Son's demand for an apology creates distance

DEAR AMY >> Several years ago, my father and his wife visited me for a week.

I spared no expense trying to ensure that they enjoyed themselves, particularly his wife. (She married him after I was grown. My own mother died when

I was five.)

The week was full of shopping, casino time, outdoor activities, and sightseeing.

I thought it went great. After our “guests” departed my wife dropped a bomb on me. Apparently, my father's wife had spent the week trashing both my father and me to my wife. She advised my wife to divorce me and to “take him for everything you can.”

I was LIVID! How DARE she?

After hearing this, I picked up the phone and called my father to demand an explanation and to get an apology.

His wife answered the phone and I do admit that I didn't hold back. (I called her a “rotten b**ch.”)

I then told my father, only to have him lay into me.

I hung up on him, and ended up writing him a long letter where I laid out my position. I demanded an apology; otherwise I never wanted to hear from him again.

I haven't heard from him since.

Also, I guess my wife took his wife's suggestion, because she did end up divorcing me, while my father is still married to his “prize” of a human being. Go figure.

My father is now in hospice care. He refuses to see me or speak to me because of how I spoke to his wife.

I want to see him one last time and to let him know that I love him.

I can't STAND his wife and believe that she is playing a role in manipulating his decision to shut me out. What do I do?

— The “Bad” Son

DEAR SON >> You are blaming everything that has happened on your father's wife. However, you seem to have set subsequent events in motion by reaming her out, using unacceptable (and unforgettable) language. Of course your father defended her! What choice did he have?

(And isn't it possible that your ex-wife invented or inflated what she reported to you?)

After your aggression, you boxed your father in further by demanding an apology and laying out your non-negotiable, without copping to your own unfortunate behavior.

You let this go on for years.

I suggest that you travel to see your father immediately in order to try to make peace with him before it is too late. You should suck it up and apologize to his wife (she likely controls access), apologize to him, and do everything possible to reconcile.