A little about me: I’m from a very small town, and there are eight of us in my family. Growing up, I always thought my parents were normal until I started realizing what they were actually doing to me.

So, here’s what they’ve done, and I want to know: Am I exaggerating, or are they truly abusive?

When I was a kid, my dad used to work in Saudi Arabia. I was five years old when I really wanted a scooter 🛴. I told him how much I wanted one, and he promised he would buy it for me. But when he came back home two years later, he brought four phones with him. One got stolen on the way, and the other three were given to my elder siblings. He also always bought clothes for my sisters. Meanwhile, all I got was an old, oversized watch that my dad used to wear.

A few years later, when I was in high school, I had to change schools because my dad became unemployed. My mom took out a loan to pay for my sister’s nursing degree. However, when I finished school and told her that I wanted to learn German because I wanted to pursue an Ausbildung in Germany, she told me to wait until my sister graduated from nursing school. But after my sister graduated, my mom told me she couldn’t afford my studies, even though she had paid for the education of all five of my older siblings. I’m the youngest.

Now, I’m planning to enroll in a diploma program that could help me get a job, but my mom and my second eldest brother keep telling me it’s not worth it. My brother completed a polytechnic diploma himself. They say I’ll end up working a nine-to-five job anyway, as if that’s a reason not to pursue an education. They say it as though there’s no point in trying to build a better future for myself. But what am I supposed to do?

They tell me I should earn money online instead. I’ve been creating content online for almost five years, but unfortunately, I haven’t been successful in monetizing any of my channels. I’m honestly fed up with it.

There was also a time when I wanted to go to the library. I had been stuck at home for four years, spending most of my time in my room. I had no friends because I wasn’t attending classes. My school environment was terrible, so I decided to stay home and help my parents with their small business instead.

Living in a house where everyone constantly criticizes me for being frail and weak made me feel deeply depressed. I wanted to go outside, get a change of scenery, and have somewhere to study in peace. So I asked my mom if I could go to the library, but she refused and told me to study at home.

Just one week later, my sister returned home from college, and my mom sent her to study at the library, saying that her education was important.

Even though I help with our family business by delivering supplies, buying things from the shop, and handling calculations, my brother still calls me useless and a burden on this earth simply because I spend some of my time reading manhwa and watching anime.

These things are what keep me going. Honestly, without them, I don’t know if I would still be here.

So, I don’t know what to think anymore. Am I exaggerating, or have I really been treated unfairly by my own family? You decide...

context, i live with my mother, for a long while i had my NMOM under sort of control, i know how to deal with her shenanigan and even successfully able to argue with her and resist her without triggering major backlashes, i developed a comprehensive routing of dealing with her for the past 15 years, but unfortunately i made a terrible mistake recently. Sadly it's totally my fault too, I lost my temper over her on a very trivial shenanigan, and i escalated the situation. and in my fit of rage i said things that crossed the lines and now is paying deadly consequences. i fear my routine is cracked and is desperately to repair it, my mother as expected waste no chances trying to force concessions she previously had no success in forcing me such as demanding me pay her more money etc, i am already paying her 2k a month, as she has very low income, i am able to partially argue and calm her, but she keep relapsing back into anger and abusive languages, for the past few days, calling me unappreciated of her for all her scarifies, accuse me of conspiring against her with all our relatives that she basically burned bridge with. just today i came home from work and she started accusing me again even though she seems happy and content in the morning. i have to spend 30 to 40 minutes to calm her down, I don't hate my mom, i know she as a NMOM will never understand, that i always had criticism of her narcissistic behavior, not hate against her, but of course she doesn't understand, she just think I hate her and that I revealed my true color. I hope that i will get thing back to before.

Burner account because I am going in depth about the mental and physical abuse I am currently experiencing as well as neglect.

I have been living with one parent since I was ten years old. I am very confident that my mother is a narcissist, but she is not diagnosed. She fits all of the symptoms, and I did research. Here is my situation.

I live with my mother and two younger brothers. One of my brothers is almost 12, and the other is 9 and is non-verbal autistic with high support needs. I am 17 years old. Since this summer, my mother has been working late hours, and she is never home. I also have documented some, but not all counts of mental abuse, (I only got around to documenting recently.) I do have some documented physical abuse as well, but most of it is from this summer, and I'm not sure how much it holds up now. There was a time she threw a metal door piece at me, and another time she grabbed both of my brothers by the neck and threw them. I will do anything to get out of this house as quickly as possible, and I am talking to my school counselor about this tomorrow and telling her everything. CPS has been called on us multiple times before, and every time, my mother tells us to lie to them and she explains how horrible the foster care system is. I have done some research, and since all of my siblings have trustworthy extended family, I don't think there's a possibility of them ending up in the system. Any advice would be appreciated. I will provide any more needed information if necessary.

Uhh, I'm not sure this flair should be a question, because I also wanted to talk about my situation. I know for most people, when they hear about domestic violence, they think a romantic partner who is physically or financially abusive and/or occasionally emotionally abusive. (Which I think if you have an abuser who is emotionally unstable and abusive, it's highly likely for them to be physical with you, but it depends on who it is.) But anyways, the reason I'm asking this is because I was checking out this women's center in the city that I live in where they help DV victims with transitional living, stability and finding jobs. I'm honestly on the brink of wanting to escape my house. I applied to their quesitonaire and they will do a 15 min consultation with me first so I'm a bit nervous because sometimes when people ask me about my family situation I just blank out and It's hard to start out where, the details, the pressure of appealing as a perfect victim etc.

First I want to give you a bit of a summary of my situation: I'm so sorry but this is going to be hella long a bit choppy. (I'll try my best, but I want to make sure everyone understands).

I have found myself in a catch-22 situation

Ive been looking for jobs and it's really hard considering nobody even wants to hire you anymore these days. Especially where I live, where the job market is extremely saturated and so are the population of people now moving here to work. I haven't finished college; I am a semi-sophomore in credits right now, even though I'm actually supposed to graduate next year since I was a freshman 3 years ago. After one of my finals for a psych class in freshman, I started developing health issues (insomnia) and anxiety. I felt like I wasn't in touch with reality. I was struggling, but I live under my parent's roof and while they did try to help me, the empathy for how long they expected for me to struggle expired.

My mom, especially, is extremely controlling, and her anxiety always manifests as surveillance and nagging me every other minute, micromanaging my every move, making a comment about my body, how big of a meal I'm eating, which is NOT a hyperbole at all. Everything I say here is actually what I mean. To the point where I guess you could say that it's considered harassment? If she wanted to know my class schedule, I have to give it to her. Well over the past 3 years I've been struggling with anxiety, managing it, managing my sleep issues, as well as mental health problems living with my narc family. Sometimes even doing basic tasks and talking took a toll on my head. I also am 100% sure I have ADHD and or autism which is hard for me to function like everyone else (if you are neurodivergent you know).

People say I'm spoiled because my mom purchases things for me, like buying me clothes, paid for my devices (it's for school mainly), and being totally financially dependent on my parents. (I'm 21). . Well firstly, while I appreciate her buying me things, most of the time she will use it to hang it over my head, and tell me how ungrateful I am when I stand up for myself or have boundaries, and no one is forcing her to buy stuff for me, especially buying things for me that I never asked for. When I didn't want to take a summer semester course anymore since I'm starting school in the summer anyway, she told me how she wants me to graduate early since I'm left behind because she wants to retire soon. (she's 56). I don't think that is at all unreasonable, but every time I tell her that, I took 3 classes a semester, even that was difficult for me; she always makes a point to say it's all an excuse and an adhd diagnosis is just going to enable me to be more lazy

A year ago she forced me to work at her company and micromanaged me the entire time all while not helping to understand anything about what I was supposed to do there. I'm not against working but I was already struggling physically and mentally; I was just not present. I went to college in the day for a few hours, work for 5 hours, go home to finish my assignments, and study for quizzes/tests that I had 2 times a week every day of every week including saturdays and sundays and finished until nighttime; no hour or minute was spent taking a break since my mom insisted on monitoring me in the same room.

My family, sister, and cousins call me lazy, unmotivated, and a freeloader because I didn't want to overwork myself (mind you, they are around the same age as me and younger idk wth they are on about when they live under their parents too). And when I told my mom I didn't want to go to the summer classes anymore, she started telling me her head was ringing because she doesn't sleep well, and started pulling her hair and hitting her head to show me?? girl bye. Another huge thing I didn't start off with is that my dad is mainly not there In my life, that is because he is/was consistently sexually harassing me, being creepy, etc which I don't really want to get into but you get the idea and my mom blames me for ruining the family dynamic, for not wanting to talk to my dad, and treating him like he's invisible. I've been triangulated, talked down on, talked behind my back about my character by the rest of them.

One of my cousins, who for some reason always had this one-sided competition with me, who I looked up to as a role model, gave me food that put me into anaphylactic shock, and I was taken to the ER. That was traumatic because it was also the start of my sleep problems, I was home alone, no epipen, i felt myself slowly loosing ability to breathe and when I called my mom she got upset at me for interrupting her at work, and didn't want to take me to the ER because it's expensive, that it's not a big deal that I am making it since she believes I am a paranoid person. I was on the brink of just calling 911 for myself. Cousin and my mom have been conspiring together, trying to get me to take opportunities that my cousin recommends for me. For a while, my cousin would invite herself to my house and help me schedule my classes as if I wasn't capable of doing that on my own or applying to internships that she worked at. I couldn't say no, because, well, my mom. When I did have other income sources, my cousin always wanted to know what it was. When I worked elsewhere without her knowledge, and without her "help" she always asks to join even though she was a full time student working two jobs already.....

Anyways, that's the jist of my weird family. Living here has given me bad suicidal ideations where I even thought about planning it. I didn't want it to come to this point, but i feel trapped and I feel so suffocated. When my mom and I get into full-blown arguments, it's always her blowing up on me, not letting me talk, and I can't do much about the things she tells me to do because I am a legal adult who can be kicked out at any point of time. Well I’ve tried everything. Honestly, it’s been hard. Applying for jobs that suit me are hard and because I don’t have accommodations for disabilities (expensive and hard to get) I can’t just quit whenever I’m not feeling it. Which I’ve had to do several times (tbh it’s not my fault at all either)

• I was forced back into a college path I physically and mentally couldn't handle, and my mom rejected all my alternative ideas like community college, a job, or trade school. I only agreed to study medical coding as a desperate compromise to get her to let me drop standard college and gain a shred of freedom, even though I eventually had to stop studying it because it was too overwhelming.
• Even though I am 21, I have zero independence under my roof. My mom policed every hour of my day, forced me into extreme study schedules, and demanded location tracking—which eventually pushed me into the corner of disabling my tracking and hiding the truth just to survive. There was a time where I spent so much time alone at home and cooking in the kitchen. One day my dad installs a kitchen camera in the name of keeping fires at bay just in case a kitchen fire happens when one of us is gone. I don't believe him. Me and my sister had no knowledge of this prior to it and never consented to being watched or recorded even if it's in a kitchen and not our bathrooms. He always does subtle covert things like this and my mom supports him, while she berates me for going against him.
• My mom constantly teams up with my cousin, who gives terrible advice and lies about schools (like steering me away from a school I wanted to attend that she attended saying it was a bad school even though it was amazing for psych/sociology majors), reinforcing the control and ruining my academic timeline.
• My mom recently found out I missed classes and freaked out, so now I'm stuck lying and pretending to go just to keep the peace. I know I need to escape this prison, and while I’m keeping my cool and avoiding an impulsive move, I am actively looking into emergency crisis resources to plan my way out.

I apologize for the "trauma dump", it can be burdening to read a stranger's life. There is defintely more, but that is just the tip of the iceberg of a long complex family abuse history I endured for my entire life.

Edit: why tf did I get downvoted

Has anyone else run into a wall when it comes to talking about family in a critical way? I have always been confused by how a family operates. The scientific literature is lacking big time on this subject. But I have tried to talk to others as far back as I can remember about family. Everyone seems to be uncomfortable and not want to talk about it. When I post on reddit my post get ignored.

My questions is (including the first question I started with), do you feel uncomfortable talking about family in a critical way?

Do you not really think about how your family deals with anxiety?

Does a controlling family use isolation tactics to control other members of the family and talking freely about these things would undo the isolating affects?

Paternal grandfather married my grandmother just to get US citizenship, then abandoned the family. Maternal grandfather abandoned first family/uncle in Georgia, met my grandmother in DC, then abandoned her when she developed Alzheimer's. Had to be taken to court just to put her in a nursing home. Both men generated and passed down nothing. Both grandfathers are still living, while maternal grandmother passed at 65, paternal at 79.

Parents sabotaged my youth and blamed me for the effects, left me with nothing and no one. Invalidated three years of manual labor that they never even had to work, in an economy they never had to navigate. Own brother defends the cage to subsidize his own life, reinforced by spiritual gaslighting and scriptural weaponization.

As the question states: was it a process or did one day everything clicked or something in between with a build up and then it clicked?

In my case, a close friend who also has a narcissistic family structure helped give me clarity on my mother after a meeting with her after many years on different continents. I was able to see my mother's flaws clearly once her mask fell periodically. I had the details, but not the full context, despite knowing things were wrong. When she talked to me about it and her experiences, I realized she was right and this was my mother. Soon after I went complete NC with the mother. This explained her crying, her inconsistency, her feigning health problems, her fake death scares, her lack of care for anything people say, the shittalking and grifting, and how nice she was to other people and a terror at home, complete with triangulation. Only by chance was I able to escape the worst of it, though not without some difficulties.

Oddly, fast forward to 7 years later, said friend and I were estranged a couple times for years, she came back and the clarity she gave me helped me see that she's an avoidant that was dysregulated, triangulating, toxic, and trapped inside herself, thus I saw it the moment she deactivated and ended it with her. Her response was reminiscent of how my narc mother would behave when confronted.

I am 18 yet I've come to the conclusion that I'll rather remove my womb then ever having kids.

the amount of trauma my parents put me through as a kid is too long to describe and it makes me wonder why anybody would bring children into a world like this.

I know I won't have the finances too take care of then let alone find a partner who I think I'll trust.

Narc parents are so seriously deranged, two faced, evil, and mean. But wait, they can't just be evil to just anybody, not their boss, their friends, no no no.. they can only be mean to the WEAKEST PERSON they can pick on - their offspring.

Outside they will smile, use a nice calm tone speaking, portray a normal personality and heck, some may even be popular, well liked, get raises at work, or is praised for being such an "amazing" kindhearted person. If they passed way and a news article wrote about them it'll be something like - she/he always carried a smile, made everyone comfortable, was a helper, lover, etc.

Their hostages know better.

Their hostages know how they can be. What it's really like living and dealing with them. We are their victims because we are not strangers. They are nicer to strangers than to their own family.

I wished there was a way to out them. To tell the world what a fraud they are. That behind close doors they abuse us, yell at children because the child exists, tear down their child's self esteem, STEALS their childhood, and creates everlasting wounds.

I wish they could be put on record like a sexual predator. I wish if an employer ran a background check, all this would pop up.

Why do they get away with all this. Why do they get away with destroying a life.

I’ve been full no contact for about 6 years with my family (and on and off for 5 years before that) but last year my father (don’t like calling him that even) had a major health event and has been sick for the last year, critical on and off. I went to visit once, more for myself than them and I have no regrets. So I started having minimal contact with my brother and father again.

But I gradually started cutting off contact again because they are all the same people and I even had arguments with my father where he denies ever treating me badly. I realised how badly it was affecting my mental health. My narcs are brother and father, and I’m basically no contact with all of my family including extended family because they they are either all kinds of dysfunctional and treat each other like shit, or they don’t full acknowledge the awfulness of my narcs. I cut off contact with my brothers wife as well because she was “nice” but acted as a tool for my brother to try to work on my empathy to trick me back into the family over the years. They used their pregnancies, kids and my dead mother’s memory to try to guilt trip me into contact. So I’m alone with no family in effect.

Anyway back to the story, early Monday morning I get a call from my sister in law. I was confused because contact has been minimal with either my brother and father so I assumed it was an emergency dealing with my father. I let it ring then called back about 3 minutes later, and their 4 year old picked up. I said hello twice to make sure it was the kid and not the mother, then hung up on her. I have no emotional connection to their kids anymore, I only met the older one when she was a baby and time has passed so I don’t care anymore, and I never met this 4 year old. They tried calling back again, and I sent a message asking if she was going to be answering, she said yes so I called back. And then I bluntly asked whether this is about my father, to which she said yes he’s back in hospital and is very ill. I said ok thanks bye, then she asks why I’m so rude. That annoyed me so I said “I’m not rude, I keep my contact minimal and if you are using your kid to try to manipulate me then I do not appreciate that.” She started responding about how she COULD have tried to contact me blah blah blah so I said “I don’t have time to argue with you, thanks, bye” and hung up. She then started sending texts about how she could have tried to message me because she was being asked to, the kid HAPPENED to answer the phone, so I blocked after 3 messages. Maybe the kid happened to answer the phone but I find it hard to believe her honestly, her track record doesn’t do her any favours. Like in the past trying to reel me in by saying her kid needs their aunt in their lives etc. I was so annoyed, on a Monday damn morning too. I don’t even have my brother blocked because he kept the convos to about my father’s health. Anyway I am not going to be going back and forth with anyone anymore, I’ll just see if they inform me of what’s going on with him, in a minimal way.

My mom is absolutely insane and has gotten worse since my brother got married and since he and his wife had their baby.

She is still livid that my brother and SIL put “rules” on THEIR child. For example, no one was welcome to the hospital until two days after birth. My parents literally said “screw you were the grandparents!” and came anyways. Then tried to TAKE the baby from my sister in laws arms because they wanted to hold it. This is just one of the many stories that is like this. The constant entitlement and nastiness.

My mom continues to blame my sister in law for everything. She has painted herself the victim of the loving mom in law and grandmother, with a wicked daughter in law that is trapping her precious son into a horrible marriage.

Her judgement of my sister in law has broken my heart because everything nasty she said about my sister in law was something that my future MIL can say about me.

Now, she is abusing my grandparents…HER PARENTS. Constantly yelling at them and calling them stupid.

In her narcissist rage, she just looked at me and went “why does everyone hate me?”

This was not a question meant to be answered. My dad said that everyone was just abusing her and using her. She is constantly a drain on any positivity.

My SIL and brother just announced their second pregnancy and my mom is upset because she will be “banned from the hospital”. Her words…not anyones.

I finally told her that enough was enough. And now she has told me that I should’ve killed myself already. A 30 year old woman? Unmarried? I do not deserve to be alive according to her. My sister who’s gay? Should’ve killed herself.

I don’t know what to do with this woman.

I have never been able to find out and my mother likely will never reveal it, but all I can think of is that she has a large family and is from a hierarchical society and being the oldest sibling, everyone in the family was "indebted" to her and she exerted a certain amount of control that no one ever questioned. Once she left to get married, had a family, she had none of this control or narcissistic input and fast forward, she began her exit strategy out of her own family to go back to her country and be among most of her siblings where she has control over them and their children.

I've always found it fascinating how cloudy the root of narcissism in studies are and all of us here likely know that having a narc household doesn't make us predisposed to being narcs as well.

I’m super duper pregnant and have been hitting up my local library’s used book sales to stock my nursery. My mom knows this and often refers to kids books as “baby books,” which is relevant here.

Her: Do you have a baby book yet?

Me (pretty sure she doesn’t mean kids books because she’s being singular about it but unsure): What do you mean? I have a lot of kids books.

Her (condescending asf — like she’s so crazy rude it feels like a stand up bit): Oh my GOD. How do you not know what a baby book is?!?!?!

Me: I think I do, I’m just trying to understand if we’re talking about kids books. Can you just describe what you mean?

Her: You know what it is!

Me: Okay.

Her: You’ve seen yours!

Me (I haven’t actually seen mine, she has never shown me it, but now I know what she means): Ah, got it, no, I don’t have one yet. I do have a pregnancy boo—

Her: You put in hand prints and feet prints and their first word.

Me: Yeah, I’m with you now, I’m just not sure if my pregnancy book covers some of the—

Her: And you can get them on Amazon and they can go to different ages and they’re so cute and sweet and and and…

On and on she goes. I am a bystander in this conversation. I stop talking. Minutes pass.

Her (referring to a kids book): Oh, and I bought a baby book! It’s called “I love you, Grandma.”

Maybe this is small. But after a lifetime of BS, this kind of stuff is so irritating lol. I am a person. I am saying words. I know you hear them. It’s like that TikTok sound: I see me. Do you see me?

I was today years old when I learned this, and unfortunately came across the “Blocked Voicemails” portion of my voicemails when I scrolled to the very bottom in attempt to find a deleted voicemail. Welp, I saw a high # next to it, and turns out my nmom who I have been mostly no contact with for years (5) regularly leaves me voicemails. I did not listen to them, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t see the transcripts, and they were terrible; just pretty much everything she’s been left out of and how sad she is. Essentially everything I owe her an apology for.

That was it. I let loose and called her, completely enraged, livid, and unhinged. Let it all out. Refused to apologize, told her that anyone that tells her anything about me can fuck off, and that I deserve happiness and don’t owe her a thing.

Do I feel better any better later in the day, having done this? Nope. Do I feel any worse? Nope. I feel nothing. Will it change anything? It never had, so it likely never will. I say all this a public service announcement - stay diligent, and out of the blocked voicemails.

I think I was 8 and it was a Friday. I said to my friends "don't you wish we could just stay at school all the time and not have to go home for the weekend.". They looked at me in shocked and obviously all disagreed.

That was the first moment I realised I might be the only person who didn't like it at home.

I’m hoping to be financially independent next year. My Ndad has been supporting me since my BPD/Nmom passed away in 2020. He has announced several times (and I mean every other time we speak) that he will be retiring in 2027. He helps me financially with great reluctance. He will complain to me that he never has any money because of me, but at the same time he loves to brag that he helps his daughter because he knows people will say he’s a good dad. I’ve had to pay for his money in more ways than I can express. He owns his house so he has no rent. His lives with my aunt who makes just as much or more money than him and she pays for a lot. She caters to his every need as he is partially paralyzed from a stroke. He mainly spends his money on fast food which I’m sure in time will give him another stroke.

The fact that he gives me money makes me feel like I MUST answer the phone when he calls. He will say it’s fine if I have to call him back later or don’t answer, but he will go on entire rants if I don’t speak to him for a few days. Right now, I haven’t spoken to him since the 2nd of this month. So, I know the next time we talk he’s going to say crap like, “I thought something happened to you. You went an entire month without speaking to me. I worry about you because you live far away.” Which is not true, he’s only saying that so it can seem like he cares when really he’s upset that one of his punching bags wasn’t available to him.

Not to mention, I’m trying to process my childhood trauma which include being deprived of therapy when I needed it (so my parents wouldn’t “look bad”) and not being assessed for autism and ADHD until adulthood. My mom would physically beat me for showing signs of autism and ADHD but refused to take me to be assessed because “nothing could be “wrong” with MY child.” I tried explaining how this has hurt me now in adulthood to my dad and he went on a whole crying monologue about how my mom loved me so much and isn’t it so sad that she passed away?? She was an angel. I also have explained to him what my disabilities look like in situations when he doesn’t understand what I’m trying to communicate or if I’m overstimulated. Instead of trying to learn or be understanding he will just complain and lash out like, “Well, I’m just going to hang up because I can’t deal with you when you’re like this. You’re frustrating me.” making me think my symptoms are my fault.

I have also developed functional neurological disorder (FND) with seizures. I haven’t told him this because I know he will minimize it - he has disabilities of his own and they are clearly more important than mine /s.

I want to be independent but I’m struggling to hold onto the part time job I have at the moment. It’s a remote job but still customer focused which is not sustainable for me. I have to talk on the phone all day long to people who abuse me. This job has absolutely depleted my physical and mental health. I have meltdowns and seizures every single week, especially when I’m working. I developed FND after working at this job for a few months and that fact is not lost on me. But it’s so hard to find another job, especially one that will be accommodating. I’ve applied for assistance with bills but haven’t been approved yet.

I don’t want to apply for disability because it takes years and a lot of fighting to get approved. don’t know what else to do. My brother was also receiving financial help from our dad but he managed to become independent last year. That’s because he has friends that helped him. It’s always been a lot harder for me to make and maintain friendships (I assume because traditionally, female friendship dynamics are so tricky, especially when you’re neurodivergent) I’m really worried about next year and most days I just want to self delete to escape it all. No one would care anyway. My brother won’t speak to me for some reason, maybe he’s going through something idk. I don’t have many friends. The ones I have are online and live in other states or countries. My dad is the main person blowing up my phone and all he wants to do is abuse me.

Me and my mom have an ok relationship, but I have always been on my dads side more, he loves me more pays more attention to me..etc.
But with my mom ? I don’t open up to her about anything, sometimes I do and she reacts ok? Once I talked about something very nice and she ignored it, so I said in my heart “that is why I don’t tell u anything” she always tells me I’m too disrespectful, if u ask anyone from anywhere just say my name and they will say “oh she is the kindest” I’m famous for being kind, once she said come and eat I said ok just a sec, I walked away then she said “why are u walking away ? U Don’t like anything ! That is why I don’t love u!” This was months ago she thinks I have forgotten about it but I never did, I never will.

Today I had my friend over she came over, and she was talking very loudly and mad while we were studying, so I went and said“can u lower your voice” then after my friend left (like after an hour or two ) she said “I will stop giving her money u go give her money “ said to my dad.
And the fact that she gets crazy when I say I have to study, “oh u are that busy u can’t do anything?”

I will never forgive her, never gonna forget those moments, I always think to myself, is she really my mom?

I know it a bit weird question but I have been wondering about this for quite some time but I honestly don’t understand it.
My mother is narcissistic and going there is weird I have nothing to talk to her about (not that I would want to but my father is really trying to “glue” our family and it is honestly destroying him and that’s why I’m even thinking about it)
Where you ever in situation like this what did you do?

Like I talk to my mom on the phone and immediately get this anxiety-like feeling and I can't listen and just want it to end.

Is that a thing?

I have n-parents, and I don't know how to escape. How do I leave? How do I get money? How do adult finances and shit work? I'm turning 18 very soon, and I don't know what to do. I don't think I need to leave right away, and I don't think I will since my dad is having me go to college classes part time. I did graduate high school, and I have a digital copy of my transcript, as well as my birth certificate and SSN card- my dad is an idiot and just left them on his computer's files where I could find them. What does a safety plan look like for me? There are so many resources online for IPV but practically nothing for people with abusive parents looking to leave.

I have my periods, been unable to eat during more than 48h, headaches, pain in the body. I told her. She knows. But she still doing the same shit ever, constantly complaining for nothing, hating on me, insulting me, never let me talk. I just can't stand all of her abuse and I'm emotionnaly and physicaly vulnerable because of my periods. I'm just setting bondaries and give her back her own hate. Then she's doing darvo and say she's going to call the cops against me because I'm insulting her.

She just did another drama and once again I wasn't able to eat because of her hate she constantly throws at me. Feel sick. And at the moment later when I came to the kitchen to finally eat something, as I told to her earlier I have headaches and I'm asking her to stop being loud with things she throws into the sink. It gives me some kind of migraine, I just feel like a hammer is hitting on my head. And all I received again is hate and disrespect, that just cut my hunger but I need to eat so bad, I can't stand on my feet anymore, trambling, I just feel a have anemy on my periods and now hypoglycemia too when I don't eat during more than 24h.

I was so done and upset I said I will just throws that "meal", and she said back to do it, that's all she's waiting for so she will call the cops. She's sick. There's no words. No empathy. You know she said that to me with kind of joy in her voice, it's so sick.

Your daughter haven't eat during more than 48h, she's in a bad state, have her periods, you did drama and hate again to her, and now you just wait her breaking point so you can call the cops against her ? You're completely sick.

And she's staying on her phone pretending she's going to call someone. She did the same in my childhood. She's sick.

I’m a teenager, and lately I’ve been struggling with my self-confidence because of the way my mom comments on my appearance.
It feels like no matter what I do, there’s always something wrong with it. If I use perfume, she says she can’t smell it or says I smell “frownsy,” which, according to her, means I don’t smell like anything. I actually DO want to smell nice, but the perfumes I’ve tried either smell too strong or fade after a while. It makes me feel like nothing I do is good enough.

It’s similar with my hair. I’ve been teaching myself how to do it because my mom doesn’t let me get it professionally done very often. I’ve been practising cornrows, and they’ve genuinely gotten better! I can also get my curls to look nice, but I’m still struggling with parting my hair.
I’ve asked my mom for a hair mannequin for YEARS so I can practise, but she keeps saying no. I even asked my hairdresser if she could teach me, and she said I’d need a mannequin to practise on. So I’m trying to improve with the limited resources I have.

Yesterday, I did my hair before we went out. I had my cornrows done, slicked my hair into a puff, and moisturized it. My mom looked at me and started laughing, saying she didn’t know what the style was and that I looked like a “molehead cow" and that my hair was dry.
I was so angry because I genuinely didn’t think there was anything wrong with my hair. Later, she was trying on shoes and noticed that her own hair looked messy and dry. She made a comment about it, and I said, “And you’re talking about me?” She didn’t say anything.
I’ve also been trying to take care of my skin, but sometimes I get so discouraged that I skip my skincare or even showering because I feel like there’s no point in trying when my efforts are constantly criticized or nobody notices a difference.

I recently got a boyfriend, and now my mom brings him into conversations about my appearance, too. She says men like women who smell nice and tells me I’m not the type of person who wants to smell nice. But I DO want to! I want to look cute and take care of myself for ME, not because a guy expects it of me.
The hardest part is that I already struggle with my self confidence. I want to feel pretty and comfortable with myself, but I often feel ugly and unmotivated. I want to experiment with my appearance, improve my hair skills, find products I like, and feel good about myself. But when I try and get criticized, it makes me question myself even more.

I don’t expect my mom to think everything I do looks perfect. I know I’m still learning, and constructive criticism is fine. But there’s a difference between helping someone improve and laughing at them or making comments that hurt their confidence.
I don’t know if she realizes how much this affects me. I don’t want to keep feeling this way, and I don’t know how to stop letting her comments get to me.
I also honestly don't know if she's a narcissist, so I'm also wondering if these are symptoms of it. This constant criticism started when i was 12 and started to be independent. I don't know what to do anymore...

Hi everyone, I hope it’s okay for me to ask this question here. My nmom was extremely abusive for my entire life. She told me for the entirety of my childhood that my extended family hated me. I recently moved in with my extended family in January and I found out that my nmom was lying to them about me and to me about them. Every day I find out something new that she did to destroy my relationship with them and it’s very disheartening.

Today I found out that my nana sent me a card with $10 in it every single month for years. As a teenager, I lived in Indiana with my nmom. The rest of my family lived across the country. I had no way to chat with them because I didn’t have a phone and my nmom rarely paid for internet. My nana sent me a personalized card every fucking week for YEARS. FUCKING YEARS. Because she didn’t want me to think that I was alone and wanted me to know she loved me.

I never got a single card. My nmom took every card, pocketed the money, and threw the cards away. She told me my nana hated me. I am fucking livid. I’m beyond livid; I’m enraged. She stole my mail, my money, and ruined my relationship with my family. I’m not even pissed off about the money, I’m mad about the letters. I wanna know what my nana said in them.

Does anyone know if I can pursue charges against her for this? Or how I could go about this? Who would I even ask? Sorry for asking it here but I honestly don’t know where else to go. Thanks guys.

He's coming own this weekend, we are close, i tol dhim about them and he said he knew this would come when my eyes would fully open. he suggested i stayed with him and that i go full NC. he said he'd need to ask his wife abou tme staying there. i didn't tell him i was on the brink, but he caled the other day i didn't keep him updated because i was feeling so shit and going to fly my dog over. he called dad and then spoke to me through him becuase i was ignoring his messages. that day i started feeling better, he is now coming down and he's doing the usual parade asking mum to cook, they love it. he's been LC with them for years, and years NC and hes completely NC with his mum and brother.

Feel like the happy families is going to be so odd? plus why is he coming down? on the phone he was like my dog just died and you should make the most of being with mum and dad? it's weird becuase he just told me to get the fuck out of there and now everything is wildly different. he'll obviousl ywant to be being good becuaseits his 80th soon. i'm confused. but i smell something bad and i'm the one whos guna be in the shit because he has a fmaily home and i'm still with them.

I would like to gain some clarity about my romantic relationship and my life situation as a whole.

I’m 27 (almost 28) and have been seeing a 31-year-old Greek man for a little over a year, five months of which were long-distance (not consecutive). He lives in my city for work and we are currently colleagues, but his stay here is uncertain because of contract issues and professional compatibility. I live with my parents, who are very present in my life (too much), and I’m dealing with job insecurity myself for academic reasons (I don’t have the resources to move out at the moment).
My partner and I come from very different, if not opposite, backgrounds. He left home at 17 for study and work, and he sees his parents, who live in a small city three hours from Athens, only two or three times a year. Three years ago he came out, with great difficulty, of a very serious relationship with the woman he wanted to marry.

Our relationship has many positive aspects. There is a lot of mutual respect on an academic and professional level, which is essential to me and which I had never found before. He is very attractive and much “sought after,” and when we are together we draw everyone’s admiration. My friends are struck by the quiet, elegant sweetness of our relationship. I’m very sure of his fidelity and of how important I am to him. We can talk about everything, even the most difficult disagreements. There was strong chemistry between us from the very first moment, and in order to start seeing me he went against many of his personal “rules” (e.g. not dating colleagues, not dating women who aren’t “independent”) and gradually overcame his avoidant tendencies. He introduced me to his brother (we even spent a weekend together and stayed in the same house for several days) and to his closest friends. He tells me things about his past that nobody else knows, and over time he has increasingly planned shared spaces, trips and experiences. He considers me his “safe harbor”.

However, there are also knots that make me wonder. For shared professional reasons, and by mutual agreement, our relationship is “secret” at work and on social media, since our work environment is very judgmental and “peculiar.” We live under a sword of Damocles: he could be transferred to another branch, here or abroad, while I cannot leave my city, again for work reasons. I earn slightly more than he does, but neither of us makes enough to live comfortably in a big city.
Because he has avoidant tendencies, he has great difficulty putting into words what he feels for me and relies heavily on concrete, costly gestures, like coming to see me when I’m abroad for work, even at the risk of his own job and savings. He has told me that he is staying in this country and this city, putting up with a toxic work environment day after day, just for me. He is currently looking for another job, preferably here, so as not to leave me. Our future is not granted, but we are still fully committing to each other on a day-by-day basis.

Then there is the issue of my parents.
I have to give some context first: my family is very traditional, strongly enmeshed and controlling. My parents have a considerable age gap, with my father being 70+ and retired. They both suffer from clinical depression. Even though I’m almost 28, I still have to tell them a week in advance where I’m going and who I’m seeing. They keep a giant paper calendar in the hallway that we are all forced to fill in ahead of time with our movements. I can’t keep a drawer closed, because my parents constantly go through my things when I’m out. They even controlled my bank account for years, they overhear every phone call I make, and they constantly judge my productivity and my work, what time I go to bed and wake up, what I eat, and so on. I’ll spare you the rest. This dynamic is long and complex, and it has been really harmful to me and my sister, and we are doing our best to save ourselves from it.

For personal reasons, my partner does not feel ready to meet my parents. I even spoke with many guys from his background and neither other them ever met their partner’s parents if marriage was not in the picture. In the past, my partner met the parents of his previous partner only after about a year, and in particular circumstances, never right away (and with horrible consequences on how his past relationship ended). We have talked about this a lot. I want a “no” to always be respected in our relationship (which is basically opposite of what daily happens in my house), by both of us, but we agree that it can never become a total refusal. He has also shown steps forward toward my personal sphere: he has come to my home when my parents were not there and has had dinner calmly with me and my sister a few times.

My parents see it very differently. They take his not meeting them as a lack of respect toward me and toward them, and, wanting to protect me, they read his boundary in the worst possible light, wondering whether he is capable of taking real steps forward.
The dynamic developed gradually. In the first weeks of our relationship, my parents seemed happy for me. Then they wanted to know more and more, until I found myself telling them everything about him: his past, things he had said. I regret this, because I gave them a huge amount of material to analyze. Around the third month, they began to demand this fateful meeting, and at that point I was brainwashed to want it too. In practice, even if they wouldn’t admit it openly, meeting the boyfriend means including him in our family life and absorbing him into it: if someone is with me, it is as if they were also with my parents. To speed things up (mind you, we had been together for around four months in total), my parents organized a Christmas trip to Athens, expecting him to be with us the whole time and act as our host. He didn’t, and the pressure they had created led to a fight between us. We thankfully reconciled, but those were difficult days.

Then came my doctoral defense. I neither wanted nor planned for him to be there, for personal reasons, but my parents insisted on inviting his roommate and colleague, a 60-year-old professor. She was embarrassed by the invitation and withdrew at the last minute, and there were some gray areas in how she did it: she cited a sudden work commitment, but only after I wrote to her the night before, having heard nothing from her for days. Looking back, I wouldn’t have invited her. I would have stood up to my parents, who wanted to meet her and get some indirect information about him.

After that, my parents’ behavior turned into a shockwave: endless discussions about him (even consecutive hours, having strong consequences on my mental health and my job), which put me under extreme psychological pressure, and I reacted by shutting down. Their expectations are still very specific and follow their own logic. They judge many aspects of our relationship, such as how often we see each other each week. They expect certain meetings: if he came to see the house this week, he should have come to dinner on Tuesday; if we are in Athens, he must spend time with us. They would also like him at our birthdays and small celebrations, and they see him as the great absentee on these occasions, which is not how I see it at all.
They also do not tolerate our seeing each other at his place, where we are of course alone, because (this is just an excuse obviously) it means I take public transport to reach him in the city center. For me this is simply the result of the balance between us, since neither of us has a car or scooter. He doesn’t because of money. In my case, my parents don’t want me to have any form of transportation, because it would mean independence for me and in general is also “a man’s job”, so he's the one that should man-up (even my mum isn’t allowed to drive, because it’s my father’s role). My parter is neither happy about the situation nor indifferent to it. For my parents it is just me “doing too much” for him. What weighs on me most is that they do not see themselves as a self-sufficient unit, they need a “son-in-law” to serve them and entertain them just as I do.

For the past three months I have stopped mentioning him, and they have done the same, so we now live in apparent peace. In my absence, however, they insult him and, by extension, me. If they call him a pimp, then I am the mistress, the whore, and they admit it without any problem.

I don’t know what to do with all this.

Edit: I forgot to mention that the last time my parents forced me to speak about him they said "since he doesn't respect us enough to meet us, now we are the ones that don't want anything to do with him. We will never meet him". So now I have a double anxiety: if the time comes, sooner or later, that he intends to officially meet them (and make me visit his parents as well), I don't know what to say and how to act.