thank you all so much for your replies. it helps so much to have some place i can get all of this out and where people understand.

so here's a little more of my story...
no matter what i did as a child, i would always be associated with all of the embarrassing things. that may sound strange so i'll try to explain...like any mother, mine would always tell stories about her kids to others. if one of us did something really good, she would tell people it was my sister even if it was me. if one of us did something bad or embarrassing, she would tell people it was my fault. i never really felt good about anything i did even if it was good. i wasn't going to get the credit for it anyway.

when i was a junior in high school i had my first boyfriend. no guys had ever really paid attention to me before that so when this guy came along and was nice and attentive and 'respected' me, i got sucked in. my parents didn't like him and my mom even told me she would buy me a car (a black honda - my dream car at the time) if i ended the relationship. however, it had become an abusive relationship and wasn't easy to get out of. anyway, eventually the relationship ended and guess who got the black honda...yup, my sister. it made me feel even more worthless than i already did.
what little self-esteem i had going into this relationship was torn away by the end. this guy would tell me that i would always be alone. he was constantly comparing me to other girls and forcing me to compare myself to them. i felt so bad about myself that i started cutting. i would cut my wrists and my stomach. i just wanted the emotional pain to go away.

well this is jumping into topics of other boards now so maybe i'll continue my posts there.
thanks all for listening. it feels really good to get this all out.

to be continued....