My father raised my sister and I to be completely dependant on him, so much so that he actively kept us from learning about the world.
I didn’t make a friend until I was 14 years old. I wasn’t allowed to have friends. We were locked in the house. Only allowed to go to school and shopping which we were escorted to and from. We were prisoners.
Plus the violence and emotional abuse.
The damage he did to me in particular, led me down an incredibly bad path because I literally didn’t know better.
Families can be awful to each other, but we seem to have a bizarre cultural blind spot to abuse that occurs beyond childhood (as well as to the real ongoing impacts of that abuse). Once you are an adult people tend to act as if everything is a misunderstanding that can be resolved through some stereotyped Hallmark movie moment and all old people are assumed to be sweet and innocent. No, some people are just awful and they don’t magically change once they hit a certain age. People dying alone is often blamed on a cold and uncaring society but in reality it can also be people lying in the bed they made for themselves.
If we want to make meaningful changes in our society we need to accept that multiple different stories can be true and relationships are complicated - people can be both victims and perpetrators, they can have good relationships with some people and bad relationships with others and single cookie cutter responses based on unrealistic stereotypes often do as much (or more) harm as they do good.
My father raised my sister and I to be completely dependant on him, so much so that he actively kept us from learning about the world.
I didn’t make a friend until I was 14 years old. I wasn’t allowed to have friends. We were locked in the house. Only allowed to go to school and shopping which we were escorted to and from. We were prisoners.
Plus the violence and emotional abuse.
The damage he did to me in particular, led me down an incredibly bad path because I literally didn’t know better.
He died alone.
I’m sorry you had to go through that. 🫂
Families can be awful to each other, but we seem to have a bizarre cultural blind spot to abuse that occurs beyond childhood (as well as to the real ongoing impacts of that abuse). Once you are an adult people tend to act as if everything is a misunderstanding that can be resolved through some stereotyped Hallmark movie moment and all old people are assumed to be sweet and innocent. No, some people are just awful and they don’t magically change once they hit a certain age. People dying alone is often blamed on a cold and uncaring society but in reality it can also be people lying in the bed they made for themselves.
If we want to make meaningful changes in our society we need to accept that multiple different stories can be true and relationships are complicated - people can be both victims and perpetrators, they can have good relationships with some people and bad relationships with others and single cookie cutter responses based on unrealistic stereotypes often do as much (or more) harm as they do good.
I just wanted you to know the power of that statement shook the room I’m sitting in.
The same will happen to my mother, if you can call her that.
Fuck emotionally abusive parents. Why have a kid if your just gonna abuse/neglect 'em?
That’s why. That’s what they think relationships are.
The worst get enjoyment from abusing others.
Im sorry you had to deal with it as well mate. Sometimes in life, people get what they deserve.