Hi all,
I'm from Germany and 26 years old and I don't really know why I am writing this looong post. I guess there are two major reasons. I think it's going to be good to write it all down, which I never have, and maybe I get some opinions/help. Well, lets get started.
Note: The times are a bit wonky, they don't really add up when I put them on a calendar, but it is close enough.
I was raised with my two older brothers by my mentally ill mother. Nobody knows what she had, she never got any help and in the end drank herself to death, thanks to the strict "don't bother, don't help" policy by her/my family (which also got to me later on). Her behavior was erratic and violent and my father fled in fear and left myself, a 2 years older brother and a 4 (or 5) years older, mentally retarded, brother with her. My early memories are of violent nature, though not necessary physical violence. Insults, forcing to do stuff, getting left alone, empty refrigerator. Mother gone for days and days. Being drunk. A home (house) in complete disarray. Strange men. A garden in which the grass was higher then me. There are also some violent ones, for example my oldest brother being pushed down the stairs after refusing to drink milk or the dog being ferociously beaten. I was basically a street kid. My oldest brother, the mentally retarded one, I never had much to do with but the 2nd oldest one I spent a lot of time with. I have also have nice memories of my mother, sometimes she was balanced and nice. But most of the time it was behaviour like that: For Christmas (I was 3 or 4)
I got a play kitchen by my father, the only present. I hurt myself a little bit on it, because exploring the oven to hard. Reaction by my mother: She threw it onto the street and told me if I touched it I would get beat. She sprayed some stuff on it and told me it was poison, so that I stay away from it. I cried but nobody cared. I also remember a new years eve where she didn't open the door, and I had to stay outside the entire night, scared pantless by the rockets and stuff. My brother and I where thiefs and I have a very vivid memory of us getting caught after we tried to steal some toys. The shopkeeper said "What's the phone number of your mother? I am going to call her." My brother laughed at the shopkeeper and said "We have no phone." then we ran. I have many many memories like that. Another is lying in a pissed in bed for days, because of being afraid of telling mother. When I told her she hit me and said "If I wanted a dry bed I have to make it myself." My brother let me sleep in his bed with him until I wed that too. Sigh.
We also were send to buy alcohol for my mother, as much as we little kids could carry. Once, the bag in which the bottles where burst, and they shattered on the ground. After that we decided to run away, because we knew shed be very angry. The police found us a day later. Sigh, so many bad memories, and much much more. Chains and lock around the refrigerator for days with mother gone and us having no phone. And that was all age 0-5.
I loved my father, but he never showed. The only relative interested in us was his mother, my grandmother. She sometimes took me home with her when mother was to drunk to care. I have little to no memories of these days. Grandmother only liked me, because the one brother was mentally retarded and not fashionable, and the other was to dark. He drew monsters and stuff and with age 6 made a suicide attempt. (Lying under the table, attaching string to heave chair on table, pulling the string so that chair falls on his head.)
With age 5/6 I moved permanently to my grandmother and my grandfather. There was an accident while playing with brother that made my mother furious, she beat me senseless, then drove me to a hospital and told my grandmother to take me if she wants. I didn't see my mother for 7 years after that. That was my 4th move. (To this day I'm deadly scared of moving) For a time things looked up. I missed my brother terribly but it was nice. My grandparents took good care of my, fixing my ill feet (to small shoes for years) playing with me, reading to me, making nice food, lots of kindness. I have fond memories of that time. But then, after a year or so I went to school and at the same time my grandfather went very, very ill (kidney failure with dialiysis) and became mentally ill. School was also difficult, I couldn't relate to the children at all.
Very soon I was the weirdo without parents. At the same time I was very bad in school (only after making my a-levels found I out that I was highly gifted) my grandfather was dying, we did another move to a better house next door and I got bullied by kids and the other side of my family, my aunts side. One day I observed my grandfather hitting my grandmother with his shoe. She cried and told me to go back to bad. Another day my grandfather told my I was the devil and the reason he was ill. He was demented and aggressive by that point, so they took his license away. His illness was ugly beyond belief. One day he spread blood everywhere while dinner, the other he let go of an hot teapot which fall on his foot and inflamed. Then there was something in his belly, which got operated, but the wound never closed. So there was a christmas where he was lying on the couch, with that open, inflamed belly, dying and my grandmother told me to play next to him with my lego so he isn't alone. He yelled at me to play quieter. It was not a good play I had that day. I was in 2nd class when he finally died. It was a relief to me, but being forced to hold the hand of his corpse and say goodbye was not. It was also not a relief to my grandmother, who was difficult at the best of times, but practically became insane after that. My teacher, for some reason, hated me fiercly and took every chance she got to humiliate me, got bullied by her and my classmates and my grandmother. We also became very, very poor (far beneath the poverty line) after my grandfather died and my grandmother was to proud to ask for help and mad of grief and depression. Needless to say, she took it out on me. I took solace in books, read like a madman, books far beyond my age.
My teacher thought I was stupid, but in reality I was highly gifted, which my grandmother suspected so she put me in gymnasium, the school for clever kids after elemantary school ended. That was a blessing, it was away, completely new people, new beginning. I didn't fit it, was a loner, but didn't get bullied a lot any more. I had learning issues though, so it was always a struggle and I became sick of nervousness. My grandmother became a tyrant, a oppressive one, and was afraid to be alone so she didn't give me any room to breath. I was not allowed to do anything at all, it was maddening. When I was thirteen I tried to kill her, that is how much i hated her: I put a string on the stairs, in the hope she tripped over it and breaks her neck. I (luckily) got cold feet though and removed it before harm was done. I didn't have many friends, and the few I had either took advantage of me or didn't put up with my erratic behavior for long. Once a year I saw my dad, who insisted that I was a very, very lucky child for having such a loving grandmother. Little did he know how difficult, ugly, aggressive, dominating she was. Life was hell. I just cant go into detail here, because there was just SO MUCH happening. A few examples have to suffice: When I went to a new years eve party ( i was 11/12 or so) and left her alone she hated me for weeks. "Go to your friends, leave me alone, go. Piss off you ungrateful child, your grandfather was right. Did you have fun? I had not!) The alternative was sitting with her for hours and listening to how much she hated EVERYTHING. She also was racist, and hated gays. Not a single opportunity went unused in which she could tell how she wishes every gay man to die horribly, because they are sick perverted monsters. I am gay. She never knew.
Hell went on for years, and years, and aided by my stories and the optimistic attitude I cultivated through help of my fictional heroes I somehow got through it. My grandmother was insane, even when i was sixteen years old she insisted on clothing me herself. She bathed me till I was 12 or so, not sure. She cut my fingernails until even longer. I was caged. I got some better friends, and I started to put on a fight. One day she slapped me and I told her, that if she did that again I would do, too. I developed my own style, and managed to became a little bit independent. When I was in class 10 my mother died, of alcohol and cancer. I then learned that she sent me letters every month which my grandmother threw away, unopened. I also learned what happened with my older brother: The retarded one was in a special place for people like him, where he was taken care of, but the 2nd oldest one, the one I loved, ran away from home when I was 10 and he was 12. He was not heard of for six years until he got charged for murder in Poland and needed a lawyer. After that he came home to Germany. He travelled around Europe for six years, was a punk, living on the street while I was sitting in the golden cage. I met him for the first time in years after that, and he was nice. I didn't care at all for my mothers death, I felt that I did not know the woman. He stayed with her longer then me and was grief stricken. A few months after that he committed suicide. I cried for weeks and after that was determined to make a stance against the insanity that took his life. (and nearly mine. A few weeks before he hanged himself I stood on a roof, the only reason I didn't jump was that i was a) afraid and b) didn't know if it was deep enough) I became better at everything: Handling my grandmother, handling myself, getting friends, being sociable. I made the first good experiences in my life the timer after my brother died. Got my first good friends, had immense success in english language and theater. Had a dream: become an actor. After I got my a-levels (barely) I had to do a year of social work or military work. I chose social work and went to a place where kids from war and crisis zones around the world (mostly afghanistan and angola) where medically treated. All of this boosted my self esteam. I was loved by workers and kids alike, made even better friends, it was a good time. I was still closeted gay but came out to my closest friends.
My grandmother was difficult: She was angry and envious that I had other people then her. Whenever it came up that I wanted to study or go to acting school she became mad and yelled, insulted, threw things after me. "Then go and leave me to die you monster! Leave me alone like I always knew you would!" Sigh. Then one day i wished she died and when I came home from nightshift (Which I loved so that I didn't have to see her) she house was empty, gloves and needles on the ground. She called herself an ambulance because she had a heart attack. She died after a gruesome operation a few months later, leaving me alone with a big house, debts and no experience at all of how to do anything. The social work time was over, but I was still working at the place, which was an EXTREMELY high stress environment. I broke down, completely, but I couldn't allow myself. I was mad of grief, cause I loved my grandmother as much as I hated her, felt completely alone, and I because of my golden cage I had never had to do anything in a household AT ALL. my grandmother forbade me. "let me do the dishes" I said. "are you a fag? men don't do the dishes. They get a woman who do that for her." I never learnt money, cause I never had. I had only young, naive people as friends who didn't see how dire the situation was and, as I told, I broke down. Didn't manage the work any more, got fired. Got yelled by the rest of my "family" (got I hate them so much) for not taking better care of the house. Debts everywhere. Dishes everywhere. It was a lonely hell. If I didn't swear on my brothers grave to fight, I would not have made it. I took solace in drugs (alcohol and weed) and went from one stressful hell to another. I lost my friends, because they just couldn't relate to me. It was difficult for us before, now impossible. I got a hard job in a steel factory, which I couldn't do for me then 3 weeks. Somehow I survived, how I still don't know, but I never recovered. As always I hang on onto my stories and there was one sentence which I hang onto to. "I need to stay afloat for the summer long." I did and I found the love of my life. We are living together for 5 years now, and he helped me manage my life. The debts are slowly going away, and I took time to figure out myself. The acting dream is dead, I cannot handle stress anymore. (and acting is the art of stress) In the 5 years he helped me up on my feet I was determined to find out what was wrong with me. I got no help at all from the medical professionals. "Do some sport, don't be so lazy." Was the least condescending device I got from them.
I got diagnosed with adhd but I didn't care, I felt much more broken that simply that. Years passed, I did what I could, became alcoholic in the meantime, and after long research I found something with which I identify: PTSD. Could it be? I'm not the me I preserved for a long time, I became hypervigilant, aggressive, don't have a single night without a nightmare. I'm permanently tired, don't leave the house for months and months on end.
Whatever I try to achieve I cannot. I started to study archealoigy and arthistory, but only lasted a month. I'm so lucky to have found my hubbybear, and he knows about the good in me even though I sometimes don't show him for weeks. But my behaviour is taking a toll on him as well, and I don't want to allow the madness to spread any further. So that, in a nutshell, is my story. It was good to write it down, even though I left out 90%. If you came this far, dear unknown, there is something I struggle with: I feel like a egomaniac when I consider to have ptsd. I was not in war, I didn't get raped. That is not true though, is it?
The biggest problem is that nobody I know can relate to me. I have a very empathetic mind, I can relate to everybody. And nobody with me. The more people are around me, the lonlier I feel. So I stay alone and don't feel lonely (mostly.)
Thanks a lot for reading! (looking forward to responses) :)
edit: paragraphs.
edit: in the end my focus left me, so I shortened a lot.
I'm from Germany and 26 years old and I don't really know why I am writing this looong post. I guess there are two major reasons. I think it's going to be good to write it all down, which I never have, and maybe I get some opinions/help. Well, lets get started.
Note: The times are a bit wonky, they don't really add up when I put them on a calendar, but it is close enough.
I was raised with my two older brothers by my mentally ill mother. Nobody knows what she had, she never got any help and in the end drank herself to death, thanks to the strict "don't bother, don't help" policy by her/my family (which also got to me later on). Her behavior was erratic and violent and my father fled in fear and left myself, a 2 years older brother and a 4 (or 5) years older, mentally retarded, brother with her. My early memories are of violent nature, though not necessary physical violence. Insults, forcing to do stuff, getting left alone, empty refrigerator. Mother gone for days and days. Being drunk. A home (house) in complete disarray. Strange men. A garden in which the grass was higher then me. There are also some violent ones, for example my oldest brother being pushed down the stairs after refusing to drink milk or the dog being ferociously beaten. I was basically a street kid. My oldest brother, the mentally retarded one, I never had much to do with but the 2nd oldest one I spent a lot of time with. I have also have nice memories of my mother, sometimes she was balanced and nice. But most of the time it was behaviour like that: For Christmas (I was 3 or 4)
I got a play kitchen by my father, the only present. I hurt myself a little bit on it, because exploring the oven to hard. Reaction by my mother: She threw it onto the street and told me if I touched it I would get beat. She sprayed some stuff on it and told me it was poison, so that I stay away from it. I cried but nobody cared. I also remember a new years eve where she didn't open the door, and I had to stay outside the entire night, scared pantless by the rockets and stuff. My brother and I where thiefs and I have a very vivid memory of us getting caught after we tried to steal some toys. The shopkeeper said "What's the phone number of your mother? I am going to call her." My brother laughed at the shopkeeper and said "We have no phone." then we ran. I have many many memories like that. Another is lying in a pissed in bed for days, because of being afraid of telling mother. When I told her she hit me and said "If I wanted a dry bed I have to make it myself." My brother let me sleep in his bed with him until I wed that too. Sigh.
We also were send to buy alcohol for my mother, as much as we little kids could carry. Once, the bag in which the bottles where burst, and they shattered on the ground. After that we decided to run away, because we knew shed be very angry. The police found us a day later. Sigh, so many bad memories, and much much more. Chains and lock around the refrigerator for days with mother gone and us having no phone. And that was all age 0-5.
I loved my father, but he never showed. The only relative interested in us was his mother, my grandmother. She sometimes took me home with her when mother was to drunk to care. I have little to no memories of these days. Grandmother only liked me, because the one brother was mentally retarded and not fashionable, and the other was to dark. He drew monsters and stuff and with age 6 made a suicide attempt. (Lying under the table, attaching string to heave chair on table, pulling the string so that chair falls on his head.)
With age 5/6 I moved permanently to my grandmother and my grandfather. There was an accident while playing with brother that made my mother furious, she beat me senseless, then drove me to a hospital and told my grandmother to take me if she wants. I didn't see my mother for 7 years after that. That was my 4th move. (To this day I'm deadly scared of moving) For a time things looked up. I missed my brother terribly but it was nice. My grandparents took good care of my, fixing my ill feet (to small shoes for years) playing with me, reading to me, making nice food, lots of kindness. I have fond memories of that time. But then, after a year or so I went to school and at the same time my grandfather went very, very ill (kidney failure with dialiysis) and became mentally ill. School was also difficult, I couldn't relate to the children at all.
Very soon I was the weirdo without parents. At the same time I was very bad in school (only after making my a-levels found I out that I was highly gifted) my grandfather was dying, we did another move to a better house next door and I got bullied by kids and the other side of my family, my aunts side. One day I observed my grandfather hitting my grandmother with his shoe. She cried and told me to go back to bad. Another day my grandfather told my I was the devil and the reason he was ill. He was demented and aggressive by that point, so they took his license away. His illness was ugly beyond belief. One day he spread blood everywhere while dinner, the other he let go of an hot teapot which fall on his foot and inflamed. Then there was something in his belly, which got operated, but the wound never closed. So there was a christmas where he was lying on the couch, with that open, inflamed belly, dying and my grandmother told me to play next to him with my lego so he isn't alone. He yelled at me to play quieter. It was not a good play I had that day. I was in 2nd class when he finally died. It was a relief to me, but being forced to hold the hand of his corpse and say goodbye was not. It was also not a relief to my grandmother, who was difficult at the best of times, but practically became insane after that. My teacher, for some reason, hated me fiercly and took every chance she got to humiliate me, got bullied by her and my classmates and my grandmother. We also became very, very poor (far beneath the poverty line) after my grandfather died and my grandmother was to proud to ask for help and mad of grief and depression. Needless to say, she took it out on me. I took solace in books, read like a madman, books far beyond my age.
My teacher thought I was stupid, but in reality I was highly gifted, which my grandmother suspected so she put me in gymnasium, the school for clever kids after elemantary school ended. That was a blessing, it was away, completely new people, new beginning. I didn't fit it, was a loner, but didn't get bullied a lot any more. I had learning issues though, so it was always a struggle and I became sick of nervousness. My grandmother became a tyrant, a oppressive one, and was afraid to be alone so she didn't give me any room to breath. I was not allowed to do anything at all, it was maddening. When I was thirteen I tried to kill her, that is how much i hated her: I put a string on the stairs, in the hope she tripped over it and breaks her neck. I (luckily) got cold feet though and removed it before harm was done. I didn't have many friends, and the few I had either took advantage of me or didn't put up with my erratic behavior for long. Once a year I saw my dad, who insisted that I was a very, very lucky child for having such a loving grandmother. Little did he know how difficult, ugly, aggressive, dominating she was. Life was hell. I just cant go into detail here, because there was just SO MUCH happening. A few examples have to suffice: When I went to a new years eve party ( i was 11/12 or so) and left her alone she hated me for weeks. "Go to your friends, leave me alone, go. Piss off you ungrateful child, your grandfather was right. Did you have fun? I had not!) The alternative was sitting with her for hours and listening to how much she hated EVERYTHING. She also was racist, and hated gays. Not a single opportunity went unused in which she could tell how she wishes every gay man to die horribly, because they are sick perverted monsters. I am gay. She never knew.
Hell went on for years, and years, and aided by my stories and the optimistic attitude I cultivated through help of my fictional heroes I somehow got through it. My grandmother was insane, even when i was sixteen years old she insisted on clothing me herself. She bathed me till I was 12 or so, not sure. She cut my fingernails until even longer. I was caged. I got some better friends, and I started to put on a fight. One day she slapped me and I told her, that if she did that again I would do, too. I developed my own style, and managed to became a little bit independent. When I was in class 10 my mother died, of alcohol and cancer. I then learned that she sent me letters every month which my grandmother threw away, unopened. I also learned what happened with my older brother: The retarded one was in a special place for people like him, where he was taken care of, but the 2nd oldest one, the one I loved, ran away from home when I was 10 and he was 12. He was not heard of for six years until he got charged for murder in Poland and needed a lawyer. After that he came home to Germany. He travelled around Europe for six years, was a punk, living on the street while I was sitting in the golden cage. I met him for the first time in years after that, and he was nice. I didn't care at all for my mothers death, I felt that I did not know the woman. He stayed with her longer then me and was grief stricken. A few months after that he committed suicide. I cried for weeks and after that was determined to make a stance against the insanity that took his life. (and nearly mine. A few weeks before he hanged himself I stood on a roof, the only reason I didn't jump was that i was a) afraid and b) didn't know if it was deep enough) I became better at everything: Handling my grandmother, handling myself, getting friends, being sociable. I made the first good experiences in my life the timer after my brother died. Got my first good friends, had immense success in english language and theater. Had a dream: become an actor. After I got my a-levels (barely) I had to do a year of social work or military work. I chose social work and went to a place where kids from war and crisis zones around the world (mostly afghanistan and angola) where medically treated. All of this boosted my self esteam. I was loved by workers and kids alike, made even better friends, it was a good time. I was still closeted gay but came out to my closest friends.
My grandmother was difficult: She was angry and envious that I had other people then her. Whenever it came up that I wanted to study or go to acting school she became mad and yelled, insulted, threw things after me. "Then go and leave me to die you monster! Leave me alone like I always knew you would!" Sigh. Then one day i wished she died and when I came home from nightshift (Which I loved so that I didn't have to see her) she house was empty, gloves and needles on the ground. She called herself an ambulance because she had a heart attack. She died after a gruesome operation a few months later, leaving me alone with a big house, debts and no experience at all of how to do anything. The social work time was over, but I was still working at the place, which was an EXTREMELY high stress environment. I broke down, completely, but I couldn't allow myself. I was mad of grief, cause I loved my grandmother as much as I hated her, felt completely alone, and I because of my golden cage I had never had to do anything in a household AT ALL. my grandmother forbade me. "let me do the dishes" I said. "are you a fag? men don't do the dishes. They get a woman who do that for her." I never learnt money, cause I never had. I had only young, naive people as friends who didn't see how dire the situation was and, as I told, I broke down. Didn't manage the work any more, got fired. Got yelled by the rest of my "family" (got I hate them so much) for not taking better care of the house. Debts everywhere. Dishes everywhere. It was a lonely hell. If I didn't swear on my brothers grave to fight, I would not have made it. I took solace in drugs (alcohol and weed) and went from one stressful hell to another. I lost my friends, because they just couldn't relate to me. It was difficult for us before, now impossible. I got a hard job in a steel factory, which I couldn't do for me then 3 weeks. Somehow I survived, how I still don't know, but I never recovered. As always I hang on onto my stories and there was one sentence which I hang onto to. "I need to stay afloat for the summer long." I did and I found the love of my life. We are living together for 5 years now, and he helped me manage my life. The debts are slowly going away, and I took time to figure out myself. The acting dream is dead, I cannot handle stress anymore. (and acting is the art of stress) In the 5 years he helped me up on my feet I was determined to find out what was wrong with me. I got no help at all from the medical professionals. "Do some sport, don't be so lazy." Was the least condescending device I got from them.
I got diagnosed with adhd but I didn't care, I felt much more broken that simply that. Years passed, I did what I could, became alcoholic in the meantime, and after long research I found something with which I identify: PTSD. Could it be? I'm not the me I preserved for a long time, I became hypervigilant, aggressive, don't have a single night without a nightmare. I'm permanently tired, don't leave the house for months and months on end.
Whatever I try to achieve I cannot. I started to study archealoigy and arthistory, but only lasted a month. I'm so lucky to have found my hubbybear, and he knows about the good in me even though I sometimes don't show him for weeks. But my behaviour is taking a toll on him as well, and I don't want to allow the madness to spread any further. So that, in a nutshell, is my story. It was good to write it down, even though I left out 90%. If you came this far, dear unknown, there is something I struggle with: I feel like a egomaniac when I consider to have ptsd. I was not in war, I didn't get raped. That is not true though, is it?
The biggest problem is that nobody I know can relate to me. I have a very empathetic mind, I can relate to everybody. And nobody with me. The more people are around me, the lonlier I feel. So I stay alone and don't feel lonely (mostly.)
Thanks a lot for reading! (looking forward to responses) :)
edit: paragraphs.
edit: in the end my focus left me, so I shortened a lot.
