It’s something my mum had said that made me realise.

My dad is an LVM through and through. Married for 29 years, he’s never bought her an anniversary gift or a birthday present, let alone wishing her. He’s calculative, and when he was earning more than her, refused to pay for his children’s school expenses. I hated asking him for school pocket money or for anything because I felt like I had to beg him for money. My mum was the one who provided for us and I am eternally grateful to her. Whenever they fight, my dad will say my mum has a “problem” and when he’s losing the argument, he would always tell her to shut up.

With the COVID-19 situation, the whole family has been forced interact with one another a lot more than before. We sit for meals together now as compared to before. As such there are some days where my mum don’t feel like cooking - understandable as she is also working full time. My sisters and I would take turns buying lunch or dinner for the family. My dad, however, would always complain, and in the event he does buy food, he would only buy 2 or 3 packets (there are 5 of us) and expects us “kids” to share amongst ourselves. We’re 3 grown adults and he expects us to share a packet of rice...

He would complain he earns lesser than us and therefore he shouldn’t be paying for food. If my mum doesn’t prepare breakfast before work, he would throw tantrums, and complains that he is tired to do chores after work (all he had to do is the ironing).

Today my mum was on leave for a medical appointment and she requested for my dad to buy dinner for her and my youngest sister. He came home with a tantrum, complaining about the lack of cooked food and proceeded to nag at my mum about the cats peeing on the cushion (there was no pee). My mum snapped and yelled at him, calling him out on his behaviour and my dad laughed. He just laughed. My mum said he doesn’t like seeing her happy and I realised that she was right. The fact that he took pleasure at her rage, all because of her simple request for a simple bought meal, made me see how miserable it must be to be married to an LVM.

It made me realise that I would never want that, even if it means staying single forever, an idea my dad said was “crazy”.