I think I can finally breathe...

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

As I have gotten older, I have battled with a lot… From a child hood that was far from ideal, to an out of control journey through my teens… And only now am I starting to see the effects of these poor circumstances. I need to share…

When I was 2 my parents were divorced and my mom was angry and bitter, and she got custody… Needless to say I spent the time from when I was 2 to when I was 10 watching her beat my sister relentlessly, and tell me the divorce was all my fault. As my sister got older, she started to fight back, the last fight I remember seeing was my sister was crying trying to lock my mom out of the bathroom, and she was unsuccessful. I couldn’t handle all the yelling and screaming and I went outside and sat on a swing, hoping that just maybe I could get away… Not too long after my older sister, covered in tears, and obviously sore came out to me and told me she was finally leaving, she would be moving in with my dad. She was 14, which is the legal age to choose who you want to live with in the case of a divorce. She moved out… It was my mother and I and her boyfriend from when I was 10 to when I turned 14. At first it was only verbal abuse, I was “never good enough”, I was a “bitch”, and she “should have killed me when she had the chance”… I put up with this every day, no matter what I did or how hard I tried to make her happy, I would hear something new every day… As I got older I developed fairly quickly, which made my step father take notice… Things got really uncomfortable. He would make inappropriate jokes about my body and touched me in ways that weren’t quite wrong, but were never comfortable. I couldn’t escape it. Then my mom started getting pushy, and she would hit me, push me into things, all the while telling me what a waste of life I was, and how I never deserved anything I got… When I was 12 I finally told somebody about my home life, it was my guidance counselor and things began to happen so quickly… SRS had a hearing with my parents where they denied everything, a social worker came to my house and prior to his visit… my mom pulled me aside and told me I better tell him I was lying just because I wanted to live with my dad… So I did, crying, sobbing, hoping the man would know I was lying, and that I couldn’t be there any longer… No such luck. I was stuck there for another 2 years while my moms abuse only grew more violent.

Finally! I’m 14 and I can move out and I move in with my dad. Unfortunately my once older and wonderful sister is now rolling with a bad crowd and is heavily addicted to drugs, my dad and stepmom struggle with her, and somehow got pulled in too. They never did anything wrong, they kept the house nice, and went to work, and took care of us, but still… It wasn’t right… then things started to go downhill, my dad had a nervous break down, and stopped working, and my stepmom couldnt work because she is disabled, and so things started to become less ideal, fortunately for me this was in my senior year, but I couldn’t get a break, I have to pay for college myself now, and every now and then I get calls asking if they can borrow money… I don’t have the money to give them, and even if I did… I couldn’t afford it.

I’m older these days. Unfortunately everything I experienced in my childhood is definitely affecting me now… I am currently in a relationship and I worry all the time that I am not good enough, or that hes not happy, or that I’m being awful to him, no matter how much he assures me that none of this is true. I am very insecure, and I worry that all these girls that are in his life are going to replace me, even though this clearly isn’t true, as he chose to be with me. I am afraid to ever say how I feel about things, in case it causes a fight, because I don’t want to ruin it, and I feel overwhelmingly bad every time I think about being mad. I feel all of these things stem from my childhood… If my mother didn’t love me, who will? I think about this a lot, and I worry that I have not grown enough, or that I can’t get past this, but I’m trying so hard! I really am…

If the relationship I am in were to end, I would be okay… I am not needing to be in it, I just want to be. Hes a wonderful guy and he makes me happy more often than not… I just worry that these things will never go away and I will never be able to have a completely successful relationship. I have not shared any of this with him… Primarily because my mom is trying to be a part of my life, and I am trying to forgive her, and part of that is trying to include her in my life. I have been actively working on this since senior year in high school… There have been a few set backs, as she likes to throw things in my face that I share with her, but I’m realizing more and more that those things aren’t my problem, they are hers…

I think that now I have shared this with someone, and that I have seen it all written out, that I can finally breathe. I am hoping that getting all this off my chest will reassure me, will help me move on, and will make the rest of this life that I have, easier to handle. I hope that I can gain the confidence I should have, and be more assertive when it comes to the things that I want.

I hope this is my moment of clarity.

2

I hope so too. Thank you for writing this out and sharing, it is very much a moment of perspective for those of us reading as well.

3

You can love you. That’s the first step.

My husband grew up in an abusive household - his father physically and emotionally abused his family, and his mother didn’t protect them. He says he loves his father but he sure doesn’t like him. (I neither love nor like my FIL.) And recently, he’s finally allowed himself to admit his resentment towards his mother for not protecting him and his siblings.

You don’t have to love or like your family, just remember that. You didn’t get to choose them, and obviously just because someone has a kid doesn’t mean they’re any good at being a parent. Take care of yourself first, and only let your family into your life as much as you can deal with.

4

Does your school have a counseling center? See if you can see a counselor for free or reduced rates. Just getting the chance to talk about the things that have happened to you can help put them behind you, and help you realize you are worthy of love. You may need some time alone - as in not in a serious romantic relationship - to sort things out and come to terms with your past. it is difficult to have a healthy relationship if you don’t think you are worthy of being loved.

Focus on the fact that what was done to you was done TO you - not by you. It was not caused by you. No child is perfect, but no child deserves the treatment you received from your mother. She colored your childhood with bad memories - now is the time to realize you can take control of your life and determine the outcome yourself. Distance yourself from your parents if necessary to make yourself KNOW they are no longer in control of you. YOU are in control of you.

Breathe deep. You have a wonderful life ahead of you - now it’s up to you to determine what it will be.

You will be in my thoughts. If you want/need to talk, my e-mail is in my profile.

5

You can acknowledge that the first part sucked and resolve to make a better life for yourself and those around you.

Sometimes it’s hard because you don’t have a good built-in “blueprint” to follow, but that than be used two ways: one, you are free to make your own “blueprint” however you see fit and two, when you see or feel something that you recognise from before, that will alert you that you could be heading the wrong way.

I’m not religious, but the best advice I ever got was to “forgive, forgive, forgive”. Some people are stupid, mean, horribly selfish, and make bad or even terrible decisions, etc. You can let that go. It may take some effort, but it is certainly worth it.

I still remember the day I suddenly realized I could make a better life for myself. Oddly, it involved some tattered (threadbare and scorched) curtains at my childhood home.

Also, it helps me to avoid people that suck.

6

Wow. I can’t find any words that aren’t flat and hackneyed to express my sympathy for you. First off, though, good for you for getting through an awful and difficult time. You are a survivor, and that is a very good and strong thing to be.

Secondly, I agree with the advice above – get to the student counseling center and see how they can help you. A trained professional can help you to see the patterns of your life and how they were shaped by your past experiences, which can help you to change those patterns in the future.

And finally, don’t hold yourself back from your fellow. He sounds like a great guy, and he deserves to be in a relationship with the complete you. If he can’t handle it, he’s not the one for you. If he can, and can make you in your entirety feel loved and safe and seen and accepted … that’s pretty much the ultimate reason to be with someone at all, right?

Be good to yourself. You deserve it.

7

I agree that you should get counseling as soon as you can afford it.

I grew up in similar but not quite as physically abusive household. We were more often ignored and verbally abused, well, two of us were. I thought I was fine and had accepted and moved past my childhood but once I had my own children things began coming to mind again and things I didn’t much think of before became new memories to deal with.

I still cry when I think of the happy, carefree childhood I never had. I don’t blame my mother because she didn’t have a mother role model for herself, and I don’t blame my grandmother because she had it even worse. It breaks my heart all the time how much we all missed out on over three generations all because of one mother’s early death. It makes me more sad the older I get.

8

Thank you all so very much… I really don’t know what to say, or which direction I will take…
But I hope you all know that this has helped me, and I am very touched by these things.