Today, my wife had a gynecologist appointment, so it was my job to take care of little Isaac. While I was showering him, I started thinking about the people who ever showered me as a kid. Not just that, so many things I do for my son, and I can’t think of a single one that was ever done with my father.

I mean, yeah, the same old lines: “They all love you,” “He’s still your dad,” “You owe your life to him,” “You need to be forever grateful.” All those voices from trivial human conventions. But despite all of that, the hatred just keeps growing.

My son is a kid who’s hard to love sometimes. I mean, his level of destruction, his temper, his inability to stay still for even a second, it’s exhausting. But I still love him more than anything, and I can’t seem to change that.

A few days ago, at night, my wife suggested we get a maid and let Isaac stay with his grandma so we could relax and focus on our careers. That broke me into pieces. It led to a big fight, and I still have a migraine from that day. That’s how much you can love your kid.

I didn’t think it was possible to love another human being that much, until the moment I held him for the first time. The love only grows. And with it, so does the hatred toward my father.

I was just comparing my childhood, trying to make sure my son never feels what I felt. It’s like a guideline for parenting. But it also makes the hatred grow. Every time I break a sweat to make ends meet for his necessities, the hatred grows.

I wasn’t like my son. I was smart, imaginative, a quiet kid who liked to sit down and zone out. Just opening a big cupboard full of my grandma’s china could make me fall asleep. I never broke a glass. But even then, he abandoned me.

That hatred isn’t something I want to feel, but I don’t have a choice. It’s a weight I carry, my stone to lift, if I were Sisyphus. The abandonment, and my mother’s resentment because I look like my father, formed a personality that likes to repeat sad scenes in movies. A complete masochist, literally. I know it’s psychopathic, but I used to make tiny cuts on my fingers on purpose and dip them in ethyl alcohol just to feel the pain.

I don’t need another psychological diagnosis—I’ve learned it all. My hatred toward myself makes me love others too much. And in the name of that love, the terror I’ve committed to protect and provide for them is unthinkable. Whenever something bad happens to me, I think of all those terrors I’ve done and accept that I deserve it. Then I face another day on the verge of suicide.

That’s life, I guess. It’s a bitch. And to keep on living, you have to keep lifting the stone over and over again. The struggle itself toward the height is enough to fill a man’s heart, eh?