My dad wanted nothing to do with us, unless he felt we could do him proud and he didn't think that very often. He didn't engage us much except to call us names or yell at us at various times or, when in a good mood, call for a few minutes to talk nonstop about himself.
My mom was an all consuming borderline who was in your face all the time, nagging, yelling, calling you names, telling you why you were no good, etc. Those 3AM "waking-you-up-to-yell-about-something-from-three-weeks-ago" reminded me a lot of the movie Mommy Dearest and the wire hanger scene. It was just like that minus the hangers and hitting. But you got awakened in shock at an ungodly hour and you couldn't even think about what she was screaming about for a few minutes until you woke up all the way. And it was always something that you thought had been finished. I'm the only one who got those, but my sister shared a room with me so they woke her up too and she remembers them well. We called them, appropriately "night raids" from Mommy Dearest.
I preferred my father.
