DEAR ABBY: I am 86 years old. My husband died six months ago, after 60 wonderful years of marriage.
As I have been mourning and reliving our life together, my 50-year-old daughter -- my only child -- has informed me that when she was a teenager her father molested her often and raped her one week before her marriage "so she wouldn't be inexperienced," he said. She told me the molestation went on for two years before the rape. (She married at 18.)
Why did she have to tell me now? She says it is because she could no longer stand me talking about how "wonderful" he was. Now my heart is broken, and all I want to do is die.
Why would someone want to ruin your memories after all this time? Wouldn't it have been better to have left me with my illusion than ruin what life I have left? -- HEARTBROKEN IN DENVER
DEAR HEARTBROKEN: Better for whom? Your daughter has already tried to answer your question. After all those years of keeping quiet, what broke the camel's back was listening to you idealize your husband. What I don't understand is why your daughter kept silent so long, when she should have told you what was happening when she was 16 -- or told the police what happened when she was 18.
Please don't think I'm heartless, but you and your daughter will both be better off if you try to see your husband as less of a saint and more of a fallible human being, and forgive each other.