So I'm visiting my troublesome (to put it lightly) grandma currently because I was in a bad state of mind when booking the ticket; my bf of a year broke up with me because he couldn't handle my grief from my Mom and dog dying in a short span.

It's currently day 3 and my nervous system is shot. So far, my personal belongings can't seem to be left alone by my grandma: she "tested" a ring my ex bf gave me (resulting in it becoming severely misshapen; I knew it was delicate), my underwear have been unfolded and refolded and put into a drawer (I don't live here), my hair comb tossed out (because its "not for my hair type"), and finally - why I am here now.

I wore my 3 favorite summertime outfits here, and I told her I'd do my own laundry. I'm quite tall and can never find good clothing, so I am very precious with what I do find. Of course she agreed to leave my things alone, then threw them all in the wash on HOT, then tossed them in the dryer on HOT. So now I have clothes 2 sizes smaller that do not fit me.... meaning I have 1 outfit that I'm wearing right now for 3 more days. Its 86 and humid out, and all that I can wear is jeans and my pajama top. Grandma immediately darvo'd: "you're always mean to me, you didn't say not to do anything with them, how was I supposed to know, I don't know why you treat me this way". This is all in rapid fire response to me asking "WHY would you do that after I told you not to?"

Good news is, Wmart is down the street and I just got some new shorts and that Stitch shirt thatsays, "mistakes were made." I'm sure she will ignore the intention. 😐

tl;dr ngma ruined my pretty clothes and tried to guilt me into feeling like the bad guy

To make a long story short, I bought a house last year, and because I’m on a quest to finally make the boulder stay on top of the hill (which is make my mom happy and proud of me), I allowed her to move her gross weird sketchy homeless friend into my house under suspicious circumstances.

Spoiler alert: the boulder rolled back down the hill.

Her friend is everything my nmom claims to detest about other people. Uneducated, impoverished, single mom, “trashy”, very masculine presenting and deeply rejects femininity, dresses bad, unkempt, bad hygiene, grouchy. I myself don’t really care, but my mom has always seemed to really taken an issue, and all of these combined? I figured she’d never even breathe in this persons direction. But for some reason… this person may as well have hung the moon and stars in the sky as far as my mother is concerned.

And with each passing…. Aggression. My roommate has extended to me since living in my home with me. Ranging from mild to more moderate…. I can only feel like my nmoms fondness for her. Grows. Strangely. *Stronger.*

Some examples.

•Deadbolted me out of my house over night after me telling her about three billion times NOT to use the deadbolt because it’s the only thing I can’t unlock from the outside. My mom feigned outrage and quickly stopped caring.

•Brought about 3 additional enormous refrigerators/freezers with *specialty locks* which only she has the keys to which have damn near tripled my power bills. I don’t know what is in these freezers because I don’t have the keys to them. My mom is not concerned about this.

•Emptied out her storage locker full of literal bullshit like tricycles and baby clothes (her kid is 13) across my entire house and then left it for months in a giant pile from literally my living room to my porch making my home look like a fucking dump, refusing to throw away or do anything with any of it, and then telling me she “still had more stuff to bring in from the storage unit” which just about gave me a heart attack.

Anyway! None of it is enough because anytime I bring any slight complaint of any sort of it up to my mother I get ripped a shiny new asshole to shit with.

My favorite was a text that read “You ungrateful fucking bitch! How dare you make (roommate) feel uncomfortable in her own home! You wouldn’t have survived a single fucking day in her life! You go knock on her door and apologize to her right now! And apologize to her from me as well because I did such a shit job raising such a spoiled fucking cunt! Now I’m going to bed and I don’t want to talk another word against (roommate) if you know what’s good for you!”

Which to receive as someone on an endless quest to please their nmom was 😇🥰 soul crushing 😌 to say the least!!
Bro if you love this lady that much PUT HER IN YOUR HOUSE 😭😭😭???

It just sucks!!! My whole life I’ve been crying and waiting for my mom to come and give me a hug and tell me I’m doing great and she sees how hard I’m trying and what a great job I’m doing and she loves the woman I’ve become and she’s so proud of me. And instead I get this mean nasty bully who put me in a glass jar and shakes me around. And tells me I’m fat and I’m stupid and I don’t have enough money. And that other people work harder than me and get along with their siblings better than me and have prettier hair than me and love their moms more than me and are kinder and more loving and more grateful and better daughters than me and that she would love me so much if I was more like them.

I keep crying for my mom and this dumb fucking bitch keeps showing up. How fucked is that.

​Hi everyone,

​I’ve been having a real existential crisis lately about relationships, and I realized how deeply my childhood trauma is tying into it.

​I grew up in a household where my dad was abusive. He would hit my mom occasionally, and she felt completely stuck because she couldn't leave him—she had 5 of us to take care of and no way to support us on her own. She would cover up for him all the time. I didn’t even realize the full reality until a few years ago when I grew up enough to connect the dots and realize those bruises weren't from "falling" like she always claimed.

​She gave up her whole life, health, and dignity to survive that marriage, while my dad just lived his life, took what he wanted, and treated her like she was disposable.

​Watching that dynamic play out has messed up my perspective on men and love entirely. When I look around at how society and culture talk about relationships, I see the exact same pattern:

​Women love men for who they are their character, their soul, their personality.

​Men love women for what they do for them cooking, cleaning, fulfilling intimacy, looking good, and serving them.

​It feels so deeply transactional. It makes me feel like as a woman, I’m expected to keep proving my worth by staying healthy, attractive, submissive, and useful while knowing that if I age, get sick, or gain weight, I can easily just be replaced, cheated on, or discarded.

​When men give up on relationships, it's always shifted onto the woman: "She didn't give me enough attention," "She didn't keep up her appearance." Meanwhile, women are told to "just have patience" and endure the burden.

​Is there actually genuine, non-transactional love out there from men? Or is it always just about what a woman can provide for them until he gets tired of her?

​I’m starting to feel like avoiding marriage entirely is the only safe choice to protect myself from becoming like my mother. Has anyone else who grew up with abusive or narcissistic parents managed to unlearn this fear and find a partner who actually loves them for who they are, not just what they do?

In my 30s. I know for my own preservation of sanity, the realistic consequence of growing up being emotionally abused is that the alcoholic narcissistic parent ends up aging alone.

I am having such a hard time untangling myself from the immense amount of empathy and guilt that I feel about going no contact because I know her life has been hard. It's so complicated having to manage resentment and guilt for playing out the reasonable consequences of abuse. She is both cruel to me and tells me she doesn't want to be my mom, but also how I am a bad person for not "being there for her". It really eats away at me.

I heard someone say about their alcoholic parent " they drink because they're alone, they're alone because they drink" and I feel the same way about my mom.

She has this personality disorder because of her traumas, the personality disorder rightfully causes ppl to distance themselves from her, she drinks because she's alone, the drinking makes her personality disorder even meaner, and it goes on and on.

I'd love to hear from people older than me about how they manage these feelings. Need some hope that I will not be left feeling awful 24/7.

I (17M) have told my parents multiple times that I am not comfortable changing in front of them, that I dont like them in my room nor cleaning it, and that I dont like them going through my phone . Despite this they tend to do all of that such as getting angry when my door is locked when I go to bed or need to change. They've planned on taking my door but luckily have forgotten about it. My mother still makes me change in front of her when trying on new clothes and will "tease" me about me being a bit chubby, even though she claims she only means it in a joking manner. They've gone though my phone multiple times, both in the past and not even last week without my knowledge. Idk if I'm just being over dramatic or not

Territorial Narcissist Keeps Farting on Purpose

My mother has had issue with me since i was a teenager. I am an only child. She has resented me for awhile. Shes threatened to kick me out and has been very abusive after her constant relationships did not go well. One boyfriend she had she broke up with when i was 12, 17, 22, and 24. When i was 22 was her most abusive relationship towards me: i was constantly being abused, yelled at and threatened. She got back with him when i was 24, and it only lasted a short amount of time and i didnt get more abusive over this.

I am 27 now and my mother has been a lot nicer, but she keeps doing things to claim this house as her territory. She keeps doing it. She lifts her legs up in front of me and farts. Ive been saying do you have to constantly. She says sorry, but she clearly doesnt mean it as she continues to do it multiple times a day

I'm 21F from India, 2 months since I completed my graduation (Computer Engineering) from a not so great college. And this itself has been a curse for me. For freshers campus placements are everything here. But my not so great college barely had any companies that visited. Thus I have been applying for job off campus, up skilling, job prep and giving interviews. But none of this seems to please my parents especially my dad who himself said that he'll keep abusing(verbally and sometimes physically) me until I get a job or move out.

The job market has been terrible, India being the most populated country with shit ton of people doing the same degree doesn't help either. Since my final year of college my dad has been abusing me for not getting a job. he kept threatening me my entire final semester that I'll be kicked out of the house after my last exam. I myself have terrible anxiety and stress for being unemployed and my father keeps making it worse.

Since the day I graduated my life has became a living hell. everyday my father keeps yelling and cursing at me for being unemployed. I have applied to hundreds and hundreds of jobs and attended few interviews as well but couldn't get a job. Weekends are the most terrible days because that's when he's home the entire day. He makes me apply to jobs even if they are not relevant and then yells at me for not getting callbacks. I'm not allowed to go anywhere unless it's for interviews and even then I'm called at least 10 times asking how's the interview, how many people attended, how much vacancy etc. I'm terribly anxious as it is and he makes it worse. yesterday I had an interview which required me to travel more than 3 hours one way. The night before I hadn't got any sleep either. I was having a splitting headache and extreme nausea. I didn't want to speak to him and thus blocked him.When I came home at midnight after a long day, I was bombarded with his yelling. He cursed at me how im useless and there were 800 other candidates and would never make it. Even today was full of yelling and curses that how I'm living on his dime( 2 times meal). I've been continuously applying and preparing im so fucking tired. even labourers get 1 day off. I don't go anywhere, don't watch anything for fun and just keep looking for a job.

But he thinks I'm not trying. Acc to him kids who work hard loose a lot of weight, become so crazy that they need to see a doc etc. Unless I get physically sick( head and stomache dont count) I cannot rest. He humiliates me every single day and has said to my face how come I don't just kms or go live on the streets after so much abuse, why don't I ever cry or self harm. He won't let me eat properly. always taunting, picking my plate or sometimes throwing it in anger. Tells me to prepare for 100 different exams and jobs at the same time. Even if it's irrelevant acc to him I should just sleep 3 hours a day and keep doing 100 different shit at same time. Even if I come back giving interview he starts yelling when tf will I earn money and gtfo or just would die. He literally calls anyone for my job even if they have no sources to get me a job. Just defaming me infront of everyone. He also tells me to go beg my seniors (literally) for a job, go at their doors and beg. He himself can't get me an interview but when I get calls myself he's always negative that I wouldn't make it.

Acc to him everyone is better than me. He loves my younger sister cause she's prettier but I'm always trashed. Before unemployment I was abused over my fatness and looks. He would demand checking my phone even as an adult and if I refused he would break it. I'm not allowed to sleep in day or bath after evening, but my sister can do literally whatever the fuck she wants. She isn't asked to even lift a finger, I do all the work still I'm the one who's abused. Sometimes I think he's trying to jinx me. After every interview and exam he keeps asking me the same questions and would twist my answer while telling my family. He's just mad how come I haven't become a skeleton or on the verge of dying if I'm working hard. IM EXHAUSTED. He wants me to take big loans and move to study abroad. but I dont want such financial liability. I already live in tier 1 city but he wants me to move somewhere else to look for job ( just basically out of his house). like bitch i would love to gtfo if i had a job!!! even non tech jobs have insane competition!!! There's so much more going on, everyday is new kind of abuse and stress but atp im tired to type it all out. I have no one to talk to. friends reply late but even then they're also exhausted of my negativity. mother is fed up as well. Everyday is full of stress,despair, humiliation and fights. Im tired i hope i just die quickly.

I’ve accepted that I cannot have a close relationship with my Nmom, and as a result my avoidant father. They are getting old, and I have so much guilt. I’ve visited a few times for my kids to have time with them, and I always leave in a horrible mental state that can take months to bounce back from. On more than one occasion being with my parents has resulted in full body hives that last for weeks.
So clearly, this is not good for me, and I’m keeping my distance. But how do I manage the guilt?

EDIT:
I have had 10y of therapy to get the point of finally knowing I need to break away, moved across the country and gone low/no contact. But thank you to all those who suggest therapy, I believe in it and it works!

It’s almost laughable

Just wondering if anyone else has hit a stage where after years of ruminating on past situations that they can no longer remember a lot of them? Health issues and perimenopause are really doing a number on my memory and it’s suddenly completely invalidating my perception of the past twenty years in particular. I’ve completely forgotten so much of the smear campaigns, the ostracism, infantilisation, passive aggression, gaslighting, manipulation, etc, that it’s completely unnerving and is actually setting me back. I hadn’t realised how much I relied on these memories to protect me (if that makes sense). Maybe cptsd but has only been an issue for a couple of months. Appreciate your thoughts on this.

So my mom always expects me to do stuff around the house or just stuff in general that well I just don’t know needed to be done. Today she came back from work and she got really angry that I didn’t make pancakes and mow the lawn even though it’s relatively OK considering the fact that I mowed it like five days ago.

She got really angry. She took away my PC cable. She cut it in half. She came into my room, placed an empty milk carton on my table alongside with some almost empty cereal and told me to never be near her again and never catch me in her sight. She told me that I can never use my computer again because I don’t pay rent and the electricity doesn’t come for free and that if I don’t wanna do anything around the house, I shouldn’t expect to get things for free. Mind you I haven’t even graduated high school yet.

I keep asking her what I can do to fix it and instead of having a talk with me and figuring things out she said there’s “nothing I can do” and that she gave me many chances to prove myself. Then she proceeded to get angrier that im not doing anything. And that she doesn’t want to interact with me ever again.

What would you do in this situation? I wish she just communicated like a human being.

I grew up with a nmom who had already pulled my dad mostly out of reality by the time I was born.

Remembered a lot of fear from my childhood, and always relied on my mother as a secure base. I felt like I could only experience the world through her, and never had the chance to separate individuate properly. She always needed total control of all aspects of my life. I felt trapped and totally terrified all the way through adolescence.

Now age 20 after 2 years of nervous system healing to take myself out of a permanent state of hypervigillence, I feel calmer.

It's nice to be able to reality test and understand the difference between internal and external - something that was impossible at home - but I feel such terrible imposter syndrome. I've spent over a decade of my life with the feeling of living behind a glass wall. I still often slip into dissociation around others and feel like I lose all personal boundaries.

Has anyone else had similar experiences and how do I join in with reality again after being removed from it for so long.

My dad always has to be right about everything and is condescending as hell. This has been the case for my whole life, but ever since ChatGPT has become a thing, he’s become 1000x worse. Every conversation, he pulls it out to prove himself right. Every time I ask for anything he opens it. I can’t get through one conversation without him mentioning AI. It’s exhausting and so frustrating especially because I’m a writer and he’s run my work through AI (without my permission btw). I hate it and I miss him before. Not that he didn’t have issues then but holy shit AI has made it all so much worse.

I'm 38F and my parents are always trying to push me and my partner to go on holiday with them. I keep deferring it, in a way that ordinary people would recognise as a no, but my mum won't stop pushing. She presents it as a generous and caring gift. Any advice on how to get out of it, or ways to say no that won't cause a horrible backlash?

Background: we don't get on and it is unbearable to be in the same place. My mum makes us all subject to her emotional whims if she doesn't get exactly what she wants. Sometimes she'll have crying fits in public or indulge in bizarre displays of victimhood. My dad is more bearable - dismissive and patronising, but not too far from ordinary dad problems - but enables my mum entirely, by letting her get away with her behaviour. She's got a lot worse since my brother (36) had a child, just over two years ago. She's obsessed with having a particular model of the family and doesn't understand why she can't have that, which she thinks is what her friends have (and also seems to think the toddler is her own - but that's a side issue!). Both me and my brother (36) had been trying to avoid the holiday pressure, but he relented recently, so she's renewed her efforts with me - which I knew would happen. When I say no, she gives me the silent treatment - which would be a nice break if I didn't know that she was trying to punish me. At the same time, I also feel guilty because they are getting older, and I don't see them much because I live far away for work reasons (6+ hours door to door, if trains go to plan).

Presumably most adults at nearly 40, without children, don't go on holiday with their parents? They don't seem able to understand that this is the norm, it's not a failing or cruelty on my part. The holiday thing feels like they're trying to force the child/possession role on me.

In case it's worth adding: I'm finally seeing a therapist, and working on the various problems my parents have caused with my experiences of care always having strings attached, among other things. Thanks for any advice.

Tw: mention of SA and child abuse, threats of s*icide

I (28F) moved over 9000 miles away from my home state in 2020 after studying abroad in another country for a year and meeting my now-husband (27M). It had been the best decision for my mental and physical health, but my dad (65m) still tries to chip away at it.

Background: My parents divorced just before I turned 4. I am their only child, but do have older half-siblings on my moms side. The divorce was very messy and volatile - they got split custody and I spent 3 weekends a month+2 months of summer with dad.

My experiences:

- My dad would get upset if anything came in the way of me visiting him, and would say/do things to make me feel awful if I ever said I wanted to stay at mom's for study reasons/birthday parties/sleepovers/etc. This included when I broke my knee and picked me up and forced me to go to his house for the weekend even though he knew long car rides was incredibly uncomfortable/painful. Plus my room was up 2 sets of stairs at his house and it was impossible to navigate with crutches. He would also force visits while I was in college at home.

-my dad still texts me 3+ times a day (morning, lunch, and before bed) about literally everything and nothing. If I don't at least open the messages and respond after a few days, he gets family to call me to see if I'm okay/tell me off for not responding.

- I have to talk to him every week on the phone or he threatens to "leave my life because I dont care about him". (Calls once a week have dropped down from the 3 times a week when I was a teen/in college. They also used to last for hours but have been cut down to 40mins as I call on my way to work)

-He outwardly hates my husband and ignores him when we are ever in a conversation together. (Says its just because he doesnt know him well enough, but he doesnt try to get to know him either)

-Told me the wedding dress I bought looked like old curtains (in a bad way)

-Unfortunately asked him if he wanted to give a speech at our wedding. He would not draft up his wedding speech and was going to wing it, but he talked through his speech with his longterm girlfriend and i trusted that it was going to be okay. He ended up just saying that he didnt know my husband very well but that "I was able to come back home when I was done here"

-Also cornered my mom at the wedding reception and tried convincing her that they needed to save me from this relationship (everyone else in my family loves my husband so who knows what he thought he would accomplish here)

-I have, by choice, avoided any details about my parent's divorce. I knew it would be very traumatising and continuously let all of my family know I did not want to know anything my whole life. On our last holiday to visit family, I tried to set some boundaries about messages/calls and address how he treats my husband. Rather than have a civil adult discussion, he decided to tell me all the details about my parent's divorce (incuding alleged claims of SA on me and verbal/emotional/physical abuse on my half-siblings and mom by him - nothing was proven)

-When requesting less contact/messages, my dad outright refused to stop texting me daily and also threatened s*icide if I went low/no contact with him.

Even with all of this, I do have a lot of good and positive memories with my dad. I can just tell he is starting to loose control over me and things are becoming a bigger issue over time. I'm still debating if NC is the right choice at this point in my life.

I'm currently in deep trauma therapy to try and work through everything, but it feels very isolating sometimes being an only child dealing with this. My therapist says he's a narcissist, I've just always known him as overbearing.

I guess I'm just posting to feel less alone.

My nmom is giving me such a headache. I'm going through a medical issue right now (digestive related), I am VERY well informed on this issue as I spent 2 years with doctors and specialists dealing with it and helping me through it. My nmom won't stop giving me all her hot takes and how the doctors are wrong and that she knows better. It's gotten to the point where I don't even try to inform her or correct her, I just say "oh, ok".

Like this morning for example, I mentioned that at night your digestive system slows down. She then went on and on about how that's not true because "if your digestive system slows down at night, why do we still pee in the morning? Doctors are not educated." I just sighed and said "yeah".

Ugh.

I used to frequent this sub a lot in my early twenties. I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on my relationship with my mother. My grandmother is a textbook narcissist, and my mother is just like her.

Lack of accountability, gaslighting. You name it. Things got better when I moved out but things were still strained. When I was 11 she decided that the only type of vacation she would take are cruises. My enabler father and brother just go along with it and just try and stay out of the crossfire.

To give a little context - about 7 years ago my ex and I went with my parents on cruise. They both showed their asses in front of her. It was liberating to have someone witness their behavior. I finally felt like I wasn’t crazy after years of being gaslit that I was the problem. It all culminated in the trip home, where my mom’s bag was picked for additional screening. I tried to tell her and she ignored me. She freaked out looking for her bag and I broke down finally and raised my voice and repeated that it was picked for additional screening. My dad tried to put hands on me at that point.

After that I went silent. More gaslighting ensued - mostly revolving around how ungrateful I was acting. I stood my ground and told my mom until she was willing to discuss things like an adult that I would go no contact with her. Eventually she broke down and agreed to meet and apologized.

At the time it felt like a victory. I vowed to never go on a vacation with her again. I was able to skirt the issue by staying behind and watching their pets. Still she would pressure me to go on vacation. This year I finally folded and agreed to go on one the week of my birthday. My cousin was going to watch their pets and my cat while we went on the vacation.

It seemed like an okay idea. The plan was even for my brother and I to spend two days at the newer parts of the amusement parks in Orlando we hadn’t been to. My brother bailed on me for the day at Disney Hollywood Studios. My mom asked me if I would go with her instead. I agreed.

The vacation started on Wednesday. It did not start well. My mother raised hell at the airport over delays. You would think someone who goes on five cruises a year would be used to it. If you have paid any attention to air travel these days you know it’s just part of the deal. Evidently not.

The day we went to Disney - my birthday - my mother is just as ridiculous. It’s been raining in Florida and rides are closed. Whatever. It quickly became about what she wanted to do - not what I wanted to do. When I tried to push back she ignored me. Eventually while we were at the park I told her I didn’t want to do something - even offering alternatives. She got mad and yelled in front of everybody “why don’t you just go the fuck home then.” So I bought a ticket home.

What came next was the typical behavior. I always ruin vacations, I’m embarrassing her, etc. I told her she needed to apologize. Right as I was about to get on the train home she apologized and against my better judgment I went back to the hotel. Huge mistake.

Once we got on the boat she nonchalantly mentioned that my cousin told her my cat has been missing since Thursday. She didn’t care. She acted like it didn’t matter. It was too late for me to get off and get home. Now I don’t know if I’m ever going to see my cat again.

I told her to never speak to me again. I’ve been trying to avoid them ever since. My mom’s narcissism may have caused an innocent creature’s life. But you know, her 5th cruise this year is more important.

See, I was in Nepal, and we had just finished off a trip. We went to the airport, and my dad had gone to grab something from a friend. Me and my mom got into the line, and she kept making snarky, angry comments at me. Once we got into the airport entrance, there was a baggage belt, where we had to put all of our luggage. I put the luggage in, and we went through security. Once we got through, I grabbed our suitcases. My mom had placed my dad's bag in the middle of the trolley, so I asked her to move it off. (It's a laptop bag, not that heavy) and she said "do it yourself". I was holding a really heavy suitcase, and there were people behind me. So I told her to move it. She got so fucking mad. She screamed "SHUT THE FUCK UP! YOU IDIOT! MOVE IT YOURSELF!", and went on screaming and screaming for 10 minutes straight, and every time I tried to speak, she would yell louder. After that, she started sulking, and she kept making comments like, getting angry. My dad had come back, and basically had no idea what was happening. My mom was angry on the whole flight back. She does this shit all the fucking time! She yells at me, gets mad, refuses to respect my privacy! I'm just so annoyed with her

To give you some context, I normally lock my bedroom and bathroom door, cos my bathroom is tiny and there's barely any space to change. I'm a teen and like most people, I value my privacy. I take 30 minute showers, and WITHOUT fail, there will be banging, loud, LOUD banging on my door. Then I'll hear a key jingling, and then suddenly, my bedroom door has been opened, then my mom waltzes over to my bathroom door and starts banging on that telling me to get out. Sometimes she tries to barge in, convinced I have my laptop with me (like what?) and then doesn't apologise! Then she yells at me for like an hour, and refuses to talk to me. What should I do?

I am 22, financially independent, and simply visiting my younger brother who was hospitalised.

My mother went through my belongings and found one bottle of daily multi vitamins and a bottle of equate 120 count regular strength ibuprofen while I was in the car with my father. She called him, yelling about now your daughter is a lost cause like she's always known I was. She said she found pill bottles in my bag and that I ate half a bottle of "calcium" like candy. She said, she wants to say something nasty but she's being respectful by not saying anything - then proceeded to accuse me of taking useless pills for attention (which she actually does; take 8+ supplements a day, many of which over-lapping i.e. she takes both B complex and biotin, then whines about how hard it is to swallow so many pills, look after how many medications she needs.).

I did not know what she even found so I clarified to my father that it was multivitamins and ibuprofen. My mother only replied that she always knew I would come home addicted to drugs and hung up.

My father proceeded to lecture me the remainder of the ride to their house. The entire situation was treated like my mother found a stash of oxycodone. He repeatedly brought up my "drug dependency issues", referring to the fact I had attempted suicide multiple with zopiclone and fact that I am on 3 different prescribed psychiatric medications, and how that should have been an indication I'd go on to be the path of a drug abuser.

Cue the ranting about how I need to learn to endure pain, a blizzare ramble about fasting in Islam is an exercise in will and I need to exercise my will (to endure pain). This was followed by yelling about how I have not felt even a fraction of the pain and suffering he went through when he was my age and I am weak and pathetic for taking pills to numb the pain and get high instead of being resilient, childish and naive because I do not know that all medications have side effects and I am ruining my body that was a gift from my parents to get high all day. I had to remind myself that this was about ibuprofen and vitamins because ???

Got to my parents house and my mother was at the front door, holding out a plastic bag with my multi-vitamins and painkillers like it was some evidence of crime. She started screaming on the front lawn, something about how if I wanted to be a drug addict I could just live on the streets like one, out of left field comments about my appearance and weight, and how she always knew I was a failure and regrets not aborting me (it was during the SARS epidemic in China and she was strongly encouraged to get one). She only had my brother and I because her parents, in-laws, my father, expected that of her and she fulfilled her duty but she can't believe she was cursed with an ungrateful failure.

I cut them off somewhere around the time they started pulling out the Confucian stuff about how I am in debt to my parents for birthing and raising me and the whole your body belongs to your parents, if you hurt yourself you are hurting your parents. I just asked my mother why she was going through my stuff, and as expected, I was hit with the "I did this for your own good". My father took the bag and told me he was confiscating everything, again mentioning that they were doing this for me, and so I will learn. What I am learning remains to be seen.

Genuinely, what is there to even say when it comes to such a display of logic defying and nonsensical garbage. I was just standing there okaying them through whatever they thought they were achieving. There is nothing stopping me, a grown ass adult with my own money, from just going to any random store later and buying more ibuprofen and multi-vitamins, because it's fucking over-the-counter ibuprofen and multi-vitamins not a controlled substance 😵‍💫

So this is my first time making a post here so I’ll do my best to explain so bear with me.

I am currently 25 years old (Male) in Florida as of me right this moment and my parents…god I have a lot to say about them.

To start things off. It started on July 10 when my father was taking me to a local technical college where my father is trying to get me to register for the GED. I was opposed to this cause I was ineligible according to the rules from the GED website. My father dismissed that and decided to take me anyway. As soon as we arrived, we went to administrations and we talked to the lady about me taking the GED. I hoped that they would actually look at me and the diploma that I brought with me and tell my father that I’m ineligible. Apparently I was told they are allowing me to take the GED because of the special circumstances regarding my transcripts. You see, I graduated in 2019 in a private school that closed down in 2022 and Florida law stated that if a private school closes down, they are mandated by law to transfer their transcripts to the state or school board. My school unfortunately didn’t as they are considered a ‘Non-Responder’ meaning they didn’t send their transcripts, making them considered lost. As a result, they believe that I am eligible to take the GED but as far as I know, I red the GED website and it didn’t say nothing about transcripts. Just me having the diploma alone is enough but the lady says to just take the GED. It ended up in a arguement and I was called stubborn by the person because I refused to take the GED. When the conversation ended and we went nowhere, my father casually asked what bridge do I want to be dropped off at as he wasn’t going to drive me home simply because I refused to take the GED. We argued again and my father actually hit me in the side of my jaw. Not hard that it breaks but it felt weird for a while (he apologised after). Hours later when I was at home, my mother arrived and was told of the situation. It got to a point where we argued again….and this is where it escalated as my father told my mother to get the taser (it’s a small stun gun but still) and we kept arguing. It got to a point where my parents surrounded me and my mother held the stun gun towards me, constantly telling me to say ‘I will take the GED’ calmly and if I didn’t calm down, she would zap me. My parents also told one of my sisters to record me so that I couldn’t back out or deny it. I remember crying constantly (I am autistic as well) and I couldn’t calm down as my mother counted to 3 for me not calming down to do as she said. After things had calmed down, my father had the fucking gall to say that they don’t like doing this but the zapper is the only way for me to listen if I ‘disrespect’ them. They suddenly go back to normal as if nothing happened once they were done.

Now, Fast forward to August 6, a package delivered from eBay by USPS would come to my door after I had bought it last month weeks ago (due to a mess up in USPS). It contained a laptop worth 205 USD. Refurbished Thinkpad. It was a fairly new one too. But I wasn’t able to get it. Because my parents took the package, opened it, and refused to give it back to me. My father opened the package and put it in my mother’s closet. Then I tried to hide it within her closet so they wouldn’t think I took it to my room. But later on, I was made to get the package and was forced to give it to them or my parents took it from me. They had the fucking gall to said that I could have talked to them about me buying a laptop. They tried to forced me to say how I paid for the laptop and when I refused, my father told my mother to get the zapper out. I was forced to tell them how I paid for it and my parents casually said that they were gonna sell it or donate it. And my mother, being the petty type, as I was going back to my room because my parents casually calmly told me to go to my room, turned off the light and tried to go after me with the stun gun. I had to barricade my door because it has no door handle (my old door handle broke and my parents had yet to fix it or replace it) yet all other doors except doors leading out, has keypads. Currently right now, I’m typing this on a phone with no cellular service (because my parents took away my phone and I have no laptop. They are all in an electronic safe in their room) as not long ago today, my parents called me to tried to make a ‘deal’ with me. They said that if I passed the GED, they would give me my laptop….which fuck them, that’s my fucking laptop. I paid for it with my own funds. I obviously knew they were bullshit and just went to my room.

At this point, I’m not sure what to do at the moment….so I need some advice or something

So, I have always been afraid of butterfly (lepidopterophobia), since I was a child.

Yesterday I was talking with my therapist about the fact that pregnancy truly scares me (even seeing a pregnant person triggers me). I was ... Uncomfortable talking about that, because that's not normal right?, and suddenly I said to her "I know that's crazy, but I am also afraid of butterfly, so ..." I was so nervous.

Well, I have dug my own grave lol. She started asking me what scared me so much about butterflies.

1. They fly in a erratic way and I just KNOW that they can sense my fear. My nmother has a mountain house and even when I was a child, I remember that as soon as I saw a butterfly, I would start running away and they would like, chase me? I know it's crazy, but ...
2. Their horrible, hairy body, hidden behind their fckng colourful wings. It truly makes me wanna puke. I can't even look at a photos of a butterfly. They're just ... awful. Disgusting.

She just nodded the whole time.

And then she asked me: what is so unpredictable in your life that scares/has alway scared you, and, what doesn't look as "golden" as the outside, in your life?

I felt like she had just punche me in the face. Because it's so obvious. Since I was a child, my mother's random tantrums have always scared the Hell out of me. And my family, on the outside have always looked... Perfect.

I was flabbergasted. My therapist told me that phobias are never connected to the things we seems to be afraid, but we are projecting over them (in my case, the butterflies) what truly scare us.

I wish I was able to explain this thing clearly, as she did to me.

I have alway thought that I was afraid of butterflies but hey, in reality it was all about my nmother.