Childhood Not sure what to do with these

[ladee]

A very deep sigh of relief to hear that you are leaving today... and you are protecting your little self.... so very proud and relieved to hear that there is some fight left in you.... and you don't owe her an explanation, even if you could find the words, nothing is going to satisfy her and you already know that.... so get out of there, and hopefully while you are gone, you can figure out a way to never go back.... I would live on the street before I let her take one more brain cell and bash it against the wall... hope you have a relaxing day away from the crazy house..... just wish you could find a way to never have to return.... thinking of you !!!

 

[Klo]

A very deep sigh of relief to hear that you are leaving today... and you are protecting your little self....

Thank you ladee and the rest of you. It has been a big help to be able to vent here and get some feedback. I don't really have any actual plans yet but know that I need a day of space. My brother and I aren't emotionally close at all, but he isn't evil, either. Just a golden child "flying monkey" as some describe it, but it's not his fault, either, he was raised and conditioned in certain ways. Chances are that he thinks he's going to get me to talk and then go squeal everything to our mother. In reality he's going to buy me a pack of smokes and then we're going to watch movies / play video games. I can be a little selfish, too, sometimes. So. Smokes for me and no dirty for the family.

 

[DharmaGirl]

I'm glad you are getting out today too. Some calm time away from the abuser does wonders.

 

[Klo]

Well today might be emotional D-day. I've been almost completely avoiding my mother and her husband since they returned from their vacation, including getting out of the house and 'sleeping' while I'm stuck here during day hours. But today my mother is working from home. This is actually because she has dental surgery scheduled for today. It's actually a pretty invasive surgery for a pretty gnarly root canal, and my mother does not handle dental pain very well at all, which is completely understandable, since it really does suck and is invasive (literally in one's face). She will be genuinely stressed, in pain and doped up heavily on (legal) drugs after the surgery. Which traditionally means that an emotional explosion is incoming. So I really need to grey rock super hard today. If I let anything she might say get to me and blow up, I will be blowing up at a drugged middle aged woman who is in a lot of pain, and I just don't want to do that, no matter how much of a monster she is in some ways. Avoid and grey rock. Alarms start going off in 20 minutes. Here we go.

 

[Kintsugi]

We're here for you.

You really need to GTFO of there, though. I hate to see you coping with these people's bullshit.

 

[Klo]

Well so far she just slips in and out of liking me and hating me. Like she forgets that she is supposed to be hating me right now, suddenly remembers and then gives me the silent treatment and cold shoulder, then forgets and starts trying to make chitchat again, then remembers she hates me and becomes angry. I know this might be kind of warped, but it honestly reminds me of when I worked in memory care as a CNA. She is a lot like some of the patients I cared for during that time. She threw an 8ft fake tree out of the house and into the driveway this morning, and is currently in the process of wrangling it back into the house like she is drunk. The funniest part is that she actually refused the nitrous oxide gas and isn't high. I'm the crazy one, though.

 

[Anarchy]

There are people who will genuinely and lovingly look after pets for people who find themselves in difficult situations, and will do it for weeks, months or even years as necessary. They are typically animal activists and are committed, they're not bull shitters. My ex does this,. I will see if she has contacts for networks of people who do it in North America.

Please make some careful enquiries with shelters. Use the security features on your browser, for example use an anonymous browser window which won't record your browsing history. Can you get a pre paid or a top up simcard for your phone?

Your intelligence and good nature both come across strongly in your posts.

It is horrible to think of you trapped in that abusive environment, with a mother who is actively keeping you trapped and being abusive towards you.

With a little help to get you out of there, and to get accommodation and either a job or a college place, I have absolutely no doubt that you will be well able to make a living.

There are members here who will know how to contact refuges and get yourself out of that environment and get help adjusting,. Starting a thread specifically asking for that help in the title should get you some sound info to work from.

The DVD stash that you found is a two edged sword.
First, it must really hurt to see the sick sadism that was directed at the helpless innocent and dependent infant you

Second, you have validation, with those DVDs no one can try to gas light and invalidate you by trying to say that you had a wonderful childhood, loving mother - and any difficulty you have now must be genetic or a chemical imbalance...
You have proof that you were abused from the start.

There are people here who's parents have destroyed pictures of their abusers, leaving them to wonder whether they just imagined it
And that is added to by the gaslighting "you always had the best...". " Nothing of that sort ever happened, how can you be so ungrateful" etc
_________________________
Family situations can be crazy making. That was established beyond doubt in the 1940s and 1950s, with research into why those people who were released from asylums, did so much better if they went to live alone, in a hostel, or with a sibling
Compared to those who went to live with their parents, especially mothers!

That was found to be due to a style of communication termed "high expressed emotion" or "high E E".

Parents are a more powerful political lobby than their hurt ("insane") offspring, and so medical people tend to be shy of apportioning causes, and invoking chemical or physical causes gets the medical people out of that situation. Despite such biases and cowardice, high E E, has good empirical support.

Also from the 1950s was work by Bateson and his team, looking at communication within families, and double bind situations (whatever you did you were going to be hurt, and you'd get hurt even more for recognising the injustice of that)
There's a good retrospective of the paper by gibney in 2006 "the double bind, still crazy making after fifty years"
Duckduck go search engine will find you a .pdf of that piece, and of the original paper ( Bateson et al 1956, toward a theory of schizophrenia).

Bateson's research team went on to found several of the original schools of family Therapy.

I'll try to get some suggestions for safe care for your dog, if you need to get her looked after for a while.

Please make some enquiries for getting yourself to a safe environment!

@

 

[Klo]

I have a list of possible resources going, saved them in my personal email so they don't get lost.

To be completely honest I just feel very stuck right now. I think it's almost entirely psychological. It's like a numb depression in a way.

I'm pretty sure my mother has launched another smear campaign behind my back again, because she has done that so many times in the past, but also because suddenly every single one of the handful of outside connections I had is either not responding to me or has abruptly cancelled plans we made with no explanation. I mean all in one swoop in a matter of a few days. That is usually the sign. While meanwhile my mother is acting in the fake-creepy-nice persona she gets when she is up to something, just from life's experiences.

I honestly just feel kind of frozen and stuck. I think I might be scared but am too much of a "freeze" type to be able to sense it very well, as opposed to a "fight" or "flight" prone type.

I am still mechanically going through the process of just collecting information, though. Might as well.

 

[ladee]

Good to see you are collecting resources... you may have, out of fear of having an idea or feeling of your own, reverted back to the tortured child... but you are not a child anymore.... and who knows, you don't have to wait until your absolute breaking point to see what some of these resources are about...... do it now when you aren't in Freeze mode...
you have been her 'victim' for a long time... doesn't mean you have to stay that way... to step your toes in the water , so to speak, of course this great big world is a scary place.... but you can take baby steps. Whether you do anything with it or not.... it is practice of not being a hostage... to help you feel 'unstuck'... you are very smart.. very wise.... that is apparent in your writing... so search out a little more of some of these resources..... ya just never know when one of them has your way out... and safe.

 

[Klo]

All of the resources so far seem to be geared towards specific situations and demographics that don't fit my own. There are social services programs all over, to my honest surprise, but they specialize in specific things.. domestic physical violence, racism victims, cancer, veterans, etc. I was told by someone else a long while back in life, that as a last ditch resort, one can go to the emergency room of a hospital using the angle of feeling suicidal, and that there will sometimes be a special nurse there who addresses you to tell you about social services. I'm seriously contemplating this idea but don't know how insane it really is to do it. I have just enough money on an Uber account that I could afford a trip to the hospital, get dropped off and walk right in. But at that point I'm not even sure what I should say. I am also planning to call my doctor's office on Monday and ask about the social services information they had offered me during the tetanus shot, but that I had declined because my doctor breaks the law and tells my mother everything. Maybe something will come of that, or else why would they offer, maybe. The biggest thing I think I need help with is getting a job. My employment is a mess, with multiple firings and big gaps where I had no work. I don't have any good references after about 2013. And also the jobs I qualify for, are the part time minimum wage jobs, like grocery store or fast food, which all make you apply online with no chance to do an in-person impression. I even went to the local big grocery store a few weeks ago with my resume and tried to express in-person interest in a job, but I was told by staff that they don't in-person anything, they wouldn't take my resume, that it is all online-only. So I'm hoping I can find some sort of program that will help place me somewhere without me having to prove that something is wrong with me, because I don't have any records or anything. Even when I was nearly catatonic for several months, I was just left upstairs on the floor for the most part. My hair became so matted that I had to chop it all off at the time. I was never taken to the hospital or anything.

 

[Klo]

This is one thing that I found for my own state (I don't mind revealing that info):

Link Removed

Some of the things that it includes:

"Some disability examples are amputation, back disability, brain injury, cancer, cerebral palsy, diabetes, epilepsy, hearing loss, heart disease, kidney disease, learning disability, mental illness, mental retardation, multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, paraplegia, quadriplegia, and substance abuse."

So I'm not really sure if growing up with psycho-malignant parents qualifies as a disability, especially without any paperwork or anything. But apparently if I can get my hands on some meth, then I would qualify.

"A person with a disability may be eligible for MRS services if the disability causes problems in preparing for, finding, or keeping a job."

I guess this would be determined with an interview? The idea makes me extremely anxious. I've been gaslighted my entire life between being told I am insane and being told I am completely fine. Even in the few cases when I have seen a psychiatrist, for example, it was always terrifying. Like I felt like at any moment they were going to start launching scathing remarks at me about being a faker or something, and that once I was put on medication, then it would become that I had better not stop taking the medication because I'm insane. I think I could force myself through such an interview but the idea about makes me hurl.

"The individual must also require vocational rehabilitation services in order to work."

I am honestly not even sure what this means exactly.

The money I have on the Uber account could get me to the office in my area, or to a hospital. Both of which feels weird, but I need to do something. It just feels like.. if I can look up this information, and get myself to their office, will that prove I don't need help?

 

[ladee]

No, that proves you do need help and are willing to do what it takes to get help.... and the vocation rehab probably means training for jobs... which you could absolutely use.... and you can call an ambulance to take you to the ER... and work that out later.... or the cops.... that's a free ride !!!
And I get it that you don't even have confidence that you need or deserve any kind of help.... but you are aware you are stuck, and that takes insight. You are aware in order to save your life, you have to get out of there... and that takes courage... courage doesn't mean you aren't afraid, it means you do it anyway....I do things every single day that takes courage... this is a big one... try your best to not over think it... you at least have a plan....and if you go to the Er, you don't have to say you are suicidal... but that you need help.... before it turns into that.....

Very very proud of you for looking up things, getting some resources together, narrowing it down.... the only insane people in your house is your mom and step dad.... you don't need proof for that.... you do have the right to receive help....

Sending lots of healing courage your way... if nothing else, you are going to be diagnosised with C PTSD.... and that will get you some help too.... you are very smart and very wise... you have intense survival skills.... you are going to get out of that house.... in one piece, and get to have a life... it will be difficult but not impossible... unlike the situation you are in now....

You are so much braver than you think you are... you are willing to save your life.... that takes more than words can say...
Please keep us updated... and don't let a few setbacks throw you from your purpose...... there is a way out... I don't know if your situation can be considered domestic abuse or not.... but you can do this.... you can !!!!