[kranky]

I currently reside in Europe with an uncle who has been a close friend of my father's and is like an alternative parental figure. My parents are always out on business trips back in my home country so I can't really talk to them that much.

I have several problems that are surrounding my life, some of which concern my work, my future plans about having a spouse, but most of all, the problems with some of my relationships with my uncle and other family members.

My uncle has been more or less a good person in his own way despite his personal difficulties with life. However, he has certain personality characteristics that are so difficult for me with deal with that it is impossible to get along with him (practically no one in the family can get along with him) because he is altogether stubborn and hijacks every conversation and makes reasons to get into fights with me in order to win. He tends to be paranoid and usually creates large arguments with threats to leave the house and abandon the family, makes me angry or emotional unstable and then BLAMES me for causing them or threatens to scream that I am "crazy", and sometimes even exaggerates and invents illnesses that I have that don't exist. He acts like he cares for me but has a hypochondriacal way of making myself feel weaker and even sicker by picking at small details like a small scrape on my wrist to verbally abuse me. I've been to mental health professionals and they say that in their objective opinion, he's an altogether toxic person to deal with and that staying with him will not be beneficial to my mental health. Usually whenever I take trips away from him for some time, I usually regain my energy and end up feeling better.

In addition, he cannot be reasoned with. If I try to pinpoint something or suggest a possible advice to avert problematic situations, he never listens to me. In fact, he often TURNS on me, participates in other people's abuse and humiliation of myself, yet also acts like he is interested in my well being. He cuts my self esteem down by devaluing my personality and character with threats, emotional blackmail, and capability to as a grown adult in order to make me feel like a stupid kid who can't do anything. There were times whereby he would be so stubborn and willful to be right that he would threaten to kill himself or kill his wife or kill us all just because he wanted to prove that I was "wrong" and that it would be "all my fault if it happened".

He also tends to calculatedly use words using his knowledge of me to twist it in me like a knife. Stuff like saying, "i wish I kicked you out and adopted someone else", or "all that effort that you made building up that project was all for nothing and a waste of time and you're worse off than before", or " should I help you get things done because you can't do it"?

He never seems glad to see if I get stronger or more independent. He also doesn't really seem to be very happy when I accomplish something or get empowered. He's more critical and likely to bring up past issues to make me feel like I've gone nowhere or that I haven't changed. He has a wife who is constantly sick and he hates it if anyone of us go outside without his permission.

Alot of the time, he doesn't seem to even get or Listen to what I have to say. If I say, "um, I don't think I would want to eat something because I'm allergic to it or I'll get sick" he'll blame me for bringing it upon myself because he's fine eating it. If I say, "please don't do that because it will lead to monetary loss and physical damages" he will ignore me and then not really care... yet start apologizing and act all suck up to people who bully me.

If I have a bunch of Jehovah's witnesses stalk and try to brainwash me, he'll purchase one of their book and tell me to read it while he never really reads it himself. If I tell him that I would not want to go somewhere because I have an ex friend there to throw crap at my dress, he'll take me there and start verbally abusing me if I don't.

Yet, he's actually willing to spend alot of money helping my condition that he has zero understanding of (because he lacks any self awareness of how much he emotionally abuses people around him), discourage me going to psychiatrist counsellors because he finds it "embarassing", and make me take medication that is prescribed based on an illness that isn't even my own personal illness.

I don't know exactly what is wrong. So much have happened over the past years. I think that I have witnessed many accidents, deaths, torture, and discrimination and tried explaining this to him... but he had not changed one bit, nor seems to actually care or realize a scrap of what it means to spend quality time with family and understand the meaning of living every day happily and with respect. I'm tired. I almost sometimes think that he's a sociopath but I don't know why it's so difficult for him to understand the things that I try to tell him.

[Leed]

Dearest Kranky ! You NEED to get out of this house and away from your uncle somehow. This environment is TOTALLY TOXIC to you. Your self-esteem is being stomped into the ground and smashed! You won't have any left if you stay there.

He is doing NOTHING for you -- nothing at all, except perhaps providing a roof over your head, and if it were me I think I'd rather live in a cardboard box than listen to this crap all the time! Who does he think he is? He must be terribly mentally sick himself to verbally abuse people like this. How dare he? He needs therapy badly, but people like him don't THINK they need it, so consequently they won't listen -- and probably he wouldn't even go to therapy. He's always right!

Please find somewhere else to live -- there MUST be somewhere else you could go. Aren't there friends or relatives who would take you in? Relatives must know what he's like and would be glad to take you in. And same with friends!!!

Get OUT as soon as you can -- and I'm positive that you'll feel so much bettter. Then it might be a good idea to see a therapist yourself to regain some of your self-esteem that you may have lost thru his rantings. I wish you the very best. I'm sure you're a great person with much to give. God bless and please take care. Hugs, Lee