"do it scared" no I won't, sorry guys

I love how I will wake up from a nightmare and then not be able to move much from the bed that day. Really adds a level of helplessness and panic in this 'struggle for survival' type life.

As a kid did you ever feel like, refusing to have fun, and actively keeping yourself away from anything that would make you laugh or have a good time because you had a strong feeling the the Horrors™ should be addressed/experienced first? And you wanted to wait until someone noticed that something was wrong and addressed the horrors with you, and only after that the fun would be allowed?

me about my mother during my childhood: I would do anything for her, I won't let anyone insult her, I'll do her work because she's sick often and I want her to rest and get better! I'll give her gifts and let her know she's a good person :)

my mother about me during my childhood: I will throw this stupid useless child to the wolves and then criticize how ugly their crying is

Having a traumatic childhood means you cannot talk even objectively about your basic foundational experiences without it being "venting", even if you're not actually venting. You just straight up have a huge chunk of your life you can't talk about, full stop, without it being trauma dumping.

And it not being socially acceptable to talk about your own childhood is super alienating. Sometimes people want to know why, and any answer you can give them is going to be off putting.

It's to the point I get irritated when something I said is framed as venting when I'm literally just talking about my life experiences, doing my best to keep emotion out of it.

Do you ever have a friend complain about you about all the stress and struggles and pain in their life, and then you react appropriately to it, with comfort and reassurance and understanding and acknowledgment. And you're the only person in their life who responded this way, everyone else dismisses them or minimizes their pain or tells them off. And from that point on, you become their 'comfort friend'. They come to you only when they have a problem, when something bad happens, when they're stressed and overwhelmed and need some warmth and comfort to feel okay again.

But they don't share any other aspect of their life with you anymore. They have friends they go out with, they have friends they share their interests with, they have friends for joking around, celebrating, going on field trips and enjoying new media. You're left out of all of that, and only cross their mind once they're feeling bad and want someone to understand and comfort them.

And even if you try to engage with them in a different way, or express interest in doing other things, talk about happy and cheerful topics with them, they can't keep it up, eventually they melt away and go back to venting and seeking comfort, because that's the need they've allocated you to fulfill in their life, and they have other people for all those other needs.

But it doesn't feel good, for anyone, to be a 'comfort friend'. To think that someone only remembers you when things are bad. To know that every conversation will have drama, stress, pain and despair in it, that your role is to soothe that and then to let them go until they need it again. You can't ask them for reciprocation because they already put you in the role of the one who 'takes care', or because they don't react as well as you do to other's despair, they instead dismiss you like their friends dismiss them, because that's what they consider a 'normal' reaction, and they don't see the irony in that. They don't see what you do for them, they take you for granted, and get you to feel bad for them, because they subject you to the worst of their life constantly.

it was disrespectful to give birth to me

Asking for help when you're being abused, doesn't come naturally. It, in fact, feels counter-productive, dangerous, wrong, bad, shameful, mortifying, scary, burdensome (for the person you're asking), and sometimes the abused person can feel like they would rather keep to themselves forever, than reach out and say what is going on.

This is not accidental; abusers make it so on purpose. They spend a lot of effort convincing you that you're a burden on the entire world, that you're attention hungry and making things up to stir up drama, that you lie and remember things wrong, that you should be ashamed of what was done to you and how you made the abuser do it. Even if not spoken out loud, it is very clear that if you said anything to anyone, you would be punished, shamed, and put trough even worse abuse than what you're experiencing right now. That things would turn around to make you seem like you're the worse one in the situation and everyone would side with the abuser.

So reaching out for help, after a certain point, feels useless. Like you'd be only inconveniencing people around you, showing them how incapable you are, how helpless and pathetic and ashamed you feel, and nobody would be able to help you anyway. Abusers make it seem like they're above law and authority, the idea that just another person could do anything to stop them feels ridiculous. And there's a possibility outsiders will side with the abuser, making the situation infinitely worse for you, because they will tell the abuser and get you into worse trouble.

Not asking for help, and instead just surviving or maybe independently trying to get away, is not a sign of a fault, or a person not trying hard enough and not wanting help. It means the situation is so bad that involving another person might mean extra danger, and doesn't lead to resolving the situation.

When you think about it, what does your average person do to help someone in abuse? There's no easy steps to secure somebody's safety. A person might report it, which might end up just pissing the abuser off. The victim often has no other place to go, so now they're threatened with homelessness. Someone offering you a place to stay might work short-term, while also being dangerous, but victims need more than short-term solutions. They need permanent, foolproof and secure life plan to stay away from the abuser. They need resources that help them access safe places to indefinitely stay in, they need consistent income, and a community to keep them safe. This is not something that anyone can just offer, and even programs that offer some of this help, are temporary.

Sometimes we don't ask for help because we can tell that help is impossible, and sometimes, we're conditioned not to, we have gone trough torture for just thinking of telling someone what's going on. We still want the abuse to stop. We still need to get away. We're still doing our best to survive and escape, while also trying to not inconvenience anyone around us.

something i think a lot of able bodied people dont understand is that being chronically ill affects your emotions. constantly being exhausted and feeling bad is going to make you sad or depressed or angry or jealous. constantly being in pain is going to affect your mental health. never feeling "good" is obviously going to affect the way you act.

my parents during all of my formative years: there's something fundamentally wrong with you. you're unlovable and nobody will ever want you. you are a waste of space and shouldn't exist.

me, for the rest of my life: hm, I wonder why I feel like there's something fundamentally wrong with me and I'm unlovable and a waste of space. It's a mystery.

Being raised in the abuse means the dynamics in the home changed for your rapidly. One moment everything could be okay, you could be just tending to your own business, playing or doing homework or even hanging out and cracking jokes, and then within that same day, without you doing anything to cause it, there can be screaming, death threats, you running for safety in your room, trying to argue back but being shut down, obscenities being thrown into your face, you blamed for the entire thing. Or, you could be outside with your family enjoying a field trip and everything is fine and everyone's in a good mood, and then later in the car every adult is screaming, throwing blame, exploding with rage and bitterness and you quiet down hyper aware that all of this can be turned against you in a second.

After a while you can predict when things are likely going to go bad, but you can't control it. It's never you who decides to start the drama, you're always doing your best to make it safe and calm again, to get to that place where maybe someone was talking to you in a normal tone of voice or said something funny that made you laugh. You need that reality to be true, you need that normal. You do everything in your power to keep it consistent, but it seems that any minor inconvenience, any kind of event, any little irritation and frustration that comes from the outside, can throw the entire family experience into chaos, hatred, threats and violence.

This inconsistency and instability is what causes constant vigilance and anxiety. You cannot count on anything. You cannot know whether the parent you need something from, will react calmly and give it to you without an issue, or whether they'll turn on you and ask you what about what they need, why you never ask about their needs, and what a filthy selfish disgusting brat you are, leaving you alone with a problem you're not able to solve. You don't know whether you're allowed to speak your mind or say what you think, because sometimes it's allowed, and sometimes it's taken as a provocation and 'talking back' and you could be punished for it. The rules and goalposts change constantly, you don't know what behaviour is allowed or okay, never know what is expected from you, only that whatever you're doing can be proclaimed as wrong and punishable.

Your parents moods and whims dictate the atmosphere, and what kind of parent you get that day. You need a parent who cares about your moods too. Your need for consistency, reliability, safety, predictability, logical consequences and clarity, is completely ignored in favour of two adults throwing tantrums every other day of the week. Your childhood and raising you are so insignificant, they don't even care about your experience of it, or how hard you're trying to keep an illusion of 'normal', so that you would keep being able to survive in a home like that. Having parents that can change moods rapidly, explode, go from rage to good humor in a second and then turn back just as quick, is traumatic for a child who needs a consistent, kind, attentive and patient parent. That child deserves a parent too. Not this. Even adults wouldn't be able to consistently deal with bullshit abused kids go trough every day.

It's not enough that you didn't love me, you had to convince me that nobody else would either. Because you knew that if I thought otherwise, I would attempt to escape from you and find acceptance and love elsewhere. You couldn't have that. You had to keep me where I was unloved, and without hope that I could be loved. And for what. Because it suited you to make use of me? Was it worth it? You have an enemy now.

my parents during all of my formative years: there's something fundamentally wrong with you. you're unlovable and nobody will ever want you. you are a waste of space and shouldn't exist.

me, for the rest of my life: hm, I wonder why I feel like there's something fundamentally wrong with me and I'm unlovable and a waste of space. It's a mystery.

As a person who spends a lot of time lying down and rarely does any kind of activities, I come off as someone who's taking a lot of 'me' time, or a lot of 'resting' time. However I have to assert that any time I spend recovering from an activity is not 'me time' or 'resting time', it's the time that is stolen from me. I can't do anything with this time. I am in pain, I can't move, my activities are limited to 'hopelessly distracting myself so that I do not experience the full horror of what's going on in my body right now'. I don't even get to have 'me time' because of how much of the time is stolen from me.

abuser: what do you mean I abused you? Am I not the most special person on the planet? Should I not get to do this, at least? You should feel honoured you were picked for this!

Abusive parents will go 'Oh yeah? Well I had it worse! My parents were bad!' and it's like, Oh? We can acknowledge that your parents were bad? You can say that? You can say they treated you very badly? You know this and are aware of this?

And yet, when raising your own child, you used their methods and decided that you are the victim here? That it's okay because they've done it 'worse'? You're comfortable telling your children that they're paying for however you've been treated, and that you specifically had your children to expose them to all of the bad things that happened to you? The world feels fair to you if your own children are suffering? That's where you take your power?

Your parents were bad and you know this, so you went ahead and became a bad parent on purpose, and you're thinking you're the victim in all this?

When you're a small child, your abusive parents seem omnipotent to you. They are the highest authority you've known, they know everything and can do anything, mostly including hurting you if you don't do as you are told. They make you believe that they can read your mind and know your thoughts, and that they're impossible to escape from, they'll follow you to the ends of earth and drag you back into their house.

It's normal for small children, with no point of reference, to believe their parents omnipotent, but as they grow up, learn how things work in life, find references to how children are made and raised and what parents are responsible for - they grow out of it. They start to understand the limitations of parents, and often make use of them. They know that parents can't do or know everything, they can keep secrets, tell their little white lies, and they're not intimidated by parents because parents are not a threat to them, but figures of care and safety, people who they can go to when they're in trouble or in need of safety.

Abusive parents, however, work very hard to carry that imposing, omnipotent, oppressive illusion of them deep into adulthood. They will insist that neither you nor any authority or law can control or stop them, if they've decided on something. They'll show you by example, by manipulating people around them, sometimes even people of authority, that no matter what, they'll get their way. They'll want you to feel helpless, powerless and isolated whenever you want to oppose them. They'll manipulate your own point of view, and insist you have to see them in positive light, or else. They'll convince you that even thoughts that they don't approve of, are a sin, and that you could be punished for it. That there's nowhere to run, nobody who would believe you or help you, that you have no other choice but to submit to their will.

They wouldn't be able to impose such illusion on anyone except a child, and then the adult they've been grooming from very early age to believe these things to be eternal truths that cannot be questioned. And this is a part of what makes abusive parents so terrifying; they can go above some authority with the power of manipulation, they can lie their way out of crimes, they can gaslight and convince their victims it's their fault or it didn't happen, they regularly do and get away with this. Anyone watching that unfolding would be in trepidation of them, and hyper-aware of how dangerous these individuals are.

But, they are not omnipotent. They do not know what anyone is thinking. They do not know things outside their little bubble. If you go to a location they don't know of, and nobody can tell them, they cannot find out. They cannot predict your thoughts or actions as well as they try to convince you they can. They cannot change reality, they cannot erase what happened, and they cannot keep you imprisoned against your will your whole life. It is pretty hard on them, actually, to try and keep controlling an adult who has a mind of their own - that's why they're putting so much energy into trying to make their children into people without any thoughts of their own. But that's impossible.

Think about all the times they're really flying into rage, yelling and screaming and convincing you that something is right or wrong for you. How hard they go at changing your mind when you're thinking something that doesn't go to their benefit. Lot of effort on their part just to change your train of thoughts, isn't it? But if they were omnipotent, your thoughts would be no threat to them. If you were simply 'wrong', why would it even matter? An omnipotent being would simply shrug and not care.

They work extremely hard to change what's in your mind, because that's the only way they can keep that illusion of goodness and omnipotence. If you're allowed to think for yourself, to make your own conclusions, to believe your senses and point out what is logical, then their entire charade falls into nothing, it becomes obvious they're nothing but skilled liars and their power of manipulation is how they maintain everything else in life. It also becomes obvious how cruel and immoral their lies are, and how much damage they do to everyone around them.

They don't want you to see the limits because the limits show they're only good at terrifying and brainwashing children, not anything beyond that. You can get away from them to a place they can't follow. You can escape their cruelty and mind control. You can gain freedom. Your thoughts can be your own. You are allowed and able of keeping secrets from them. You can withhold information and opinions from them. You can lie to them. You can deceive them and trick them in order to get away. They have no legal right to you. You do not owe them anything. Their power ends the second they can't find or contact you.