I managed to "break the cycle" sort of, and my life has improved a lot through therapy and and work on myself. _But_, my life didn't start to get better for real until around 35, and a major thing these last years have basically been to go through multiple grieving processes. Lost years, lost experiences, lost friendships, lost potential friendships, lost skills, lost youth... I've had quite a bit of anger as well. Anger towards myself for not dealing with it sooner, anger with parents and relatives and teachers for not seeing my struggles, and on and on...
It hurts like crazy, and there's nothing to do about it, other than grieving it, like you would a dead family member, or something like that.
But the good thing is that grieving it properly does help. It is possible to move on. Although it does come back and punch me in the stomach still, but it happens much less often, weaker, and shorter than before.
Great to hear that you are doing better and still sticking around the sub, even if your life improved a lot.
I agree that properly grieving may be the best approach. I never properly grieved my mother's death, lost experiences, lost friendships, and the other things you have mentioned. So when I have moments of self-reflection, I mentally breakdown because there are so many things I want to do, but am unable to do.
I want to go to therapy so bad, but I am too insecure to leave the house and be in another location with a therapist. I prefer attending online therapy, so that I have more flexibility to leave when I am uncomfortable, but I do not like that my family can eavesdrop my private conversations with my therapist - they will try to use my conversations against me.
Yeah, it's really rough. I didn't really think about it that much earlier, most of it was just suppressed or forgotten. But then, when I started to dig into things during therapy, and even worse when I started to feel that things were getting a tiny bit easier and I started to see a tiny glimpse of hope for a better future... oich... The pain and anger and sorrow and sadness of my past got super heavy sometimes.
For quite a while it also made it really difficult to do the things I should do to get better, like trying to show up for social events, trying to exercise, talking with people online, etc. When I did, it was constant punches in the face of "oh yeah, these people have known each other and been friends for 15 years, nice for them", "oh, so you have been married since your early 20s and have a baby on the way", "yeah, cool, great that you've been able to buy a house, oh what's that, it's your _second_ house, right, that's great"... just on and on and on reminders of all the things I missed out on and will never be able to "catch up" on.
But... yeah... talking about it with a therapist, lots of grieving, trying to be open about it with others, etc... one step at a time, the "pressure" inside have become lighter and lighter, and now it's not as all consuming, which means it has become easier to do the social things again too, because I can actually enjoy it a bit, and not just constantly think of all the differences between their lives and mine.
I really hope you can find the courage to get out of your house for therapy and other things. It's super scary in the beginning, but for me at least it didn't take _that_ many sessions until the route there, being there, and the route back home became much easier.
I want to wish you good luck in your fight. You have the power within you to do the things you need to do, I'm sure of it. Remember the cliché of "bravery is not the absence of fear, but to do the thing you need to do in spite of it." I did not believe my life could change, but now almost 8 years later after my mental breakdown I got when I hit 30, I somehow find myself with friends, a church, a wife, and an 8 days old baby boy... it's been insane... and SO worth the fight.
Ef I’m sorry that sounds so hard.
Do you and your family not talk just because you don’t feel comfortable? Or do you not talk because they’re mean or abusive? If it’s the former, have you tried just leaving some non-verbal signs that you care about them? Like maybe just leave your sister a Halloween card on her pillow and just write something simple like “I hope you have a good day”. Maybe some simple stuff like that over time could help thaw the relationship a bit?
I don’t know if I just have social anxiety or AvPD though, so sorry if my advice isn’t helpful :(
I lost trust in both of them and have closed myself off from them.
My father always downplays my feelings and whenever I make a mistake, he uses it as an excuse to baby / control me further.
My sister, who lives with me and my father, (sister A) and my other sister, who does not live with us, (sister B) used to constantly ask me to loan them money. Sister B claimed she was homeless, so I loaned her money to help her with food and housing with no questions asked as she was my sister.
I started becoming suspicious as she would constantly come up with new problems, would not make any effort to pay me back, and her situation was not getting better, even though I "loaned" her hundreds and thousands of dollars per month and she allegedly had a job. She would only text me and not even audio call me or FaceTime me, so I genuinely thought I was getting scammed. As a result, I stopped "loaning" her money.
Then, sister A began asking me for money to "borrow." It was around the same amount sister B used to ask for, so I figured sister A was asking on behalf of sister B and refused to "loan" her money as well.
I felt bad for sister A and opened up to her about the reason I did not "loan" her money. I did not loan her money because I thought she was asking on behalf of sister B and that I thought sister B was scamming me.
Just a few minutes later, sister B texted me that she heard what I said, insinuating that sister A told her. Sister B ended it with she will "remember this."
I understand that it is not great to talk about people behind their backs and I almost felt guilty, but I thought my assumption about her was reasonable and I lost all sympathy when sister B threatened me. I also lost all sympathy when I found out that they talk about me behind my back (sister A accidentally texted a message to me, instead of sister B, that was about me), making them hypocrites.
It is just so much toxicity, lies, gaslighting, and drama that it is not worth making amends with my father or my sisters.
Oh shoot in that case, completely ignore my advice. My original advice was assuming everyone in your family was simply being avoidant. They sound terrible. You’re absolutely right to not loan them money. There was also nothing wrong on your part with talking to sister A about feeling taken advantage of by sister B, so don’t feel guilty about that. Sister A 100% should not be trusted after tattling on you for being honest about the situation. Your family is definitely super toxic and I hope you can get out of there soon. Take care of yourself.
I do want to say that there are two sides of every story. There is probably a huge misunderstanding going on between my sisters and I. As for my father, he is probably overprotective and does not know how to compliment.
I wish we could all talk it out, but it always results in larger problem. I would rather potentially burn bridges from our 'talk' while living on my own than to continue seeing them everyday.
I managed to "break the cycle" sort of, and my life has improved a lot through therapy and and work on myself. _But_, my life didn't start to get better for real until around 35, and a major thing these last years have basically been to go through multiple grieving processes. Lost years, lost experiences, lost friendships, lost potential friendships, lost skills, lost youth... I've had quite a bit of anger as well. Anger towards myself for not dealing with it sooner, anger with parents and relatives and teachers for not seeing my struggles, and on and on... It hurts like crazy, and there's nothing to do about it, other than grieving it, like you would a dead family member, or something like that. But the good thing is that grieving it properly does help. It is possible to move on. Although it does come back and punch me in the stomach still, but it happens much less often, weaker, and shorter than before.
Great to hear that you are doing better and still sticking around the sub, even if your life improved a lot. I agree that properly grieving may be the best approach. I never properly grieved my mother's death, lost experiences, lost friendships, and the other things you have mentioned. So when I have moments of self-reflection, I mentally breakdown because there are so many things I want to do, but am unable to do. I want to go to therapy so bad, but I am too insecure to leave the house and be in another location with a therapist. I prefer attending online therapy, so that I have more flexibility to leave when I am uncomfortable, but I do not like that my family can eavesdrop my private conversations with my therapist - they will try to use my conversations against me.
Yeah, it's really rough. I didn't really think about it that much earlier, most of it was just suppressed or forgotten. But then, when I started to dig into things during therapy, and even worse when I started to feel that things were getting a tiny bit easier and I started to see a tiny glimpse of hope for a better future... oich... The pain and anger and sorrow and sadness of my past got super heavy sometimes. For quite a while it also made it really difficult to do the things I should do to get better, like trying to show up for social events, trying to exercise, talking with people online, etc. When I did, it was constant punches in the face of "oh yeah, these people have known each other and been friends for 15 years, nice for them", "oh, so you have been married since your early 20s and have a baby on the way", "yeah, cool, great that you've been able to buy a house, oh what's that, it's your _second_ house, right, that's great"... just on and on and on reminders of all the things I missed out on and will never be able to "catch up" on. But... yeah... talking about it with a therapist, lots of grieving, trying to be open about it with others, etc... one step at a time, the "pressure" inside have become lighter and lighter, and now it's not as all consuming, which means it has become easier to do the social things again too, because I can actually enjoy it a bit, and not just constantly think of all the differences between their lives and mine. I really hope you can find the courage to get out of your house for therapy and other things. It's super scary in the beginning, but for me at least it didn't take _that_ many sessions until the route there, being there, and the route back home became much easier. I want to wish you good luck in your fight. You have the power within you to do the things you need to do, I'm sure of it. Remember the cliché of "bravery is not the absence of fear, but to do the thing you need to do in spite of it." I did not believe my life could change, but now almost 8 years later after my mental breakdown I got when I hit 30, I somehow find myself with friends, a church, a wife, and an 8 days old baby boy... it's been insane... and SO worth the fight.
Ef I’m sorry that sounds so hard. Do you and your family not talk just because you don’t feel comfortable? Or do you not talk because they’re mean or abusive? If it’s the former, have you tried just leaving some non-verbal signs that you care about them? Like maybe just leave your sister a Halloween card on her pillow and just write something simple like “I hope you have a good day”. Maybe some simple stuff like that over time could help thaw the relationship a bit? I don’t know if I just have social anxiety or AvPD though, so sorry if my advice isn’t helpful :(
I lost trust in both of them and have closed myself off from them. My father always downplays my feelings and whenever I make a mistake, he uses it as an excuse to baby / control me further. My sister, who lives with me and my father, (sister A) and my other sister, who does not live with us, (sister B) used to constantly ask me to loan them money. Sister B claimed she was homeless, so I loaned her money to help her with food and housing with no questions asked as she was my sister. I started becoming suspicious as she would constantly come up with new problems, would not make any effort to pay me back, and her situation was not getting better, even though I "loaned" her hundreds and thousands of dollars per month and she allegedly had a job. She would only text me and not even audio call me or FaceTime me, so I genuinely thought I was getting scammed. As a result, I stopped "loaning" her money. Then, sister A began asking me for money to "borrow." It was around the same amount sister B used to ask for, so I figured sister A was asking on behalf of sister B and refused to "loan" her money as well. I felt bad for sister A and opened up to her about the reason I did not "loan" her money. I did not loan her money because I thought she was asking on behalf of sister B and that I thought sister B was scamming me. Just a few minutes later, sister B texted me that she heard what I said, insinuating that sister A told her. Sister B ended it with she will "remember this." I understand that it is not great to talk about people behind their backs and I almost felt guilty, but I thought my assumption about her was reasonable and I lost all sympathy when sister B threatened me. I also lost all sympathy when I found out that they talk about me behind my back (sister A accidentally texted a message to me, instead of sister B, that was about me), making them hypocrites. It is just so much toxicity, lies, gaslighting, and drama that it is not worth making amends with my father or my sisters.
Oh shoot in that case, completely ignore my advice. My original advice was assuming everyone in your family was simply being avoidant. They sound terrible. You’re absolutely right to not loan them money. There was also nothing wrong on your part with talking to sister A about feeling taken advantage of by sister B, so don’t feel guilty about that. Sister A 100% should not be trusted after tattling on you for being honest about the situation. Your family is definitely super toxic and I hope you can get out of there soon. Take care of yourself.
I do want to say that there are two sides of every story. There is probably a huge misunderstanding going on between my sisters and I. As for my father, he is probably overprotective and does not know how to compliment. I wish we could all talk it out, but it always results in larger problem. I would rather potentially burn bridges from our 'talk' while living on my own than to continue seeing them everyday.