Difficult family.

I know I've already been writing about this in other topic, but some things changed since then. It's been rough lately and I'm pretty lost writing this because it's such a wide topic it's difficult to make it short. But I'll try. I'm 22 yo, from one of the European countries with rather low economic status and poor social system. I work full time since two years and earn rather much comparing to others in my country in many fields (transferring to Euros, like, 500) but it's still not enough to provide independent living, rent a flat and feed yourself when you're single. And that doesn't help me much. I come from a family of so called working poor, I live with my parents currently and we rent a flat cause we don't have our own, but it wasn't always this way. The social care system is almost non existent unless you refuse to work completely and become a wasted alcoholic. I'm explaining this because it plays a role in some of the frustration we face. I also suffer from physical disorders since childhood, such as congenital hypothyroidism and high androgen sensitivity inherited from my father's side (I have male second sex characteristics and symptoms of high testosterone, etc) which gives me and the whole line more or less autistic symptoms.

I'm not gonna focus on my mother much, because her family is not a huge issue here. Her father is a low functioning alcoholic who doesn't even know how old I am, her mother is very controlling and was raised in a simple village in 50s or 60s, where children were treated with aggression and stupidity (her father, for example, would tie her to a huge wooden wheel for many hours when she or her sisters acted in a disobedient way). They criticized me a lot when I was a child and her for me being "bad and unkind", this kind of stuff. Generally, my mother is a very naive, ignorant and passive person who doesn't have any friends and can't really read or deal with people efficiently. She would often act in a neglectful and narcissistic way when I was a child and growing up. That's it.

The real problem starts with my father's side. Things get incredibly messy here. Since like 7 years, I rent this flat with my parents, it has two small rooms and that's it. We basically bump into each other everyday and hear everything other's say.

But until I was in my late teenage years, we would live in an old, miserable house with my father's family. Me, my mother and my father in one room. There was also my grandfather, my grandmother, two of my grandfather's brothers and an old aunt, a wife of my greatgrandmother's brother. The point is, this whole family was very sick. Each one of them had strong autistic or even psychotic features, displayed a long history of both physical and verbal aggression, OCD traits. The aunt's husband would physically abuse her, beat her with a stick all the way until he died because of alcohol. My grandfather's mother was a terrible, hostile person and her husband (who was also in Auschwitz) was like that too, but also very obsessive-compulsive, cold and especially obsessive in money saving. Their cousing was so awful he led both of his sons to suicide and there was yet another suicide in this family. One of my grandfather's brothers is an alcoholic who never leaves his stinky, dirty flat and his legs had to be cut off due to gangrene. But before he had lost his legs, he was displaying exhibitionistic tendencies (stood up naked in a window) and I remember I was have to be watched every time I wanted to go outside to play in front of the house. He went psychotic after drinking one time and started running with a knife and I couldn't go to school safely, yet no one admitted there is a problem in the family and shouted at me for showing disrespect to him. I remember him as this scary man who would look at me in silence in the garden or through a window when I was leaving for school. He had a wife and a daughter but they moved to another country. There were many women visiting him, even entering his flat through a window so the rest of the family wouldn't see them. The other brother is very lost and moody and obsessive about religion, has a controlling wife and three daughters.

And my grandfather. Well. He was and still shows signs of low functioning autism, his verbal communication is just shouting, repeating sentences over and over again, screaming commands and offending people and repeating stuff aaagain, even things he heard three days before. To him, everyone is inferior, he has no clue about theory of mind, doesn't understand the simpliest things about how humans work, he was always obsessed with order (had his own stuff no one else could touch or use, which had to be placed in a perfect manner to a millimeter) and germs. He doesn't judge people well, everything is a matter of duty to him. He would never get close to me as if I was something scary, that's perhaps the reason for why I so closely remember this one time when I was little and there was nobody home apart from him and I wanted to go outside and asked him to help me put my jacket on and he did. This was probably the only moment there was some normal human interaction between us. I just remember I was shouted at for moving any of his stuff and touching it. He couldn't communicate well with society, everyone despised him, called him an awful man, terrible to be with. He was in jail when he was younger and was kicked out of school for misbehaving. And you would be surprised that this man seems incredibly intelligent in writing and has an incredible long term memory (he was only calm telling a story from his past), very detailed and great knowledge of history and was a professional driver in the past, from cars to huge buses. He also had his own business when younger. Now, he has lost feeling in his hands due to neurological and spinal issues that cannot be helped and requires constant help.

What was and is worst about him, is his obsession with money saving that led him and everyone around (including my grandma) to self- imposed poverty. It is not just an obsession, it is an Obession. To the point of starving, living in dirt, counting and making a neverending conflict about few pennies. Every penny. Buying only the cheapest food, so much to not die of hunger.

My grandmother died half a year ago of leukemia, but she was suffering from never diagnosed Addison's anemia (maybe undiagnosed hypothyroidism also), ataxia and signs of dementia. She was dying for a long time, my father had to take care of both of them for a long time, because there was barely any help from social care (here it's like "these are your parents and it's your job to do"). She was an orphan and spent her life at home literally not knowing what's going on 100% of the time due to neurological changes. She was very emotional, but also naive, couldn't think logically (signed a lot of fake contracts through phone, agreed to anything). She was dying for a very long time, even then my grandfather would act terribly, there were huge fights between him and my father cause he's been doing everything and he only heard this and that is wrong and he is terrible. My grandfather was awful to her, would shout at her, call her names, perhaps even use her sexually in the past (Imagine that 3 months after she died my grandfather would call my father, whining about how he needs a new woman...Disgusting). I don't talk to my grandfather anymore after he has been attacking me verbally. He had two private nurses, the first one basically ran away from him after grandma died cause she couldn't stand him and he payed her almost nothing, the second one just comes into the house, makes him food and runs away too.

Currently, my grandfather is at a hospital for the second time for rehabilitation. I was there once, but only to accompany my father. I went to his room, but he didn't recognize me, so I left and sat on the corridor. And heard some guy talking about him to a nurse: "This man who cannot use his hands. What a terrible human being. No one will be there to help him soon, every private nurse would run away from him after one day. He is awful, so awful. So nasty. His son came to visit him and he just shouts and shouts and everything is not right for him. He shouts at all of us, and doesn't understand why we don't want to interact with him and then gets frustrated even more".

Indeed, when my father comes to him, he just gives him commands about every single thing, for example how to put a toothbrush on a table, in what way, how he does this and that wrong, shouts at him, calls him stupid, etc. He criticizes others and calls them annoying and nasty, not seeing it's him who has an issue. Then calls my father or writing him messages on the phone (very long ones and without a single mistake, even though his fingers are barely any use to him) about how he doesn't want to talk to him and why, how alone he is, starts telling stories, uses metaphors and seems like a different person in writing,but would criticize me for not saying goodbye the time I went there cause he, poor thing, just didn't know that is me (quoting "Thought some another stupid woman came in") and how he gave me some money in the past and now I am so proud and bad. And I was just being ignorant cause I thought he didn't bother, like I'm used to in this family. He doesn't let other patients sleep in peace, constantly has some complicated issues.

What's surprises me is the ignorance of psychiatrists and language therapists. There were two who visited him. Don't know what language therapist said, but both psychiatrists just came by, prescribed SSRIs and said he is depressed and that's it. I couldn't believe it. Like, are they blind? Don't know anything about neuropsychology? SSRIs actually made him even worse. My father is extremely frustrated with having to deal with all of this and he doesn't cope really well.

He actually turns into his father, which is nothing surprising, but still painful. Read about how extremely high testosterone affects the brain and personality, very similiar to autism, and there you have me, my father and my grandfather. Because my father tries to make me guilty by saying that I am almost like his father. And I do realize that. But I am also aware of it, even though it often scares me to see even the physical similiarity to them on my face.

The thing is, my father has also been difficult to live with and now it's even worse. To the point, I start getting nightmares like a kid again and get constantly stressed and feel like in grief. I'm very emotionally tied to him, but I cannot anymore.

He is nice only when in a good humour, and that is rare. He used to be a private bodyguard or just a bodyguard and a driver, now he only works for a few months every year and is on disability due to his spinal damages. He won't go to work "that requires doing something" and is always mad at the world and refusing taking responsibility for anything. He has most of the Asperger's parents traits, been treating me and my mother like something bad that happened to him, he was treating me like an adult since I was a little kid, making me guilty for acting "inconsiderate" and immature and for "choices" I made even as a 5 year old (for example, protesting moving to another town, like a 5 year old kid is something that could stop him for making a decision). He never took any responsibility for me. Been talking to me when I was small about how nobody, even him, is to trust, everyone is bad and fake. Scaring me with his misery, talks of suicide, complaining about how bad his life is, even some pathetic stuff about not winning a lottery ever. He would follow me as a kid, checking "if I'm not lying" and making me hide everything and lie about everything. I was depressed at the age of 9 both because of social exclusion and his neglect, at 15 I already felt like 80 year old. He is very one sided, constantly criticizing everyone, even people on tv (this one is an idiot, this one is a jerk, she looks ugly, etc), basically criticizing everything. Someone was killed after a party? Why the hell that idiot would go to a party! Injured on a vacation in a foreing country? What an idiot goes to foreing countries, they better sit at home! Some woman was raped? It's her fault! When I was physically attacked on a party two years ago and told him, he was like "You didn't have to go there, could stay at home".

Another thing is he is verbally abusive towards my mother (she is also, they are perfect together) and towards me and has a short temper. He belittles everyone, makes fun of everyone and feels like he can throw temper tantrums and get angry just because he has a reason for it. And I am physically stressed around him, because he is a huge, wide man. And his stories of how he used to beat someone up protecting a club when I was younger weren't a good idea. The worst it was when I was around 15 and had many issues, was on chemo, I was too very angry and he once reacted, running at me with his fist clenched. He is also obsessed with saving money (me and my mother had to pay him for each time he would drive us somewhere with his car always, he counts everything etc) and - if he is not giving me a silence treatment like now for when I got emotional over them fighting and let myself get provoked - he can follow you around this small flat, checking if u use the microwave properly, instructing you about everything, criticizing for doing something not the way he wishes.

He got so frustrated lately that when I was sitting with him in the car one day in front of our block of flats, and suddenly fired the engine (I have my driving licence but don't drive due to condition and NVLD issues and...fear of making a mistake he induced in me. But I also won't touch his car anymore and have to buy my own if I want to drive) he started shouting so loud half of the neighbours heard it and embarassed me in front of everyone. "What the **** are you doing? Are you crazy??? What are you doing???" "I'm...firing the engine?" "But did you push the clutch?? You were suppossed to turn off the radio!!!" "I know how to fire an engine, I have my god.damn licence" "I thought u...it's your fault!".

Few days later I was driving with him and suddenly he started shouting "*****! ******!!!!" and almost lost his control over the car, and I was like what are you doing?? "I thought I forgot the papers I need!!! But they are here!" and started laughing nervously. And then something has broke inside me and I started crying and even thought about calling police or something.

He is really getting over the top with what he says and does. My mother comes home, he is already by the tv, calling people names, he looks at her "You look so fat in these jeans, time to lose some weight, don't you think? So unsexy!". They start a morning conversation with my mother yelling "***** off, moron!" and my days off are worse than my working days. More tiring.

And it's all sad and terrifying for me, because he was not always like this and my father was always very important for me, but his ignorance and this kind of behaviour just forces me to cut myself off emotionally. I have been financially independent since a long time, because he always refused to pay me for anything and I had to go to work after high school. Still not enough for a full independent living, as I mentioned, but I will finally work something out. The only gifts he had got my mother years ago were some stuff he found on the floor in the club he was protecting and he was very open about it, that just came up to my mind when I was writing about this financial cut off. But as I say, there were times we had a good contact and it makes me feel like in grief. It's all very confusing. Scares me to share many, so many similiarities with them. And - even though I'm rather self sufficient - there is still a part of me that dreads making a mistake, saying something incorrectly, doing something the wrong way, etc. Also, my father knows nothing of emotions, like they do not exist, he didn't even show his sadness when his mother died. Just anger. Unfortunately, I react this way, too.

It's barely and overview, I could write tons of things about how it affects me and my relationships with people that are already difficult, neuropsychological issues (motor skills, my performance skills and speech not matching my writing, theory of mind, male brain characteristics, etc) our autistic traits (possibly due to androgen issues cause it's almost the same), but don't want to make it too long. Most of the time, I'm pretty cool and logical about this, but recently it changed, perhaps due to high stress and exhausting job.

Sorry for my English, not my first language.

WOW. You've had some tremendously hard knocks in your life and you've prevailed. Your writing is fine. You are very articulate. First, let me say how sorry I am that you are having such a tough time and second, how can we get you away from this toxic environment? Can you come up with a plan and then take things one baby step at a time? Good luck and keep posting to let me know how you are. I care.

Well, I can only go out more and keep saving money.

The thing that troubles me the most is actually how I come across other people. I'm very self conscious and socially anxious because I kept getting negative feedback from others my whole life. I obsessively research interpersonal skills and stuff like that (I'm also keen on neuropsychology and neurobiology) but most things that happen when you're around others are spontaneous and you don't always have control over your responses. My appearance itself is an issue, because I have this aggressive, unusual look and very sharp features, very deep voice etc. I was bullied since primary school until high school, for my looks but also for my behaviour (lack of natural social skills, acting blunt often, being too proud, critical, zealous etc). There was a time in my life where I was attending a school abroad and would get physically and mentally threatened on a regular basis. Then in high school I had this rebellious phase that wasn't that bad in the end cause I started getting friends and people around me and with many of them I'm still in touch (I'm from a small town where everyone knows everyone). I really overlooked my behaviour like two years ago after I was physically attacked along with my friend (the cause was completely random and stupid, but people got seriously drunk and it started, the party was in another city, with people we didn't know well), and some gal that heard of me only from stories used the opportunity to try to fight me but also told me how awful I am and everyone hates me etc. I got really down for a year and started getting even more defensive and anxious. I stopped doing some things and try to act fair with people and kind of improved on that.
But the point is, there is something about the way I speak, my voice (okay, I really do have a weird prosody, even when I listened to myself on a tape), my looks, I don't know, that still stresses people out sometimes. I've been sometimes told that either people get stressed by me or I look stressed. Like, yesterday I went to the pub with my friends and there was some guy, who only heard of me, didn't know me, like really stoned and drunk (everyone wanted to get rid of him), but he just said something random approaching us and I didn't even open my mouth yet and he was like "Woah, you, you think I'm scared of you or something?" and I was like "Eeeee?". Not the first time, drunk or stoned people used to tell me such things in the past too. Maybe they say something sober people won't. But it also happens to me to offend people while I don't even know I'm offending them, like maybe two hours later when I think of it. Few days ago I was finishing my morning shift, sleep deprived at that time (always sleep deprived on morning shifts which make me get up before 4 in the morning) and I went to my coworker and she chose the wrong workstation that day so we couldn't work together and was like "Oh, you've ran away so far from us today!" and I just wanted to joke and said "Well, I think before I chose the workstation! Like, strategically" but it didn't sound like a joke at all (that also happens often), just awkward. Or I was parking with my guy friend, he was driving and said "I parked terribly, but I'll be off for a second, will you repark the car if someone has a problem?" and I went "Oh, it's called parallel parking in English I think and it's diffi..." "Will you repark the car if something?" "Oh, yeah". Like, there is a wall between me and what other people say sometimes and how I filter it. Wrong Theory of Mind, or something. I'm also very anxious at work, because we work in a huge open plan space and you are constantly watched and forced to interact.
I keep on being around people, it's like a desensatization technique, but it only helps to lessen the general anxiety.

His actions are really causing me distress. I have a hard time dealing with rejection, especially from someone who I was emotionally tied to. He doesn't speak to me and I just hear him complaining about his health and everything, how the world is bad and others nasty. My mother's mother asked him few days ago if he cares about someone and loves anyone "No, I do not. I didn't love my mother, I don't love anyone, don't bother with such emotional ****". And he plans onto leaving for another city to get some part time job. He's been moving out a lot since I was a kid, longest time three years, always with that "I'm so tired of you all and happy to leave you" manner. My mother asked me yesterday why I DON'T TALK to father anymore and I was like "Just because", cause I'm tired of her ignorance. My mother sticks to everyone and gets heavily involved even if that someone treats her or me badly. Same with my grandfather, she runs around him like a dog. Thinks I should be kind and lovely to everyone and never show anger, no matter how they treat me. I'm really angry and upset because of this, such stuff happened in the past already and I only managed to have a good contact with my father and mother for some particular period of time. Last year my father stopped speaking to me too for a few months, then again because I didn't want my dying grandmother placed in my room in my very bed, as they were planning back then, because I felt it was a violation of my privacy and I already have little of it. I didn't want to pay for my grandfathers stupidity, he could easily buy himself a flat that had proper heating (it was winter and they were planning it in case she wouldn't go to the hospital and had to stay at home), I wasn't the one to blame for his self imposed poverty. They said I was a heartless monster and that my opinion doesn't matter anyway and they won't bother about it. I have a hard time dealing with issues that you cannot fix immidiately and here I constantly go on and on again about the topic, changing the narrative in my head, but it just isn't something that can be fixed. And I tend to fixate on such things. My anxiety got much worse lately. I am really angry for having such immature people as parents, for having to deal with the knowledge that I was just a nuisance to them, because my mother didn't bother using contraception and my father only feel trapped by her and this family stuff (they told me this). I see my peers getting support from their families, they are helping them with stepping into adulthood, get emotional and financial help (okay, most doesn't even have to work, but i don't think it's good for them), and here I am with two people who behave like five year olds and my father who used to take money from me or my mother after severe calculations for each kilometer I asked him to drive me somewhere. He criticizes people who send their children to vacations, who go somewhere, make money, so their kids won't have to worry "oh, my parents never thought about having a place to leave, so we're renting, so technically I may have nowhere to stay at in in the future and have to work like crazy so I will maybe afford it after 11 years of saving". They are also not getting any younger, my father has a damaged spine, my mother doesn't care about health and I fear that in a few or more years, I will be in the same place my dad was with his parents. Alone, barely supporting myself as a single working woman, having to also support their living and physically care for them, because I will get no help from the social services, already seen how it works. I'm also thinking about changing the country again, because it's all much harder when you live in mine.
For example, for 11 years we were on a list for a council flat. And we almost got one, even though it was barely a flat: required putting a lot of money into it. Only one room for the three of us, 37 metres square, no bathroom, no kitchen, rotten wooden floor, smelled like hell, the old, doddery wallpaper was curling off the walls. A disaster, but it was possible to make something out of it and we could then buy it for a cheaper price (every normal flat is sold by the city council for a normal price to the private customers and the city gets money from it, just as it happens alongside the country). But just before we were to get it, they checked our income again and it happened that - because I started working year before - the income was like 400 dollars too high so we finally didn't, they told us to wait another few months or few years. So now my father stopped working so we have lower family income and he just sits at home, only checking some no-contract offers. He used to say that if not we, he wouldn't even bother moving out of this ruin my grandfather lives in. I think they really did nothing to prepare a future for me, and I don't want to get into this "I have a tough life and it's my parents fault", but I sometimes have to, due to socioeconomic situation in my country, because people don't just get all self sufficient here, maintaining their living from a single wage. Even if you work like crazy. You either live at home with your parents and divide bills into the number of people in the household, or you get a partner and rent a flat or you are sponsored by your family completely. And there is my father who mentally lives in Disneyland and has his sick expectations such as me buying him a car or making him not having to work anymore, while I don't even have my own. He doesn't appreciate my job, even though he himself has been constantly changing them and even now, being 21, I already stayed at my work for the longer period he has ever at a single position. He once even complained about me not becoming a CEO, manager or anything. Have you ever seen a 21 yo with basic job experience becoming a CEO at a company after 6 months of working there? I don't think so. I have nothing towards a bit of motivating stress, but I really do have tons of issues in my life and what they're getting me is just frustration, because no matter what I do, it will never work. I'm good at managing and solving some temporary issues, but no idea what to do with all of this on an emotional level, since I have an obsessively analitycal mind that is not designed for such stuff or whatever.