping and she has taught herself to look the other way over the years as if it never happened....but it did!

As time went on my siblings were handling this situation not as to what I would have expect when they were around me or my daughter. They still had this admiration for my father and all of the family, my daughters cousins included, made my father out to be this hero that they adored...as if this that has happened to my daughter never existed. Even though we decided not to confront my dad, my family's handling of my father and how they still portrayed him over the years, was a sign to me of the disregard etc. they have about this issue, and to me as if they were out of touch with reality. I can almost say as if we were a dysfunctional family (of course my mother was never informed it would have meant the end of her)

My head was too small to understand what the hell is going on, how can they not take me into consideration when I was around when they discuss our so called wonderful father, to be honest I didn't know how to handle this so I just kept quiet. As time went on, I confronted them one night in tears and asking them how can they not acknowledge what my father has done to my daughter, and go on as if nothing happened. I am not saying they should have shred him to parts because me and my daughter decided not to take this further with him for reasons already mentioned, but gosh keep in mind that he actually did molested my daughter. In my head I was thinking that yes, it is what happened and they also have their heads messed up because of this, but there is numerous other ways they could have dealt with this other than still talking about my father and interact with him as if he was the best human being ever. They then told me that it is not that they are turning their heads, they themselves is also trying to cope with what happened and this is the only way they know how to do this and that they are sorry I am feeling like this.

Well that was that and time went on. Nothing changed they still went on the same way, cherishing my father and making him to be a hero like figure, they didn't even made it a secret that they despised my mother and choose my father over her.

Over the years I was at lost with how to handle all of this....me and my daughter regularly discussed it, and even came to the conclusion that I have a dysfunctional family, I even realized that I and even my children have never even fitted in with them.
They were all just so different from us and our logic about how things is suppose to work. In away we were always judged in a subtle manner, We have always stood on the background because of this handling of things. We couldn't and will never get there where we can understand how their heads is working, nothing has ever made sense to me in a logical way. and all I ever felt was that they betrayed me and my daughter along with my father.

Their actions has spoken louder than words. Me and my children were always on our own, even if we struggled we have never ever asked for help and just went by our daily lives, And no matter how well we were doing in life or how bad we were always the topic of discussion without them knowing that we do know about it. In other words we were always judged in a way, without any reason. Sorry if this part is confusing in bringing it in as well, but I have always questioned myself, because I was outnumbered by my siblings in the way they were going about everything everyday.

Logic said to me that I was not wrong in the way I was thinking about everything but in a way also felt as if I was maybe wrong, and never knew how to act or feel or or or or....I have always felt alienated from them because of all the issues that has never really left my mind. And now I have came to a point where this is becoming a very big issue to me again.

Me and my daughter has spoken about this recently again, and we have decided that my family should be cut off for our own sanity. This might be long overdue I know, but the thing is, I have always longed for something to happen within my family to make this pain and confusion go away. I so wished for a "normal" and healthy family life, that I kept on clinging to them.

The thing is also that they are not bad people and each and everyone of them also have deep issues of their own in life, which in short put us all in a very sad place. But I can no longer function and interact with them as if nothing is bothering me. I think this will never change, because too much time has passed by. Today my daughter is 33 years old, and yes I know a lot of you would most probably say but why wait so long? That I cannot answer you, I don't even understand some of this myself, I am lost to be honest as to the numerous why's!!!!

My father has passed away 3 years ago and my mother about 4 months ago. Until today I cannot look at my fathers picture, or pictures of my daughter when she was the age she was when he molested her. And the insanity of it all....I do love my father, and my daughter admits that beyond logic she never felt unsafe or didn't love her grandfather because she did as time went on and he stopped doing that to her.

But still there is this unfinished emotions that I know still needs attention, and I am at this point where I am once again torn into million pieces and cannot cope with this anymore. I want "normal", because how many can say that their child was molested by their own grandparent, my father??? And the rest of the family goes on as if they have distanced them from this because it didn't happen to them. Well that is what I think the reason is why they have always handled it the way they did.

I can no longer stand the feeling of betrayal, and also giving myself blame for allowing all of this. This is at the end of the day my own fault!!!! Please tell me that I am not crazy and that is normal of me to think of this the way I have always thought of it, and that the best is to cut ties with my family because this will never be resolved...I don't think it can be resolved, this is too deep and for too long.

I should have followed my own head that time and confronted my father, I should have never listened to the psychologist in leaving everything because too many years has passed. I should have this and I should have that....but I didn't!!!!!!

And still don't know what to do with all of this!!!! Because this is not "NORMAL" and never was!!!!

I am still looking for help for my daughter, because until this day, I couldn't find the right person to help, and even though she is coping and doing very well in life personally as well as professionally, she admitted that she still needs to talk about it. It is of such an issue to her that this is a secret that is kept from her husband, she don't want him to know about this.

You can throw stones at me, you can even tell me what bad mother I am, because I think I deserve it, I failed my daughter, because I didn't know and still don't how to help. The only thing I can think of is to still get help from someone professional, and to cut ties with my family, because of the betrayal me and my daughter feel toward them.

I don't know why I am feeling even worse than before. The feeling that they have done an "injustice" to us and not support us in a way that is healthy for our emotional well being...I feel more angry and betrayed as ever before, could this maybe be because I tried to protect my mother and suppressed my feelings because of that, and now that she has passed, this all comes back to resurface?

I don't ask that you must understand what had happened here, this is far too complicated for anyone to really understand, all I am asking is for is for solid and healthy advise. Would it be beneficial for both me and my children to cut ties totally with my family? Because I know they will never have the same point of view, and if they did they don't have the ability to handle it in a way that would be helpful to us. Our emotions and point of view on this has always been different.