You read that right, my dad served 2 15 year prison sentences back to back for the same crimes. To say the least, he took advantage of innocent people. His victims were mainly if not all, vulnerable women/disabled women/identy theft. My dad was a con artist, good looking, and charismatic.

He was released from prison almost 2 years ago, and surprisingly at the age of 68 years old is finally turning his life around and rebuilding his life over outside of the prison walls which is no small achievement. Last year, he was diagnosed with liver cancer and it is now spreading to his lungs and other areas of his body and it is terminal. The doctors say anywhere from 6 months to 18 months. At least, this is what he is telling me.....

For more of a background on me. I am 35F. Which means my father went to prison when I was 5. He was abusive to my mother and their relationship fell apart shortly after they had my younger brother who is now 32. He left my mother to raise us on her our own. My mother was an alcoholic, suffered from untreated bipolar, and other mental illnesses, and had a very unhealthy, unsafe, and unstable upbringing and she unfortunately died when I was 13 years old.

I was adopted by my mothers only sister, and went to live with someone who was mentally, physically, and financially stable, and it was the greatest blessing in disguise, but life was NOT easy. I was left to undo all of the mess that I just went through from birth to teenage years and I made alot of mistakes and faced some real tough lessons all which I am grateful for now in hindsight. I've been on a healing journey since my early 20s and have found a great deal of support, resources, and purpose. I forgive my parents and I do so mainly for myself, and moving on form such a short chapter in my life and creating new memories and happy, loving, experiences is the best thing I can do. I would also be lying if I didn't acknowledge there is and will probably always be some residual trauma and sadness around the whole situation, and I hold space for it all.

Over the last 2 years, my dad has reached out to me trying to rebuild a relationship. He means well and is genuinely trying to make up for lost time. At first I was open to it, but pretty quickly he started ignoring my boundaries and that left me feeling very uncomfortable and upset and like I had no choice but cut him off or to keep him at a distance. For some reason, probably because he is institutionalized, he literally does not understand the concept of boundaries or even just asking me if it's okay if he does XYZ. For example, he moved to the small town that I live and work in, without even considering asking how i would feel about it. He literally moved a few streets over from where i currently live. As soon as that happened, every attempt to be apart of my life has gone to shit because i cannot get over him invading my space like this.

So now, we live and work in the same small town and I want nothing to do with him. He try's every which way to gain access to my life, showing up at my apartment, showing up at my job, calling me over and over - most recently he got ahold of my work cellphone and started calling that number too. The most recent call I took from him, he was on the other end balling his eyes out telling me he is dying and that he just needs to see me. I agree to meet him in a public place the following week and we had a decent conversation but still it wasn't a green light for him to be in my life which he takes any interaction as that and will overwhelm me until the point I have to cut him off again.

Well, after that last meeting, I told him I woukd reach out to him and he agreed to give me space. About a week went by and I guess he grew impatient and called my job and work cellphone. I told him that it was not okay that he keeps doing this and his response was " I'm dying I hope you don't regret treating me this way" and I just don't know where to go from here.

I truly don't want to regret not trying to have a relationship with him before he dies (he has invited me to one of his cancer treatments because I asked him how do I know it's true what he's saying) ... idk i guess I'm feeling gaslight, triggered about losing a parent (again) and not wanting to regret my choices.

Thank you for taking the time to read all of this if you made it this far, but seriously AITAH?!?!?