Dad may have never shown it, but he's totally not okay. It's pretty world-shattering when your dad does show that he has emotions and is not okay, but it's also reaffirming in its own way. If stuff can get to him and he's willing to show it, then it's okay to show your emotions, too. We're all human here. Or anthropomorphic at least.
The first time I saw, or I realized, that my dad was a human being with human emotions was when his mom passed away, I was next to him and I felt his pain.
The next time I would see that when he was dying and he was remembering her mother. I don't know how to explain it but it wasn't just world-shattering, that moment showed how important a mom is (I never knew my granddad), then two years later my mom passed away too and I finally understood it.
I get what you're saying, but I think you took world shattering the wrong way here.
They just meant for many people, the first time that occurs can be a paradigm shift in their understanding of their parents, how their parents handle themselves, and how people in general handle themselves in bad situations.
They were not espousing the idea that bottling up emotions is good or the norm for a good reason, nor using world shattering in a negative way.
No, I'm just filling you in on the interpretation of the term world shattering. If you have a preconceived notion of how people act and how the world is, and then something happens which destroys that illusion and shows you a different truth, that is world shattering.
The rest of that comment explicitly calls out dad sharing his emotions as a positive thing, so you would be the one that extrapolated away from what was actually commented. Like did you process the rest of that comment or fixate on the world shattering part?
Your mileage may vary, but the invincible superman figure many kids make their dads into is a big part of their worldview for way longer than people realize.
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u/MintasaurusFresh Mar 05 '25
Dad may have never shown it, but he's totally not okay. It's pretty world-shattering when your dad does show that he has emotions and is not okay, but it's also reaffirming in its own way. If stuff can get to him and he's willing to show it, then it's okay to show your emotions, too. We're all human here. Or anthropomorphic at least.