Some Fathers Golf, Mine Painted Nudes

This is the story of Alice as told by Elizabeth. Our “Opening Our Hearts” stories are based on people’s real-life experiences. By sharing these experiences publicly, we hope to help our readers feel less alone in their grief and, ultimately, to aid them in their healing process. In this post, Alice tells the story of her father, Philip, and how his sexual preoccupation impacted her life, yet taught her to accept loving someone contrary to their faults.  

Everything I know and learned about a healthy relationship came from the model my mom and dad showed me. Growing up we were the house everyone wanted to hang out and have fun at. Often times my friends would be shocked when they came over for the first time and witnessed how touchy-feely my parents were with each other; there were times they would practically be making out on the couch. But it was normal for me to see this level of comfort and love. I mean, my parents really, really loved each other and it was strikingly obvious to anyone who met them. I even remember a few times when I’d caught them dashing from the one bathroom shower we had downstairs up to their bedroom. Soon there was an unspoken rule where anytime you’d bring someone over you’d open the front door and yell, “I’m bringing so-and-so in the house!” which was code for Don’t run through the house with just a towel on please!

This was the house I grew up in and it was great. It was healthy. A lot of my friends weren’t exposed to what healthy sexuality was like because it was treated like something taboo; parents sleeping in separate beds and rarely communicating or even holding hands. So for me, growing up in a house where love was expressed freely and consistently taught me not to be ashamed by intimacy. It’s something I’ve always felt grateful for.

My dad retired in his early 50s and things began to shift.

My parents were both creatives whose love story began when they met in an art class in high school. Neither of them has ever been the type to conform or live a “normal” lifestyle. My dad was also a professional, but I do remember him painting a little bit while working a lot; a small collection of paintings he’d work on when he had the time. It wasn’t until much, much later, when he retired, that he started painting nudes.

My dad retired in his early 50s and things began to shift. It was unnoticeable at first, and some of the things that happened I wouldn’t find out about until much later, but eventually I learned my father had an affair at this time — something completely separate and unrelated from the time and energy he spent on painting these really big nudes; canvases of winding curves in the shape of the various model’s bodies he’d hire. It eventually became a bit of an issue for me; the way he hired all these models to come in and pose for him nude. It bothered me as much as it did because I knew it bothered my mother as well.

This affair he partook in was not an affair in the sense that he wanted to leave my mom — in fact it was clear he still loved my mom very much. I don’t think he kept it going on very long or met with this woman many times, but for me that didn’t matter. The point is he could not live with it and eventually put the burden on my mom, and she just fell apart. It destroyed her. It was a pivotal moment in my mom’s life because she was so devoted to him, and he was devoted to her for so long before this. It was a huge shock to the foundation they built.

When my mom first found out she came to me. Even though she had really good and strong girlfriends, she came to me. And that was extremely hard on me. A difficult thing to hold. At this time, I was living on the East Coast and came home to visit my parents, no awareness of the upheaval that was about to unfold. My husband and I would always drive, and it was a long drive, and I just remember crying the whole way back after learning this truth. Like all of those hours, all I did was cry. My mom was seeing a therapist which was good for her, but it was very clear to me how broken she was. And on top of that, here my dad was painting all these nudes and having all these women coming in. It was hard for me to wrap my head around all of this. It was hard for me to understand how my dad could do this to my mom.

He told my mom she wasn’t allowed in this studio of his.

When my parents retired and consolidated, they moved to a place in Arizona where my dad had remodeled the garage making it two stories high and used the top part of it as his art studio where he’d work on the nudes. He told my mom she wasn’t allowed in this studio of his, and when the models came by my mom would make it a point to be busy with something else so that she wouldn’t have to be around to think about it. This is what told me how uncomfortable she was with it.

I remember thinking, if this were my husband I would barge into that space whenever I felt like it, because who did he think he was telling me where I couldn’t go in my own house? Because if you really are just painting a nude and we’re both artists, why should it matter? But for some reason I did not have these words for my mom. I did not encourage my mom to burst through those doors and make herself known. Maybe it was my way of protecting my mom. Maybe it was my way of protecting the love I knew they shared, the love that taught me how to love.

One time I had showed up at their house unannounced because I needed to have my cat taken care of while my husband and I went on a road trip. In hindsight, I wish I never just showed up unannounced like that. I should have called ahead. But so, I pulled up and there was his studio door open, and I got out of the car and grabbed my cat from the backseat, and all the sudden when I turned around there was my dad at my car, which was odd because my parents never came out to meet me by my car— I always just walked into the house. I knew he had come from his studio, and I noticed my mom’s car was gone. All he had on was a pair of pants, no shirt, and I just knew. I was suddenly overcome with a sudden wave of chaos and questions. Why did I show up like this? Why didn’t I call ahead? I wanted to disappear. To vanish into thin air. I wished I was anywhere but here.

A part of me wanted to tell her, “Divorce that guy! You deserve better!” But I also knew living a lonely life would not be a happy life for her.

At one point my mom wanted to leave my dad for having the affair and it was actually me who talked her out of it. I knew in my heart of hearts that her chances of finding love and companionship would be nearly impossible and I did not want her to be alone. It wouldn’t have been good for her, for her not to have touch and all the things she was so used to having would have been extra devastating for her, and so I believed it was better for her if she stayed with my dad. I don’t regret this. At the time I was telling her to stay with him I was a little surprised at myself for it, but overall I truly knew I said it because it was what was best for her, and I always only ever wanted what was best for her. Of course, a part of me wanted to tell her, “Divorce that guy! You deserve better!” But I also knew my mom deserved to be happy, and living a lonely life would not be a happy life for her.

I also still loved my father a whole lot despite his flaws and mistakes. It was this complex mix of “Damn you” and “I love you.”

Sometimes being human is confusing like this. And being old enough to know the messy parts of your parents’ relationship was challenging to sit with. It sometimes made me wish to be small again — too young to be told such intrusive truths.

When I started going through everything in his studio, I just knew I was going to uncover something I didn’t want to see.

Sometime before COVID my mom suffered a heart attack and we lost her. It became very clear to me then that I needed to help my dad.

When I started going through everything in his studio, I just knew I was going to uncover something I didn’t want to see. But somebody had to do it, and I didn’t want my siblings to find it or the nieces and nephews to have to see it, so I just went through everything myself. Sure enough, I found a packet of photos. There were actually a lot of photos, but the particular packet I opened was of a woman — clearly one of his nude models, and she had this chain around her neck with a leather thing hanging down. It wasn’t necessarily that shocking because by now I fully understood what had been going on, but when I opened this envelope, I told myself I would look at every one of these photos no matter how disturbing and uncomfortable they were to me and then throw them away and that would be it. My father was not in any of these photos with her and none of these photos ever became a painting. Realizing these photos weren’t used for painting was a hard pill to swallow. I sat in his studio for a little while trying to process the mountains of things I did not know about my father. Because even though I knew a lot, I was beginning to understand there would be so much more to learn, and none of it would be easy or comforting.

My dad did not know I was going through everything and probably didn’t even remember these photos existed. By now he had started showing signs of dementia, though he was not completely gone yet — just far enough for him to not remember or recognize certain things.

“I’m having an affair with a married woman, and she wants to come over to the house right now.”

Not long after this my father started taking a clay class and called me one day from class.

“I have a problem,” he said over the phone. “I’m having an affair with a married woman, and she wants to come over to the house right now.”

Even though my mother was already gone, had been gone for a while, I felt the familiar pang of discomfort like a shockwave through my body. I was currently at his home unsure what to do, jaw to the floor. It was COVID so there were a million reasons I should have said no, but instead what I said was, “Okay. I’ll just go to Barnes & Noble for a bit I guess.”

So, I left the house to give this strange woman and my father space. Not even an hour passed when he called me and told me I could come back again.

The next day after I had some time to process it and think it over, I approached him and said, “Never again. You aren’t ever doing this again. It’s COVID.”

He listened to me and agreed with me, but I also understood I couldn’t tell him what to do with his life. It wasn’t up to me. It was such a complex situation to be in; to feel responsible for him yet not in control at the same time.

The day after the married woman situation my father whistled all afternoon. I hadn’t seen him so light and happy in such a long time. This just made everything even more difficult because it was hard to see the good in something that also felt so wrong, but it also felt nice to see my dad in such a great mood for once.

He began going on porn sites … putting all these charges on a credit card.

As my dad became more and more lonely, he began going online — going on porn sites. We went through this whole thing where I had to talk with him about how he was using his credit card — a conversation no daughter wants to have with her father. He was putting all these charges on a credit card, and we’d have to call and get it shut down and then we’d get another credit card and the cycle continued until I was finally like — you know what? No more credit card.

“That’s it. You’re done,” I finally told him one day.

I sat down with my sister and the caregivers we had coming in to help care for my father, and they said they weren’t sure he even fully understood what he was actually doing. We had a lot of discussions like this— something I guess we would never know for sure.

“Boy these women, the way they message me and the things they say is less than classy,” my dad said to me one time. And that’s when I realized that maybe he doesn’t realize he’s on an actual porn site and he thinks he’s speaking to real women. Maybe his dementia is at this point where reality is getting harder and harder to grasp. We really couldn’t put our finger on it for some time, but this gave me a pretty big indication of where his head might have been at.

I would fantasize about going into his bedroom, climbing up on his bed and kicking him off.

I had these moments where I would fantasize about going into his bedroom, climbing up on his bed and kicking him off.

I was doing everything for him: getting his slippers, getting him water, hearing him cough in the middle of the night and waking him up to drink something, warming up his bed. It was an endless list of servitudes.

I never complained about these things because I loved him. But it was just a very difficult place for me to be.

After being with my mother for 70 years and suddenly losing her, it was no wonder he became as lonely and hungry for companionship as he did.

One day out of nowhere he asked me, “Can I have you look someone up on the internet for me?”

“Who?” I replied.

“Her name is Sydney Houser,” he said.

“And who is she?” I had no idea where this was going or why.

“She’s a woman who lives in Sarasota, Florida.”

“How do you know her?”

“I had a client down there and we were meeting at a restaurant and she happened to be there because she had a store — did art and printmaking — and she had a bunch of cats and one of her cats was at the restaurant eating and she came over to our table,” he said.

And then I suddenly remembered this client and my mind was blown because it was so long ago — I must have been a teenager, still in high school, and somehow my dad was going this far back in his memories to reach for some sort of connection.

I looked her up but unfortunately she had died. She was about 12 years younger than my dad. I realized he’d met her that day, remembered her name and all these years went by and he never forgot her. As if she was his backup, someone he could reach out to when he was lonely enough like he was now. She never married and it was clear to me that he held onto this potential throughout the years, just in case.

Even after I’d told him she was gone I noticed he kept her name written down on a sticky note next to his computer because he’d still forget. Every now and then he would ask me once again to look her up for him.

I knew right then and there what I was going to do, so I brought it up to him.

In the course of my adult life, he’d brought up a few times, not knowing I knew about the affair — and it’s probably the biggest thing we ever disagreed on — that women don’t understand affairs from a man’s perspective. They don’t understand that it’s just sex to men. That men could love a woman and have sex with another and it didn’t mean anything. I never really argued with him until I finally hit a boiling point. It just bothered me so much and I brought it up.

“I don’t understand,” I’d said. And at this point, he still didn’t know that I knew about his affairs. “Why are men that way? Why do men treat women that way and hurt the woman they love?” I made sure I looked him right in the eyes and continued, “Because women are people too. Women are human. Women have emotions and it’s really hurtful and really hard for them when they get treated this way. And why is it just okay for men to do that?”

He thought about it for a minute and said, “Well, men don’t think about it. They don’t think. And society allows them to do that. Society allows them to not think about it, and that makes it so they don’t ever have to.”

 I thought wow, because it was an answer I wasn’t expecting. And then I knew right then and there what I was going to do, so I brought it up to him. Because my mom was gone, I finally felt capable of telling him that she had come to me about the affair he had all those years ago.

“I have no idea how many you’ve had, and I don’t really care. I just know it tore her to pieces and I was the one who had to deal with it. And she was the one who had to deal with it. And you weren’t able to live with it anymore, so you put the burden on her and that wasn’t fair because she was really kind and devoted and supportive to you throughout your entire relationship.” As the words fell out of my mouth a weight lifted off my shoulders. I was finally ready to give the burden back to him. I was sick of carrying it myself.

He said nothing back. We sat in heavy silence for a long time afterward. And I just knew he was feeling the full weight of the burden now, and he deserved to hold it. He needed to know the impact he had on my mother, on me, on our family.

My gut rightfully told me he would never say anything about this for the rest of his life. I will never know his thoughts or how it made him feel. But I know that he knew, and right now that’s enough for me; to know it’s something he carried to the end of his life.