well i think your behavior was innappropiate. You are not responsible for your fathers behaviors and you cant make yourself be, however you do need to be responsible for your own behavior. I can think of a better way to have handled the situation you faced.

Here is a piece of mail that isnt urs but it concerns you. I would have emailed my mother and asked permission to open the mail. If that permission is denied, that ends your responsibility and completes your concern as best you could. If the permission is granted then the situation only becomes one of offering the information in the letter to your father(by whatever means).

this is a boundry issue, and if i am not mistaken, you just confessed to a federal crime. we cant change the past but you really shouldnt open mail that doesnt have your name on it unless you have direct consent of the person its addressed to. I hope this helps.

I must disagree with the above post and I say you were completely right in opening the mail and the least thing your Dad could do would be to thank you for watching his back for him.

My family has a family Post Office box and we all well know the difference between a personal letter that we would never open up unless directly told permission and a personal letter has never been mistakenly opened.

A business letter - especially one from a legal agency like the Court is some thing that we do open if the other person is out of town or inaccessable in any way.

The need to over ride the boundary makes it the right thing to do.

If the Court wanted to send it ONLY to the one person then it does that effectively with a police escort.

And I do disagree that it would be a criminal act because you are a direct family member and it would never go before any Court as tampering the US mail - no, not in a case like that.

Both the Court and your family need to say thank you for taking care of the business mail.

I say that if either of your parents gets angry at you for doing that then they would have to be ingrates and foolish.

We try to do unto others as we want done unto our self, and I say you did it correctly.

No matter what the consequences to your mother that you fear your father's behavior is doing,DO NOT interfere and get in the middle. Nothing good will come from it for you unfortunately.

I'm with maroon on this one. "You are not responsible for your father's behaviors and you can't make yourself be." He's a grown man that INSISTS on defying the social laws,let HIM pay for his irresponsible and poor choices. If it was a child,I could understand interference,but that's not the case. He will only continue his behaviors. It's up to your mom to set boundaries for herself and know when enough is enough of his crap! You should be in the foreground focusing more on your life,not theirs. I know it's hard not to get in the middle of things being the adult child and living with them,but you have to learn to set limits on prying into "their" life.

Sorry if any of this sounds harsh,but I do think you over stepped things by opening the mail. As hard as it is not to try to help your mom,and keep your dad on track, you need to step back from it all. Best situation would be to have your own place away from them.

Hugs,

Thanks for all the feedback. Sometimes we learn from our mistakes, and get help to see the bigger picture, and get some compassion and understanding.

Do not beat yourself up over this. You are doing the best you can with what you know right now. You are working through the co-dependency issues by going to al-anon and learning more about co-dependency. Was what you did wrong or just a symptom of your co-dependency. I would say it is just a symptom of your co-dependency. The feeling you are feeling that you interpret as bad is really just your inner self telling you ... hey ... "You love your Dad. You love your Mom. You want to fix it. But you cannot fix it. So let's think of a different way to handle it next time." Believe me, working through issues it is hard to discern what your feelings actually are. In this case, just know that your inner self ... your inner voice is just trying to help you learn what is appropriate and what is not.

A possible solution would be to ask your mom and dad if they would like for you to open any important legal looking envelopes in their absence. If they say no do not then you can feel good about not worrying about it. If they say yes please do, then you can open these things as a favor to them because they are out of town. This is just a suggestion if you are looking for ways to handle it next time. Otherwise, just know that you should not feel BAD ... just feel confident that you are learning and starting to put into practice what you need to do to take care of yourself and just move forward and keep learning and using the tools you get in al-anon and in your co-dependency reading to just continue to take care of yourself better and better.

For me codependency has been significantly about avoiding my own consequences and helping others do the same. and the ensuing annoyance and resentment and weird relationship rules......it's like, what is actually helpful? in the long run.
thinking of you!

It's normal to feel bad since it wasn't your mail that you opened but it is understanding that you wanted to be helpful. Try not to feel bad you did a good job, who knows what would have happened if no one had found out about him driving on a suspended license...I think that next time you shouldn't open up your father's mail but you can't fix the past only learn from your mistakes and move on into the future.

You crossed someone elses boundaries that is why you are feeling so bad about it, we have feelings so we don't repeat those behaviors. You were in the wrong, but I think you learned from it. Your mom and dad have there own lives, you have no grounds for prying, unless they want you too.

booky its illegal to open someones mail, geez.You definately have very different views from us law abiding people.I wish you would take a closer look to what you write, some of these people are looking for help.

I did hear back from mom who says what I did was trying to help and that she didn't know he had a suspended license. I said I would ask before I ever did that again.

Thanks so much for the responses. My counselor reminded me I am a "fixer and helper" type of person and I couldn't agree more - we get into these roles and this is where we find our self worth whether or not it is working for us unless we are willing to do some work and look at our part in things.

I'm feeling better about this - it clues me in to some work I have to do with boundaries and letting myself be responsible for MYSELF.

It's interesting how this is continuing. Dad asked mom to ask me to make an appointment for the dept of motor vehicles and go for him and give them the proof that he paid his ticket. She mentions he let his mail stack up for a month, and who's red tape is this??

I reply that there are wage disputes and strike at the dept and I don't want to go, and my experience with trying to get someone on the phone there is like a 20 minute wait, and I don't even know if they'd accept me - it may have to be him. I said I may look into it. Anyway!

Mom gave me permission to open any mail that I feel is important.

What matters is how we feel about something.

Thanks for all your input.

There is nothing wrong with helping your parents, and nothing wrong with taking care of the business concerns, and healthy families do pul together.

Codependency is when you help serve the addiction of others, or you try to control the feelings of others, or the twisted results of abuse.

I believe your parents are very fortunate and blessed to have such a caring and considerate adult child.

I have to disagree with Booky on this one. You would be facing all of your dad's consequences...the DMV, the unopened mail, the searching for proof of a paid ticket. This is a small thing. I think he probably could handle it without so many "helpers". I am saying this b/c my parents divorced after 35 yrs, aand codependency and fixing was just such a huge part of that. My dad could barely write a check, when he finally opened his own business, he ran it into the ground. My mother had always been terrified of him having any control of finances. So he never had to be responsible. He never really grew up, and he was defended so much -it felt like we were living in an alternate reality.
This is a little thing. They will not throw him in jail, although the fines may go up.
Saying it all in love!
me

I agree with Clarify 100% on this(sorry Booky).

It sounds like dad doesn't want to have to deal with the consequences of what he caused. Why should you or your mom have to deal with these issues yourselves? I agree that if your mom said you could open the mail,then great,but THEN having to run around doing all the work? Ridiculous. Does your dad do this for you two on an on going basis too?

All I see is that two great women are enabling a man to do childish and possibly illegal things without him having to face the negativity HE caused.

I'm sad for the women in his life he doesn't seem to cherish and respect half as much.

Hugs,

Choam;
I do not object to people having a different opinion then mine.

I respect the opinions of others, and some times I am wrong.
====

Back to the point.

There are many families that go into a business and then Dad goes out doing the labor while mom does all of the paperwork and kids will do the jobs that fit their age and their competance.

So some fact that Dad needs Mom and parents need children and adult children help parents - none of that has anything to do with abuse or about codependency or about parents needing to grow up, or adult child being mistreated - no.

Making healthy boundaries does not mean refusing to help mom and dad.

She did a noble deed. She saw an important letter and rightly opened it, and found an urgent problem and she went out and fixed the issue, while Dad and Mom were away on vacation. Excellant.

I just wish that I had a 37 year old daughter that cared so well about Booky.

And she lives with her parents, so I say you did well done indeed.