So...am I evil??

[GlassJaw]

Sounds like he was more of an adult about it than you were.

 

[Eltab]

OP:
I introduced my son to D&D with Basic and moved to 3e (just in time for 4e to be announced) because he was interested and wanted to play the game.
Your antics are going to cause the opposite.

You are certainly not Good but you aren't Evil either; you are being Chaotic Stoopid.

 

[Eltab]

Last year, my father became so ill ...

My condolences for your loss.

You are a better person than me:
My grandmother spiraled down into Alzheimer's over a decade. When her needs were more than the family could provide, we moved her into a living facility. I was the last of the grandchildren to visit her regularly, but stopped when she no longer recognized me and was frightened by "that strange man". I still feel like I didn't 'do enough' to stay with her and stand by her.

 

[Schmoe]

So to summarize the situation, there were two options:

A.) Dad tells his son that he can't stand playing 4E anymore because it's crushing his soul and walks away from the game, leaving his son without anyone to play with.

or

B.) Dad tells his son that he can't stand playing 4E anymore because it's crushing his soul and walks away from the game, but Dad buys son hundreds of dollars of books from a new system and says "But I think you'd have a lot of fun with us if you just try this out."

This thread is about a Dad who chose option B. There was some grandstanding in there for dramatic effect, but I don't really think it changed the situation much.

 

[MechaPilot]

My condolences for your loss.

You are a better person than me:
My grandmother spiraled down into Alzheimer's over a decade. When her needs were more than the family could provide, we moved her into a living facility. I was the last of the grandchildren to visit her regularly, but stopped when she no longer recognized me and was frightened by "that strange man". I still feel like I didn't 'do enough' to stay with her and stand by her.

Thank you for your sympathies, and the compliment.

Regarding your situation, we each do what we can for the people we love. Unfortunately, life doesn't give us encounters balanced against our emotional, physical or financial capabilities. If you did everything you could bear to do, then you did enough. Wishing you could have done more is, I think, normal. Even in my situation, I wish there was more I could have done. I wish I could have spotted his decline earlier. I wish I could've been more motivating, and convinced him to keep doing the physical therapy he needed to not become completely bed-ridden.

And believe me, I did consider a living facility for him. However, he once told me he would rather die than go to one of those places. Also, we didn't have the financial wherewithal for him to go to one (they would have taken his pension and social security benefits as payment for his care, most of those places do that) without my becoming homeless. Fortunately, he had a bit of savings, and he always taught me to be frugal. Dad passed well before his savings ran out; from the time I had to leave my job to care for him until he passed was only about 5 months (the longest 5 months of my life, and likely of his as well, but that's a mercy compared to him hanging on for years). Had he outlived his savings however, the only option I came up with that would've obeyed his wishes was for me to shoot him (and then myself, because I'm not going to prison for doing the right thing).

I have chronic depression issues (and I've been intermittently contemplating suicide for the past 25 years, though it's been coming with more increased frequency over the past decade). My home situation at the time certainly didn't help my depression any, so I was ready to leave life behind if it came to that. I'm glad it didn't come to that, if only because I'm glad dad got to pass with someone he loved holding his hand and trying to say soothing things to him, instead of with a loved one pointing a .45 at his chest.

 

[MechaPilot]

So to summarize the situation, there were two options:

A.) Dad tells his son that he can't stand playing 4E anymore because it's crushing his soul and walks away from the game, leaving his son without anyone to play with.

or

B.) Dad tells his son that he can't stand playing 4E anymore because it's crushing his soul and walks away from the game, but Dad buys son hundreds of dollars of books from a new system and says "But I think you'd have a lot of fun with us if you just try this out."

This thread is about a Dad who chose option B. There was some grandstanding in there for dramatic effect, but I don't really think it changed the situation much.

If that's how it happened, without the kid coming home to find all his 4e books gone, I don't think anyone in this thread would've had a problem with it. The OP paints a situation where he never even spoke to his son, just took stuff away and replaced it with an alternative.

 

[Schmoe]

If that's how it happened, without the kid coming home to find all his 4e books gone, I don't think anyone in this thread would've had a problem with it. The OP paints a situation where he never even spoke to his son, just took stuff away and replaced it with an alternative.

I agree, the OP is misleading, because it had actually been an ongoing discussion with people actively leaving the son's game because they were so dissatisfied. Also, the word "took" is misleading. He just moved the 4e books. They are still the son's and he has full access to them.

 

[MechaPilot]

I agree, the OP is misleading, because it had actually been an ongoing discussion with people actively leaving the son's game because they were so dissatisfied. Also, the word "took" is misleading. He just moved the 4e books. They are still the son's and he has full access to them.

Took is not misleading. From the point of view of the son coming home to find his stuff is gone and other stuff is there in its place, and with the op painting a picture of not telling his son where the books are until the shock of them being missing wore off enough for him to ask, took is quite apropos.

 

[Eltab]

... I wish there was more I could have done ...

Big sympathy-filled hug. (Is there an emoticon for that?)

 

[Chuck Ocenasek]

Mechapilot, I feel you. My dad died from the same disease. It has been 6 years and so can still hear his voice ringing in my ears " don't let them take me" when I envoked the power of attorney to get him in a hospital as they took away. I figured the hospital would patch him up, I could get him in a facility that would help better than his 30 year old son with no support, but over the course of the week he got worse and passed on. I blame myself every day. No one I know understands this ( not even my wife...we married 4 years after his passing, he never got to meet her). But I carry on and so do you, every day is a new opportunity. Dad taught me that.

And to think this started out as a thread about a dad's hatred of 4th.