People of Reddit who are estranged from their families, what happened? Do you think you'll ever reconcile?

Not estranged from my entire family, but my dad was just an asshole. Constant verbal abuse and I can literally count the good moments we had on two hands in 19 years of living with him. I'm 21 now and I haven't had any contact with him in 8 months.

As to the last question: no, I don't think we will ever reconcile. He's a narcissist (not officially diagnosed, but he fits all the criteria except those of physical abuse and run-ins with law enforcement) and anytime I (or anyone else, for that matter) tried to solve a problem with him he ended up putting the blame for said problem on the other party. Example: once around dinnertime, he was pushing me around (physically) for no reason and after (unsuccesfully) asking him to stop, I pushed back (not violently at all, just a tiny bit so he wouldn't be in my space anymore and he is not a weak man) and when my mom gave me my dinner, he shoved my face into it.

I like to think of my childhood with him as a very valuable lesson: blood family means shit-all. Family are the people you can love and trust, blood relatives don't always meet those standards. It really, really pisses me off when I hear people say stupid shit like "but he's still your father" or "but he wants to make amends" (he only turned 180 degrees when mom, sis and me were sick and tired of his shit and left).

/r/AskReddit Thread