Right, here goes. This will be more of a vent than a confession. Never really spoke to anyone about this before, so expressing it on an internet forum probably isn't the best thing to do.
I'm scared of my dad. Not so much anymore, but I was when I was younger. He frustrates me, because of the way he treats my mum. He never hits her, that's one thing I can praise him for, but he verbally abuses her, and it sometimes makes her cry, and when she cries, I cry. I hate crying, and I hate seeing her cry, and when she cries it makes my dad angrier, so she tries her best to not. There is only one time I like seeing her cry, and that's when she cries of laughter. Me and my mum are more like best friends rather than mother and daughter, we share the same tastes in almost everything. She never embarasses me and I love being around her, and I'm not afraid to be seen with her. But my mum isn't perfect, and that's why I love her. I'm not perfect, in fact I'm just like her. Obviously, nobody is perfect, and everyone makes mistakes, but it seems like that whenever my mum makes a mistake, my dad just freaks out.
For example, today, about an hour ago, my mum came home from work. We have about half a foot of snow here, and an FF Mondeo with summer tyres and a lowered suspension, so not the most ideal car for driving in snow. Nonetheless, my mum tries to put the car in the garage. She gets stuck, and me and my dad have to come out to help her. Now I have no problem with this, as I would do anything for my mum and I'd also do anything for the Mondeo - but that's a different story. My dad is getting annoyed that she's done this, but keeps his cool. Then as time progresses and we struggle to get the car out of the snow, he gets increasingly angry. A passer-by with a young daughter offers to help, but my dad says we're fine. We continue to try and push the Mondeo out, but it doesn't get very far. Another passer-by on the phone offers to help, and this time my dad says yes, so the passer-by says he'll call the caller back and comes over to help us. The car moves a bit and we get it further out, but it still won't move. Eventually we stop and my dad tries to dig out the car, keeping his cool for the passer-by. The passer-by leaves, and then my dad starts yelling at my mum. I hate it when he does it in public because everyone looks, and when he shouts he gets close to her face and grits his teeth. I hate that, but I can't do anything about it.
Another thing that really frustrates me about him is the way he talks about my sister. My sister is my half-sister and not his daughter, and is about 5 years older than me. Because my sister isn't related to him, he sees her as something that's been 'dragged in' to the family because of my mum. My sister has two kids and her boyfriend is in the army, meaning she's often home alone with the kids, both under the age of 4. Money is tight, so sometimes she'll ask us for some, which angers my dad. Now I know for a fact that if I was in that situation, my dad would give me more than enough money, because I'm his daughter. My sister is also prone to illness or infection, and suffers very badly from asthma, so she is often admitted to hospital, and because her boyfriend is 100 miles south at the barracks, she needs someone to look after the kids, which is my mum. So my mum has to take trips to the hospital too to make sure the kids are alright, which also angers my dad.
I'm sick of feeling helpless when he does stuff like this. He once made me hide under my own bed covers, shivering and crying because I told my friend on MSN that he was sometimes grumpy and he saw the conversation. He started throwing things across my room. I was about 9 at the time.
I don't want to look like I'm pouring out my feelings to everyone, but after tonight I just wanted to get that off my chest.
TL;DR: I don't like my dad.
...We did eventually get the car out, by the way.