New Low

Last year I lost my job. Couldn't find another job in my field. Have been living alone in a foreign country. But today was a new low. I discovered family is just a lie. At least mine is. My regret is I allowed them to influence my life style and decisions: from what I say, dress, where I went, what I studied ... etc. What I am suffering now is because of that. Every person should do what they want and make the decisions that make them happy. If you are not happy, then no one around you will be happy. If you follow your heart, at least you will be happy, but I am also almost certain, if you are happy others around you will be happy, too. My father always told me "I want you to be happy" while influencing my life to the tiniest details. But this is a lie. The reality is he wanted to be happy through me. I shouldn't have listened to him. I shouldn't have accepted his money because by accepting money from him, I allowed him to own my life. It's a late realization.

I can totally identify with you.

My parents were very controlling. I think now that perhaps they suffered from some form of mental illness. But after decades of being controlled I became sort of brainwashed into thinking that this was normal and healthy. It took me a long time to realize that it is not very healthy. I have become less brainwashed over the years although I would not say that I have ever become completely free of it. Every day is a challenge.

I am very sorry that you are in the situation you describe. I think it is heartbreaking. I wish I knew what to say that would help. I do think that you are very heroic to be trying to transcend the unhappy things in your past and present. That is very, very admirable.

Thanks for sharing this. It got me thinking back to my own father. (I'm an old man myself now and he's been deceased for several decades.) There's a long story I could share regarding my relationship with my father. But the story would be too complicated to write out in any meaningful way. So I'll spare you that.

I never really thought about, nor understood, the dream my father had for his own life as well as the anticipations I think he had for the part I would play in it. But recently I've been watching some free old films on YouTube. And in the father / son relationships I've seen in some of those old films I think I perceive what my father's dream was about, in what way I must have been such a disappointment to him, and how what my father did in an effort to pursue his dream contributed to the train wreck I made of my own life... a realization that, in my case, came entirely too late.

It seems to me, from my own experience, parents don't realize how they can ruin their children lives. My father is convinced that he wasn't wrong in physically and emotionally abusing me. To him that was "necessary" for me because I "don't know what's good for me" so I would be "happy in the future" and I "will thank him later" for that.

Hmmmm, I fought hard to get my degree & have a computer engineering career.....but in 1994, aerospace crashed & finding a career job anywhere was impossible. I was happy with my career, but when you loose a career & can't find a job whether one you were forced into or not is traumatic & just because you were happy with the path your life took, when it falls apart, one becomes unhappy!

Fast forward 13 years & I was able to start life over but it had nothing to do with the career I got my degree & trained for. Life was new, 2100 miles away on a little farm I bought. Sometimes we hit those lowes before we can get on our feet again.

Living ones life to please others is never a good idea. I fought hard to go to the university & get my BS degree. Was it worth it? YES, because it let those who tried to influence me otherwise that it wouldn't work. I am sure if my parents were still living they wouldn't think what they did was wrong either & neither would my EX. Sometimes we just have to stop & reassess our own life & then go forward from there with a goal of doing what you want & forging your own identity.