My Story So Far (Long post, sorry!)

[kisa_marie]

I know that I'm new here, but I feel like if I don't talk about it..it'll keep coming up. I'll try to start at the beginning, but I might go off on a few tangents.

When I was seven, I attempted suicide for the first time. I was supposed to be moving overseas with my family, but because my health (as I have a chronic, immune disease) was not in the best of conditions. I overheard my mother and older sister say that if they didn't have me, they could move. I went into the kitchen, and I held a knife to my stomach. I started thinking that they should be happy somewhere else. I shouldn't hold them back, you know? My sister found me in the kitchen, and she knocked the knife out of my hands. She smacked me really hard, and then she punched me in the stomach. She yelled at me and asked me "what the hell" I was doing. I hit the tiled floor, but I didn't answer her. I kinda felt like I deserved it, since I was doing something stupid. So she started kicking me. She told me I was being stupid, and that she would just beat the shit out of me, if I wanted to hurt so badly. She told me she'd beat me up again if I told our mom. So when my mom showered with me, and saw the bruises on my ribs and stomach, she asked me what happened. I told her I fell down the stairs.

When I was nine, and my sister was thirteen, we started enjoying the ... pop culture. She took it upon herself to smack the back of my head when I said or did anything she thought was stupid. Around this time, my mother got kind of...emotionally abusive. She would leave me to my own devices, finding it much more pleasurable to sleep the day away. I wouldn't eat for hours, and I would just do my homework or read. When I tried to check up on her, she told me to just leave her alone, because I could never understand what she was going through. She started to show more favor towards my sister, who got to sit on the bed with her, while I sat on the floor. They would be very cliquey, and would never really spend time with me. I thought maybe my parents' wanting to get divorced caused this, but...I didn't spend time with anyone. My father worked a lot, and my mother and sister just ignored me. My sister yelled at me that I didn't understand anything, and that I was a traitor of sorts for wanting to live with my dad, not my mom.

The idea of me being a traitor followed me into my teen years. My parents separated, but didn't technically get divorced. My mother got with a man she knew from her childhood. He gave me bad vibes when I met him. He visited our house, under the guise of coming over for a beer. I saw my mom spruce herself up, like she never did for my dad, and I got the picture. When I met him, I didn't like him. I played pool with my sister, instead. When he saw that we were playing with only half of the cue sticks, he said he would show us how to play, with my sister and my mom on one team, and me and him on the other. He offered to teach me how to shoot, and stood too close behind me. I was 12.

At 14, I lost my best friend to a hit-and-run. My family moved to (removed place names) for financial reasons. We had very little connections there, and I was separated from everyone who kept me sane. I stopped taking medication for my diabetes, and I ended up going to the hospital. I don't remember much from the first hospital, but I remember being transferred to another one by ambulance. I guess my diabetes was bad, because they said they were taking me to Intensive Care. I don't remember blacking out, but they told me in the ambulance that I died for a few minutes, since my heart stopped beating. Eventually, they had a social worker talk to me, and I admitted I was suicidal. They put me in a behavioral hospital, which didn't help at all. In my family therapy sessions, my mother never believed a word I said, and narrowly escaped Child Protective Services. When I got home from the hospital, I told my mother I wanted to go live with my dad, who I always had a better relationship with, even now. She told me I could use her phone, but I had to stay in the room with her and my sister, as they had to hear what I told my dad. When I left the room afterwards, they talked about how they were "appalled" by me, and how I had "betrayed" them, after everything they did to me. My mother didn't tell me she had signed papers that authorized the behavioral hospital to take me into their care.

We ended up back in (removed place name) before I turned 15. My mother spent almost all her time at her boyfriend's house, if not at work. My sister never let me leave the apartment without a house phone, which would only let me go so far away from the apartment. If I wandered out of range where the phone could be called, she would yell at me, and tell my mother, who would then tell me I couldn't leave the apartment at all. My sister wouldn't do housework, claiming that she already knew how, and it was my turn to learn. I didn't mind doing the cleaning, but it was constant in the way that I would have to rewash dishes that were already clean, or scrub at stained counters when the stain was simply not coming out. She was allowed to use the dishwasher, but I wasn't. In the apartment we lived in, she slept on a thick comforter (we had no furniture), and I slept on just a sheet on the floor. Most times, I remember my mother having us sleep over at her boyfriend's house with her and him. One night, when it was just me, my mom, and her boyfriend, at his house, they got into an argument. I heard him yelling that he didn't care about her safety. I didn't know what they were arguing about. All of a sudden, I felt very scared. I started shaking, and crying. I put on headphones, but I couldn't shake off that feeling. Music has always been comforting, a sort of therapy. But the sense of dread, almost doom, wouldn't go away. I think I blacked out for a few minutes, because when I came to, my mom's boyfriend was trying to comfort me, and I started screaming "No! No! No, no, no!" My mom came, and took me into a bathroom, and started asking me what was wrong with me. He ended up taking us back to our apartment, and he stood in my doorway, trying to talk to me. I threw things at him, and pointed outside my room. He told me he loved me, but I threw more things at him before he left. We were never the same, and I'm fucking glad.

By 17, I was angsty, suicidal on a regular basis, depressed and anxious, scared to go outside...The three of them never let me outside. They kept me from another best friend, who I loved dearly. I barely went to school, because they didn't want to take me. They had all the passwords to my emails, social media, and they took away any phones, my iPod, and frequently took me with them if they knew they would've otherwise left me home alone. On the night of my 17th birthday, my mother's boyfriend (an alcoholic) bought me a Party Pack of Smirnoff, per my request. This...I blame on myself. I was drunk. There was a "Saw" movie marathon that night, and I wanted to watch it. My mom and my sister were so drunk, they went to bed early, leaving me with him. I must've gestured that I had back pain or something, because before I knew it, I was laying down on the couch, on my stomach, and he was on my back, giving me a massage (???). Only...it was my lower back. And lower than that. I felt his hands between my legs, on my shorts. He told me that my ass was "like [my] mom's," before he spanked me. He asked me if what he was doing felt good. I don't think I said anything. I was watching it happen. I was floating by the ceiling. I know I haven't mentioned it before, but I also suffer from DID. I think I've had it since I was a kid. My dad remembers a lot of odd incidents. I remember one of them (Stephen, who isn't always there, but he comes back sometimes) saying that if he hadn't been working late, he could've stopped my mom's boyfriend. When I told my mother, she didn't believe me. She said I just didn't know what it was like to have a father-figure. These "massages" happened for years, from when I was 12 to when I was 18. I still blame myself for being drunk, but excuse him because he was drunk and high on marijuana.

Three months after I turned 18, we were preparing for Christmas. Two days before Christmas, things were..odd around the house. My mom and her boyfriend were arguing (as they did frequently), and my mom knocked down our Christmas tree, screaming that she was "done with this shit." My sister went downstairs to see what was wrong. After a few minutes, I heard my sister cry out "Don't you push her!" and I ran out of my room. My mom was on the floor, screaming for her boyfriend, my sister was fronting him, and I was still standing on the stairs. He yelled at me "What the fuck do you want!?" and my sister told me to grab her phone and call the cops. They couldn't do anything, despite the fact he was drunker than holy hell, and he left a bong on the living room table. My sister and I stayed at a friend's house, and my mom stayed at the townhouse we ended up moving to, so he couldn't claim our stuff. When we came back, apparently, all was forgiven. I started planning to move out.

I made the plan to move out after New Years, and go live with my boyfriend. When I told my sister this, she took my e-reader tablet (where I was talking to my boyfriend), and hit me on the knee with it. She stuck her thumbs in my eyes, started choking me, bent me backwards over her knee, and elbowed me in the stomach. She told me I was stupid, and was mad that I wasn't moving out with her. I shoved her into the door, to get her off me. Only then, did my mother intervene. My sister took the tablet to her, and told her I was planning to leave. She looked at me, and told me that our relationship was "over," before storming out of the house to hang out with a friend. I told my mother what I was planning, and I said I was going to call my boyfriend. She told me I would only leave with the clothes I had on; not my insulin, not my laptop where I did homework...Nothing. I called my boyfriend and told him he had to come get me. My mom said she needed to talk to him, and went to her room, closing the door behind her. I quickly packed what I could, including all my insulin, what clothes I fit, my laptop, and very few other things. I knocked on her door, and told her to give me the phone. I told my boyfriend I was ready, and that I would see him soon. I went to the front door, and heard my mom on the phone with her boyfriend, telling him that I was leaving, so he should come home. She told me she needed to check all my bags, to which I responded "No...I gotta go..." I walked out with my bags, and gave one last look at the house, giving myself the option to back out. I walked down the hill, and down the street, and waited to be picked up.

My mother still goes to the college I go to, but my sister moved out of state. Every time I see my mother, my heart jumps. I still fear I'll run into my mother and her boyfriend, somewhere on the street. The others (Stephen, Tori, Johnny) tell me they would never let that happen, and would just guide me in the opposite direction. But the fear doesn't end. The nightmares never end. But for now, that's the story of my escape from those people. I don't even know if I can call any of it abuse. But it happened to me, and I just wanted someone to tell it to.

[Bonnie]

Hey, I just want to say that I'm sorry it all happened to you, and I can relate to some of it. My relationship with my family haven't been great either, but this sounds worse and I can only imagine how painful it must have been and still be. And I'd dafinitely say it's abuse. It wasn't your fault because you were drunk. I'm probably the wrong person to say this, since I blame myself a lot, but I really don't think you should blame yourself for this.

[pinecone]

Horrible. Your family of origin treated you horribly. I'm glad that you walked away. But it stays with you until you heal. Best wishes to you.

-pinecone

[kisa_marie]

I've been trying my best to not think about things, but I'm still having nightmares about it. For almost three months, I haven't really been leaving the house. I have online classes in college, but I haven't been going to the campus. I don't go anywhere, including grocery shopping and doctor's appointments, without my boyfriend. I don't feel depression as much, or even anger. I had spoken to my doctor because Tori, my matriarch alter, noticed that, while I'm not suicidal, I've had an extreme feeling of apathy. Sometimes I can't even get out of bed in the morning.