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TLDR: you weren’t mean, you were ABUSIVE… holy shit, no wonder everyone left you. You are a disgusting excuse for a human and don’t deserve to be called a parent. I hope that your children are able to get away from you and cut you out of their lives for good…

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100% seek a safe counselor, one specializedin family trauma if possible. This is heart wrenching to hear and see, but it sounds like you are ready for a real change inside. I hope you can get through your own childhood trauma and get on to being a new person that can have the capacity to love and be loved. You took an insane first step here. Don't lose the momentum up this motherfucker of a mountain you will face.

I don't think words are gonna fix that, bud.

If this post is real, you dont deserve a releationship with your children. You deserve however to be in jail.

Your words and apologies, even if given will do not enougth. Your daughter will suffer for years or her whole life from trauma.

If it helps, there's nothing you can say to your daughter to heal all that. To her, your words just won't have any value, no matter what they are.

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So you fucked up just today by not admitting this? Reread your post a few times and accept that she is better off without you. You were straight up abusing her and still use words such as "was mean to my daughter and she hates me"? Nah, you don't deserve forgivness or any kind of relationship with her.

The best thing you can do for your daughter is respect her boundaries. If she doesn’t want to talk she deserves that.

If you really do want to make a real change I’d go to a therapist, unwrap your issues, work to understand the full impact your behaviour has had on your children and find a healthy way to move forward. This is for you and the rest of your children (the ones in your care still sound like they would also benefit from therapy and working together with them MIGHT save your current relationships)

I would recommend looking for a way to do some good in this world, such as volunteering. This may do you the world of good mentally, and make you feel less lonely. One day the daughter who doesn’t want to speak to you and the others who have left might recognise the effort you’ve put in and be ready to reconnect.

Congratulations on coming to your senses about this stuff. It's hard to do. What you're experiencing has a name -it's called moral injury- and while the nature of this particular kind of trauma makes it hard for many people to sympathize with (which is understandable), it's trauma nonetheless.

Like other kinds of trauma, the next step is to seek help. I'm not talking about family counseling here: this is just for you. This is partly to help deal with the trauma, and partly to deal with the issues that led to it in the first place. You've done wrong -you understand that now- but that doesn't have to be forever. You understand that you need to change, and that's an important step: one that many people never take. But it's still only the first step. Good luck on the rest.

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“This is a safe place” lol you thought…

Also the fact that you come to reddit looking for pity, instead of actually trying to talk to your family. Some people may think I'm being too harsh, but I stand by everything I said.

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Until you are no longer on this side of heaven, there is always a chance for reparations. Seek counseling for yourself first and foremost. You are heading in the right direction now, but were going the wrong way for so long, that it will take time, probably quite a bit of it, to mend these relationships. It will be hard, and heartbreaking, but understand the worth of your efforts. We all make mistakes. Own yours and break the chain, or the pain you feel now will become much worse as you watch your children do the same to theirs. Love is a choice that you must make everyday. Prayers and best of luck to you