Not so long ago I just began to accept that I'm emotionally stunted, and that even though I'm sort of functional I've never had experienced "real adulthood". It is weird saying that I want to saty a child, because my childhood wasn't truly happy. When I was little, I was a bit "too much" for everyone to handle, I would have extreme meltdowns for everything and anything, so my parents had to "keep me in line" with emotional and physical abuse, and whenever they weren't doing that, they would just avoid me like the plague and prefer my younger siblings while I was left in front of the television. All whilst I was being bullied since the age of 5 for being "too ugly and weird".
And nothing really changed, other than I was able to make a couple of friends that came and went from time to time. At the age of 8 something really traumatic happened that permanently switched my views around death, after that death wasn't something scary, it was my key to true freedom. Ever since my mental health just began to get worse, became more withdrawn but still manage to keep a healthy social life. I was really into fantasy when I was a tween, call me stupid but I truly believed that if I believed hard enough, I would get magic powers, or manage to abandon this awful world and go on a fantastic adventure (I know totally cringe). But of course, nothing happened, if anything things just got worst. In the cartoons I was totally obsessed with, the characters were never older than 16, so I had never imagined my life past 14 to be honest. But my parents did, my dad wanted me to get to this pretty prestigious high-academic-demand high school, so I busted my ass off for the entrance exams and I somehow managed to pass. That's when I had my first nervous breakdown, I was having panic attacks every day and I pretty much ruined my immediate family, I made everyone around me so miserable to the point that to this day my siblings won't talk to me, and we live in the same house. After ending up in the hospital for a few "unexplainable organ infections" that were apparently "psychosomatic symptoms" my parents finally took me to see a psychologist, who immediately send me with a psychiatrist. And surprise, turns out that the reason I was "too much" was because I had autism and ADHD, that were now sharing a diagnosis with BPD, general anxiety, and mayor depression syndrome. Soon after this my parents found out about me cutting, a habit I picked up before going to the hospital and changed their tune. Did a complete 180° and started love-bombing every chance they got. They got me new toys (something they hadn't done since my 9 birthday, because it was too childish) They apologized for everything they did and for not being there for me, and had one too many heart to heart conversations about how much they loved me and about how "God had a plan for me", etc.
I'm not gonna lie, at first I hated it. In the wise words of Bojack Horseman "Uh, turns out you did know what I wanted, and you waited until the last possible moment to give it to me". I knew that they were just desperate for me not to kill myself, maybe mostly out of love, but also, well, I'm guessing that if your daughter commits ctb it gives a pretty bad image to your parenting skills. But after years went by, I began to essentially gaslight myself into believing that it was all genuine, to the point that I actually see my pre-treatment parents as completely different individuals from my right now parents. Even though the masks slips off from time to time, like when I overheard my mom telling her friends how she felt shattered after she realized she hadn't had the daughter she expected, or whenever my dad comes home drunk and begins to yell at me about how my medicine is expensive and I'm ungrateful and useless.
Now I'm 21 and I pretend that their love is real mostly because I like to act out the childhood I wish I could have lived, one where I could just open my arms and my mom would hug me, instead of pushing me away and calling me clingy, one where I can have actual conversations with my dad instead of him slapping me for being disrespectful, one where my small accomplishments are celebrated instead of them calling me stupid for never being good enough. Now I get to stay in my room and play with my toys and watch cartoons without the fear of being judged or called out for being useless. But I know that I am useless, because I don't know how to do things any other adult could. I can't drive because it gives me anxiety attacks and it could be dangerous, I manage to get to college and hold down a career, but I don't treat it like college rather I act like a middle schooler that has to go to class every day. And on the four years I've been there I haven't managed to make one single friend.
The only jobs I had manage to hold are actually working with children, mostly as a teacher, all my employers said that I was great at it and that the kids loved me. I know that that's because I'm a child myself, I understand what they like, I watch the same cartoons as them and play with the same toys, I remember how frustrating it was to go to school and how horrible it was to be treated as if you were stupid or simply didn't matter. So, I try to treat them the way I would've wanted to be treated when I was their age, I speak to them as if they were humans, and listen to them as if they were saying something important, even though sometimes they do in fact say a lot of stupid stuff. To be honest it was a very fulfilling job, even thought it was exhausting, I just tried to be the cool teacher that everyone had fun with and then would forget after a couple of years.
Right now I'm unemployed and dealing with a dumb chronic illness; but I manage to get an unpaid internship that is more focused in my career, but honestly I'm doing the bare minimum of work just to not get kick out. But every day that passes by I'm just reminded on how useless I am, that I'm not really making any money and don't know shit about finances, that if I didn't live with my mom I wouldn't clean my room, or eat proper meals, or wash my clothes, that I've distanced myself from all my friends to the point that I don't talk to anyone who are not my parents anymore, and I don't know how to make any new friends, how I can't drive, how I'm leaching onto my parent's finances, how I've never had any sort of romantic relationship, I haven't even had my first kiss yet, how I'm afraid and in denial of my own sexuality. I know I'm a mess, a total loser, but I just can't get over my issues, I just can't accept the fact that I'm a real adult with real responsibilities that should be doing stuff. I want to stay here in my room, with my toys and my Legos, I want my mom to hug me and reassure me that everything is fine and to tell me that I'm a good daughter, even if she is lying through her teeth, because she knows I'm becoming a parasite. I want to fall asleep watching cartoons wishing that the morning never comes. But most of all, I want to die so that I don't have to deal with anything anymore.
And nothing really changed, other than I was able to make a couple of friends that came and went from time to time. At the age of 8 something really traumatic happened that permanently switched my views around death, after that death wasn't something scary, it was my key to true freedom. Ever since my mental health just began to get worse, became more withdrawn but still manage to keep a healthy social life. I was really into fantasy when I was a tween, call me stupid but I truly believed that if I believed hard enough, I would get magic powers, or manage to abandon this awful world and go on a fantastic adventure (I know totally cringe). But of course, nothing happened, if anything things just got worst. In the cartoons I was totally obsessed with, the characters were never older than 16, so I had never imagined my life past 14 to be honest. But my parents did, my dad wanted me to get to this pretty prestigious high-academic-demand high school, so I busted my ass off for the entrance exams and I somehow managed to pass. That's when I had my first nervous breakdown, I was having panic attacks every day and I pretty much ruined my immediate family, I made everyone around me so miserable to the point that to this day my siblings won't talk to me, and we live in the same house. After ending up in the hospital for a few "unexplainable organ infections" that were apparently "psychosomatic symptoms" my parents finally took me to see a psychologist, who immediately send me with a psychiatrist. And surprise, turns out that the reason I was "too much" was because I had autism and ADHD, that were now sharing a diagnosis with BPD, general anxiety, and mayor depression syndrome. Soon after this my parents found out about me cutting, a habit I picked up before going to the hospital and changed their tune. Did a complete 180° and started love-bombing every chance they got. They got me new toys (something they hadn't done since my 9 birthday, because it was too childish) They apologized for everything they did and for not being there for me, and had one too many heart to heart conversations about how much they loved me and about how "God had a plan for me", etc.
I'm not gonna lie, at first I hated it. In the wise words of Bojack Horseman "Uh, turns out you did know what I wanted, and you waited until the last possible moment to give it to me". I knew that they were just desperate for me not to kill myself, maybe mostly out of love, but also, well, I'm guessing that if your daughter commits ctb it gives a pretty bad image to your parenting skills. But after years went by, I began to essentially gaslight myself into believing that it was all genuine, to the point that I actually see my pre-treatment parents as completely different individuals from my right now parents. Even though the masks slips off from time to time, like when I overheard my mom telling her friends how she felt shattered after she realized she hadn't had the daughter she expected, or whenever my dad comes home drunk and begins to yell at me about how my medicine is expensive and I'm ungrateful and useless.
Now I'm 21 and I pretend that their love is real mostly because I like to act out the childhood I wish I could have lived, one where I could just open my arms and my mom would hug me, instead of pushing me away and calling me clingy, one where I can have actual conversations with my dad instead of him slapping me for being disrespectful, one where my small accomplishments are celebrated instead of them calling me stupid for never being good enough. Now I get to stay in my room and play with my toys and watch cartoons without the fear of being judged or called out for being useless. But I know that I am useless, because I don't know how to do things any other adult could. I can't drive because it gives me anxiety attacks and it could be dangerous, I manage to get to college and hold down a career, but I don't treat it like college rather I act like a middle schooler that has to go to class every day. And on the four years I've been there I haven't managed to make one single friend.
The only jobs I had manage to hold are actually working with children, mostly as a teacher, all my employers said that I was great at it and that the kids loved me. I know that that's because I'm a child myself, I understand what they like, I watch the same cartoons as them and play with the same toys, I remember how frustrating it was to go to school and how horrible it was to be treated as if you were stupid or simply didn't matter. So, I try to treat them the way I would've wanted to be treated when I was their age, I speak to them as if they were humans, and listen to them as if they were saying something important, even though sometimes they do in fact say a lot of stupid stuff. To be honest it was a very fulfilling job, even thought it was exhausting, I just tried to be the cool teacher that everyone had fun with and then would forget after a couple of years.
Right now I'm unemployed and dealing with a dumb chronic illness; but I manage to get an unpaid internship that is more focused in my career, but honestly I'm doing the bare minimum of work just to not get kick out. But every day that passes by I'm just reminded on how useless I am, that I'm not really making any money and don't know shit about finances, that if I didn't live with my mom I wouldn't clean my room, or eat proper meals, or wash my clothes, that I've distanced myself from all my friends to the point that I don't talk to anyone who are not my parents anymore, and I don't know how to make any new friends, how I can't drive, how I'm leaching onto my parent's finances, how I've never had any sort of romantic relationship, I haven't even had my first kiss yet, how I'm afraid and in denial of my own sexuality. I know I'm a mess, a total loser, but I just can't get over my issues, I just can't accept the fact that I'm a real adult with real responsibilities that should be doing stuff. I want to stay here in my room, with my toys and my Legos, I want my mom to hug me and reassure me that everything is fine and to tell me that I'm a good daughter, even if she is lying through her teeth, because she knows I'm becoming a parasite. I want to fall asleep watching cartoons wishing that the morning never comes. But most of all, I want to die so that I don't have to deal with anything anymore.
