I was raised by a narcissistic gaslighter. A pathological liar. A man who worked for and with career politicians. For most of my life, he was a local celebrity of some sort, including now. By the community, my family, and all of his friends he is seen as a saint. He’s the exact opposite. What’s even worse is because of the most insidious form of abuse he uses towards me (and others) no one who isn’t a victim of his abuse and manipulation will ever see or believe what he truly is. Which is a monster.

I am formally diagnosed with PTSD due to the abuse I suffered at my father’s hands as a child. Though initially it was diagnosed as generalized anxiety disorder, as I pulled away from my family more and more (believing them to be a problem) I gained more clarity on the situation. That I never have been the person he made me think I was. That I am not a monster. That I am not insane. That I am not this burden that he wanted everyone to believe I was. However, it’s too late to prove any of them wrong now because none of his friends see him as anything other than the most generous guy in the world. His so-called generosity is conditional and so is his so-called love.

My very first memories are of him and my mother reminding me I was adopted and different from my sisters. This was used against me constantly as ammo, even though they will claim they were only doing it to “help me”. Perhaps had they not used it as a weapon then it would have been okay but, that’s not how they did it. Through my life and countless “family therapy” sessions it was all collectively decided that everyone in the family was perfect and I was the only bad seed. This started when I was younger than ten years old and continued at every session we had until I was 18. My father and mother had successfully convinced everyone around me, including my sisters (biological to them and not adopted) that I am the problem.

No one wants to take into account that these were the adults in the situation and I was just a kid. Never. You’d think blaming a child for behaving like a child would behave under great amounts of stress, neglect, and emotional abuse would be absurd. Yet, here we are. Me, as a child having no emotional tools or recourse to know how to react to the abuse I was being subjected to day in and out caused me to be what I was. A nightmare. Because I was in a nightmare and I didn’t know how to get out of it. The adults around me, instead of considering what they were doing was horribly wrong decided that I deserved the abuse because I was the problem. What backwards ass world is this? Don’t know. Don’t ask me. This is just how it happened. My whole life.

Though I could get into way more detail and write a literal epic saga over what kind of monsters both of my parents are (because my mother shared her part in it as well) there’s no point. I will just get down to the current situation of what’s happening right now.

Being of means that I have no income and I can’t work due to a physical disability, I am on benefits for disability. For about 15 years I lived with a roommate who, over time, became abusive and would harass me on a daily basis. Seeing what that was doing to my mental health I reached out to my father for help. Which I now realize was a grave mistake but at the time I was desperate and he seemed like the lesser of two evils. He was not. He offered to get me a house and I would pay for it over time. Fair enough.

The house in question (when purchased) was in an okay neighborhood, not great but okay enough. Over the next few years, it went to shit. To a point where only a few weeks ago there was someone shot and almost killed on my front lawn over some sort of drug dispute. Ever since that moment came to pass I’ve been living in fear of it happening again, or something even worse. My neighborhood in general has gone downhill with multiple shootings per month. There’s theft, vandalism, break-ins, and pets being stolen. Two houses down from me is a well-known drug den. This place is supposed to have an HOA but they apparently don’t care who they rent to as long as the people pay the rent because they aren’t doing shit to evict any people like this.

After the shooting happened I told my parents and guess what their reaction was:

“Guns are everywhere people get shot get used to it”

Pretty easy for them to say sitting in their half a million dollar house in an almost crime free neighborhood. They have no empathy to the situation at all and keep insisting that this neighborhood is safe. Even after I’ve literally shown them the crime statistics for this neigborhood. Like, I can see on paper it’s not safe and it’s only getting worse. It will only get worse. Every day I fear what could happen if someone breaks in and it only becomes more taxing at night.

Still, according to them my fears aren’t valid and I’m overreacting, in fact, I should be grateful I live anywhere at all and by the way, my fear is “stressing them out” because it’s “so annoying”. I guess wanting to live in a house where I feel safe is a luxury and asking for any sort of security in my own home is being spoiled and ungrateful. To a point where my father told me not to contact him anymore. This was, of course, after he told me he wished I was still homeless (yes, still) and said I needed to suffer more in my life because I’m don’t understand what hard work is. This is all just convenient memory for him because he forgets so much:

The fact that over the 7 years I did not talk to him or anyone in my family I held several jobs and did them well. That everything I wanted I went out and got with hard work and my own money. That I thrived completely fine without them. The reason my back is injured is because of a labor job I had. Not because I’m lazy. Not because I’m spoiled. Not because I don’t know what suffering is. They even know I had a job because there were holidays I had to work and they were very aware of it. Yet, when they want to play the victim or act like I’m the problem all of this goes out of the window entirely as if they’ve spoiled and coddled me my entire life and I don’t know what the “real world” is. Remember how I said “homeless again”. I was homeless for two years living in the worst part of this city seeing some of the worst crimes imaginable every night. Which they are very well aware of because they kicked me out and caused the situation in the first place.

With how my father has pretty much boxed me into living in a situation he knows is unsafe (even though he refuses to admit it but I know he thinks that because he doesn’t even come to my neighborhood during the day so he’s obviously aware it’s dangerous) I’m fairly sure his plan is to get me to die somehow. Either get me shot, stabbed, or make me so miserable that I kill myself. He obviously set up an impossible situation for me and he’s even threatened to sell this house out from under me telling me he doesn’t care what happens to me or where I go because that’s “not his problem”. He has so little concern to what could or may happen to me I’m positive that’s what he wants to happen.

I’ve known since I was a teenager that if I were to die somehow, either accidentally or suicide (because I was very suicidal living with people like this) that it would all only benefit them. They would get to play the martyrs. Milk it for everything it was worth. “Cry” about how they had such a disturbed ungreateful dauther that they did “everything for” but she refused to listen to them. That they were always saints and always did what was best for me. That they supported me no matter what and I was just such a bitch that I couldn’t “take their help” or listen to them. So really, they are the victims in my death not me…obviously it would be my fault because of something I did or I deserved it.

I know that I am not getting out of this situation ever. I know I’m doomed to watch this neighborhood decline until it’s borderline unliveable and if I ever get in a position to sell this house it will be worth a fraction of what was paid for it. I know I’m a failure. I know that my dreams are dead that I have nothing. That I will never find a partner or have a family of my own. That my only source of unconditional love I’ve ever known came not from my parents, not from my family, but from my pets. One of them just recently died in the worst way possible. The one left is old and could have a few years left or a few months. No way to tell.

I know that I’m looking at a very long and pointless life of misery, stress, and danger. That the people who are supposed to care about me or support me in times of stress (like when people are getting murdered in your neighborhood regularly) call you a burden and an annoyance because “it’s not even that bad so why are you making a big deal out of it?”

Today, for the first day in many, many years I barely got out of bed. I’ve done nothing but sleep, or cry. As more and more time passes I can’t talk myself out of the idea that I wouldn’t be better off dead. I don’t know why I’m still here and I don’t know what I’m living for. The only thing is that I don’t want to die, and I don’t want them to get their way because they would only use it to make themselves look like martyrs instead of the actual demons they are. I wish people understood how terrible my parents are and always have been but no one ever will. I will never be vindicated or justified I will die alone, obscure, and in a city I’ve always hated. Explain to me why I should even want to get out of bed anymore because I don’t have an answer for that either.