[Lorelai]

Hello and thank you for reading my inquiry!

My parents got married because my father raped my mother and this was the custom. They separated when I was 4 and divorced when I was 7. My mother would be in hospital for weeks because of the beatings. He also tried to set her hair on fire and throw her from 4th floor. He does not seem to have any guilt about this and he still is insulting to her.

My mother remarried and I completely loved my new dad, as he seemed to be the father I wished for, but then did a complete reversal of behavior, but being careful to maintain the perfect image for outsiders. He would humiliate my mother, she would even kneel in front of him begging for forgiveness and I resented her deeply for not standing up to herself.

My step father would say I will never be anything in life, that I will take care of gooses on the side of the street, he'd call me stupid. His favorite was to slap me in the face and grab my hair and punish me all the time by isolating me in my room for every little thing and forcing me to read religious books.
After he left, my mother continued to abuse me physically and verbally and make me feel incredibly guilty. I could never spend money my father gave me on myself without her telling me how horribly selfish I was, that she hopes I will never have a daughter like me and making all sorts of scenes. She would say all the time that I care nothing but about myself. We did not have much, so sometimes I would have some candy to eat it for myself, she'd make scenes on my selfishness about that too. Now that I am a grown-up she makes scenes about her bills, whenever I visit for a few days, and guilt trips me by saying they're so big because I am there and I make a waste of water, electricity etc.

I am not employed at the moment, and I also have a creativity block that my ex-therapist was unable to comprehend or solve.

I would always be in a state of fear with my mother, because I knew it was just a matter of time before the other shoe would drop and nothing I did was ever good enough.

I live with my father now, and I am always afraid that he would turn violent on me, I am also in a state of constant fear with him. He used to verbally abuse me when I was little by caling me all possible names especially ‘’*****’’ and he has implied all his life to me that women short on money would to that and he’d be short on money with me.

He seems to be lacking empathy and incapable of seeing how he hurts me, and is always grandiose about himself, nothing is ever good enough for him, he is always demeaning about all the ideas and all the people unless those ideas are identical to his and those people are like him. My bother is his ‘’star’’, the child who can do no wrong.

I seem to only exist for my father as a female body that is alluring or as a mind, if I think like him. He seems to despise women and think they are inferior because of their weaker nature and their emotions.

As a child I was also abused sexually and physically by my babysitter (a high school girl). I also had a dental flaw as a child and everyone in the neighborhood would make fun of me that I looked like a rabbit and some would chase me to beat me up. I felt hurt, as I wanted to make friends. Now, due to this kind of experiences and others, I am afraid of people, that they want to hurt me. I have isolated starting from childhood, in order to survive my dad's abuse of mom into a dream world or reading or music. I still have not come out of it.

My last relationship was with a very abusive schizophrenic, that tried to kill me and ruined every bit of my self esteem.

I've tried to recover and I have managed a little, but I still don't know what to do.

Even the idea of being better financially than my mother, or happier, makes me feel horrible guilt, as if I would steal her happiness. The guilt is so big that is unbearable. So I am living by just scraping by. Even when my salary was bigger than my mothers, I would always feel unhappiness and could not enjoy anything of what I had. I told her about this, she said she wants me to be fine, but plays her guilt trips on me just like before.

I feel a deep state of shame sometimes during the day, buy especially at the state between sleep and waking up. The shame is so intense that I fear it would blow me to pieces. I feel deeply flawed, and that the whole planet sees how flawed I am and is pointing fingers at me and laughs at me, that I am utterly and completely ridiculous, that everything I do and think is like that.
I have been told by two art teachers that I have a talent in art so big, that they've rarely seen it. I have a journalist friend to whom I give what I write and he says I have the potential to be a world famous writer and that I am that talented.

I barely managed to write or draw, because of the shame I feel and that everyone will laugh at me for what I do, even if most time my work has been applauded by my friends and only had good things to say.

It hurts me the most that I have to live life scraping by, that I am becoming a wasted life that never risen to its potential. I want to be free, at least now. Then all the pain the the past would not matter.

I took some therapy and I was disappointed, because I did not feel she understood me or took my pain seriously. I was diagnosed with PTSD and depression. They gave me meds for 2 months and said I should be fine. I told them I was not, and they said I did not seem depressed. Therapy is not very developed in my country.
I also suspect I have ADHD.

I apologize for the long text. I really tried in putting it in less words, but could not make it shorter.

Thank you!

[Sannah]

Hi Lorelai, welcome to PC. I am sorry that you didn't have parents who knew how to treat a child correctly. I can support you here. I hope that you can work through this past abuse.

[Sannah]

I forgot to address your question. Your shame and guilt belong to those who gave it to you. I hope you can give it back.

[BLUEDOVE]

So sorry you have had to suffer such terrible abuse. Sannah is right--their is a thing called
"Auditory Imprints";which is when the negative
stuff we heard towards us becomes so deeply
imprinted in the child's mind,that the child later
thinks it originates from him/herself!
So knowing this,you can now DROP IT and start to
be kind to yourself--that negativity does not
belong to you. I was impressed with your creative talents (I draw+paint too),so please
fight to make the most of them,and fight for the
child you once were--you are all she's got.
I shall say a prayer for you.
God Bless,
BLUEDOVE.

[Lorelai]

Originally Posted by Sannah

I forgot to address your question. Your shame and guilt belong to those who gave it to you. I hope you can give it back.

Yes, I am aware that the shame and guild I feel is from them, that I am carrying their shame, and that all the guilt I feel is from my mother. I want to find a way to break that.

Thank you for your reply!

[Lorelai]

Originally Posted by BLUEDOVE

So sorry you have had to suffer such terrible abuse. Sannah is right--their is a thing called
"Auditory Imprints";which is when the negative
stuff we heard towards us becomes so deeply
imprinted in the child's mind,that the child later
thinks it originates from him/herself!
So knowing this,you can now DROP IT and start to
be kind to yourself--that negativity does not
belong to you. I was impressed with your creative talents (I draw+paint too),so please
fight to make the most of them,and fight for the
child you once were--you are all she's got.
I shall say a prayer for you.
God Bless,
BLUEDOVE.

Thank you very much for your answer!
I think this is what happened to me, because for a long time, I could hear those negative voices, or I would feel bad and if I dug deeper then I would find some negative remark behind it, but I did not know who they belonged to, they has just been there since I can recall.
I've started to read psychology, psychiatry books, and self-analyze using my limited ways and knowledge and I realized it was from them.
I also think my mother feels deeply shamed and that is a burden she has carried all her life, from previous generations as well.
When it comes to my father, the lack of self esteem he has caused me, I believe comes from his negative and demeaning attitude towards anyone that is different or any ideas that are not like his. I live with him now and I dislike his presence, because it makes me feel tensed. I wish I could open up to him, because I don't like to be alone in the house, but I know what follows if I do that: more put downs or demeaning attitudes, more hurting and unavailabilty from him. I've had enough and I don't feel like having that anymore!
He interrupts me when I talk, starts talking his own stories over mine, give no importance to my stories, or my feelings. I can't stand to have a discussion with him because of this, because it turns into a monologue about how great he was in his lifetime.

I want to get rid of those voices and help the little girl inside me, help her grow up, because right now, even if I am an adult, I still feel like a child many times.
I don't know what to do from here. I feel like I am fighting a dragon (auditory imprints) with a poking stick (think positive). The voices are so powerful and hateful that I feel I am going to be blown away to bits physically, that they will make me vanish from existence.

I want to defeat all this and reclaim my life back!