how do you accept that what happened to you is real?

or really what you think it was?

I'm not saying I think I made it up or that I don't remember because I do. I'm saying what if it wasn't what I think it is?

Objectively, what if I am at fault here? What if any belief I have that I am not in the wrong is just selfishness or confirmation bias?

I don’t remember a time when my dad and I weren’t having violent arguments all the time. Maybe I was just really out of control and he didn’t know what to do with me.

It was never like that with my brother as much as with me. He got it but not like I did. If I just taken my punishment in the first place maybe it would never have escalated like that.

--Trigger---sorry!

For example I remember one time when I was eight or nine, we were fighting and he was hitting me and hitting me and I ran off to my room and he followed and I was just screaming at him to leave me alone, get away from me, blah blah blah and he picked me up and dropped me in the shower. I felt really out of control; red in the face, terrified, fighting him. After that he went off somewhere and my mom was there and I was shaking and crying and trying to calm down and my mom asked me if maybe I needed “to talk to someone.”

What if I am just biologically messed up in some way? I feel like I need to get past this to really get better and I'm stuck on it...

I have no advice but I can totally relate to the way you feel. I STRONGLY identify with this - "What if I am just biologically messed up in some way". You're not alone.

I am very sorry you experienced this. I am glad to hear that you do trust the memory of these events happening. The bottom line is that parents are responsible for caring for their children in an appropriate fashion. Screaming, yelling, hitting, throwing, dropping, are NOT behaviors that are ever acceptable examples of how to care for a child.
All children will sometimes act childish - they're children! - and all children will sometimes misbehave. I suspect your behavior was normal. However, even if your behavior was completely over the top out of control, it would have been your parents' responsibility to make sure you received appropriate medical and/or psychological care, while educating themselves on how to best care for you. It would have still been no excuse for abusive behavior on their part.
If you take yourself out of the equation, would you still make excuses for them? If it was some other little girl in the scenario you described above, would you think it was okay for the dad to treat her that way?

This is why discussing stuff in therapy is so important. It helps you to understand what happened to you and be able to put it into perspective for what really happened and how it affected you.

Gr3tta, thank you thank you thank you for your response. Of course the answer is no, I would want to protect a child in that position, and that realization just made me feel super sad. It took me a couple of days to collect my thoughts to reply.

Sannah, I do want to talk to T about this. Bleh. I had a therapy session this morning, but I didn't want to talk about it. This is a new therapist (just the 3rd meeting).

Actually we talked about privacy and about me not pushing myself so far to self-disclose that I feel bad and space out (I think he sees this as a self-care issue)!

I'm glad you talked with T about privacy, and I would agree it's a self-care issue, absolutely! It's a difficult balance sometimes, figuring out how to push yourself to share and reveal, but how NOT to push yourself so hard that it leaves you spaced out, feeling too drained, or unable to function the rest of the day. I hope your discussion with T went well.

I don't know how to accept it...but I definitely can relate to your post. I wonder all the time if I'm really at fault for what happened, or I'm just looking for a reason to explain why I'm so ****ed up. It doesn't help that NO ONE will validate any of the things I've expressed or felt or remembered, and it seems like everyone blames me for things that happened to me.

Sorry I don't have any advice...but if it helps, you're not alone.