When I was a kid, I was abused by my father. It wasn’t severe, nor was it anything physical, but it was abuse nonetheless. I wasn’t allowed to emote without being yelled at, I wasn’t allowed to have an opinion, I wasn’t allowed to be correct if it meant he was wrong. If I wasn’t the rough, tough, fearless little boy he wanted, I was a pussy. I wasn’t good enough. He severely emotionally neglected me.
My mom was my saviour at that time. She would love bomb me with everything she had, trying to make me feel better, but ultimately, never doing anything about my dad.
They split when I was 11 years old, only a bit over half a year after I was raped in the school bathroom by a boy my age.
After my parents split, my mom went from my saviour…to my abuser. With my dad’s absence, she craved having him around. She began attempting to groom me into a non-romantic replacement for him. She would constantly try to aggravate me, always calling me selfish over the littlest things. Every other day, I was selfish for so much as disagreeing with a statement. She could say the sky was purple, and if I were to so much as let a “no” come out my mouth, I was some selfish, horrible, spoiled brat. At only 11cyears old, not even a year after an extremely traumatizing event, I was parentified, as I was forced to be the emotionally stable and mature one in the house. I was forced into a role to where I had to keep my mom’s mood at bay, soothe her grieving over her ended relationship, and essentially take care of her, as she was disabled. All while dealing with this same woman telling me I’m selfish for even thinking about anything she didn’t like.
This went on for 3 years. Only 2 years in, however, I nearly attempted suicide. I was 13, and my mom had left for the store, leaving me at home. It was a weekend, and I was too depressed to get up. We had gotten into an argument the night before. For the past several months, I had contemplated suicide. And in that moment, I impulsively got up, and walked to the kitchen, where I pulled out our sharpest knife. I was going to slit my throat. As I held the knife up, images of the very few friends I had made began to flash into my head. Images of friends that I loved, and made me feel cared for. I dropped the knife, went back to bed, and sobbed. By the time my mom came back an hour later, I had cried myself to sleep.
Months later, after encouragement from a close friend, I told her I needed help. I practically begged her. She said she would try her best. Something about that struck me as off, but I knew that, being a minor, my mom was my only real chance for help. My school had proven unreliable, my dad as well, and my siblings were all either on my mom’s side, avoiding me because of my mom, or on drugs at the time.
A year had passed, and with no help from my mom, and more abuse from her, I snapped. I began yelling, screaming, and cussing at her whenever she would put me down and call me selfish. She began holding this over my head, telling me I was abusing her, and that she couldn’t have done anything wrong, as she had me fed, clothed, and housed, and that the CPS people my dad had called months earlier had said as much.
Two more years went by with no mental help, and I had another break. Throughout this two year period, I would still react to her abuse, and still get labeled an abuser. During this break, however, I broke down and begged her to tell me why she didn’t get me any mental help. I begged her to tell me why she was neglecting my needs, as I was very clearly not okay. When I was 15, just a year early, I had informed her about my suicidal thoughts, and the time I nearly committed, yet she still didn’t get me help.
She told me the reason was that the only local resource was Hamilton Center, and she didn’t trust them. After that breakdown, I convinced her to set up an appointment there for me. This was right at the start of the new school year after the pandemic cut the last one short. I began going to therapy, and was eventually given a referral to a psychiatrist. I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder, Anxiety, and Borderline Personality Disorder. I also spoke to my psychiatrist about ADHD, something my therapist was 100% positive I had, but was told it was only my depression, an opinion I disregarded considering previous experiences with this psychiatrists involving medication and side effects.
When I had turned 17, I had another break. My mom and I were in an argument, and she told me that the real reason she didn’t get me any mental help was that she didn’t believe me. She didn’t believe I was suffering, because she had, “Given me everything I needed.” During that argument, I had my first major meltdown. I was gripping my hair at the roots, I couldn’t move from the spot I stood in, I was sobbing, I couldn’t speak. However, my mom kept going on and on. She kept on telling me I was being dramatic. That I was a dramatic kid. That she had no reason to believe me, even about my almost attempted suicide. I couldn’t take it anymore. I finally got the first words out in 10 minutes, and I had screamed at her to shut up. I couldn’t say anything else but. She kept talking, saying how disrespectful I was being. I broke down harder, I screamed the phrase repeatedly, sobbing, unable to look up from the floor.
After going back and forth for another 10 minutes, I finally looked up and screamed loud enough to hurt my throat “PLEASE BE QUIET!” I continued to beg her, full-blown screaming the word “please” over and over again.
She finally got quiet, and let me calm down. I couldn’t move my body, so I couldn’t walk away. I was blocking her way, so she couldn’t walk away. If people talk to me when I get like that, I physically can’t calm down. I need there to be no voices around me, or else I’ll just keep spiraling.
After standing there for nearly half an hour, my grip on my hair loosened, and I saw the several strands of hair that I had pulled out stuck to my hands. I looked at her for a few minutes, and once I could move my legs, I went to my room and sobbed.
A few months later, at the beginning of Summer the next year, just before my graduation ceremony (I graduated highschool a year and a half early because I was given the chance to take my finals of the classes I needed to graduate, and have them count as a full credit), a friend, someone I had grown close enough to that I called her my Twin, offered to let me move in with her and her parent’s. Her boyfriend was going off the basic training for the military, and she wanted company her age that she knew, so she asked her parents, and invited me to live with them.
This continued until September of that year, when I was kicked out by her stepmom due to me being transgender.
The only place I had left to go was my mom’s place. So, I moved back. I turned 18 there, and the cycle of reactive abuse continued. She would gaslight me over what I had done before, and I’d defend myself, sometimes lashing out by yelling, and she would hold that over my head, claiming I was the abuser, and that she was a victim of elder abuse.
Now, I’m 19, and it’s still going. I’m still trapped in this cycle. I’m attempting to claw my way out, but it’s difficult. I’m disabled and unable to work, but I haven’t worked long enough to qualify for SSDI. I’ve applied for SSI, and I’m awaiting results as diagnoses keep piling on me, including things like Chronic Pancreatitis, Gout, and more.
I believe I can get out, and while it will take work, I can do it. I’ve actually messaged the hotline here for resources available in my area.
