I'm not familiar with that sub Reddit. My dad is not a great person. People joke that in the nuclear apocolypse there would be cockroaches and him. But to his credit, though he is a horrible horrible person. And he has definately been manipulative towards my siblings and I. He has been okay to me in the grand scheme of things. I know that's mostly because he didn't live with us for my entire memory of him and I only ever saw him while supervised (he was also not legally allowed anywhere near our school or house). My older brother was not so lucky and did have to go to hospital for abuse when he got pushed into an escalator and dislocated his shoulder (this was before the separation when he was probably not 1 or 2 years old). This was before I was born though and a big reason behind my mum not leaving us alone with him even before they separated. While she was at work we would stay with the neighbours even when he was home and would not be allowed to go back to the house until mum was home.

I am very lucky compared to a lot of people on this site. I have a wonderful mum and in my adulthood I only see him once a year on my older sister's birthday since she wants to see him but not alone. I don't know what my life would have been like if my parents didn't separate but I don't think that's worth thinking about too much.