My (25F) stepdad (45M) is unraveling while my mom (43F) divorces him and I’m furious.

My(25F) parents are getting divorced (finally). My stepdad (45M) has always been emotionally abusive, controlling, cruel, and lazy. He didn’t even hide it half the time. He’d punch holes in walls after fights with my mom (43F), complain about me whenever I didn’t “listen” to him while he was supposed to be “babysitting” me, and act like taking care of his own family was some huge burden.

The night before their wedding (yes, I was there), my mom came into my room late at night, crying, and asked me if I really wanted her to marry him. I told her yes, not because I was happy about it, but because she seemed happy. I thought it would keep her safe. I was a kid who just wanted to protect her, because no one else ever had. She had a broken relationship with her mom, her dad had already passed, and her brothers were not the greatest. It always felt like it was just me standing between her and whatever hurt her.

And for years, that meant standing between her and him. I never respected him, not one single day. We spent half my childhood screaming at each other because I refused to bow to his authority. He wasn’t just playing the victim, he’d swing between helplessness and cruelty. When my mom finally stopped letting him walk all over her, he couldn’t handle it. That’s when everything really started to unravel.

Now that they’re divorcing, he’s spiraling. He’s told her to “prepare for war,” tries to control her through fear and guilt, and even manipulates my younger siblings (8M/10F). He literally convinced them there was an imminent bomb threat from China, played an emergency siren video and everything, just to terrify them so my mom would come home. My mom has mounting proof of how dangerous and unstable he’s become. I’ve even told her I’ll testify if it comes to that.

And now he has the nerve to tell her that I hate him because of her. HAH! I never respected him because I saw through him. We spent half my childhood screaming at each other because I refused to just submit to his power, and now he’s trying to rewrite history to make himself the victim.

I don’t understand why he’s fighting so hard to control someone he claims to hate. Just let her go, bro. Move on. But narcissists never do, do they? Because it’s never about love, it’s about control.

I’m furious and exhausted. I’m so sick of watching him twist reality and hurt the people I love. How do you let go when you know the damage they’re doing and can’t stop it? How do you carry the anger without letting it consume you?