In 2000 my precious mom was diagnosed with cancer and died shortly after. I had just turned 11 at the time. Am now 21. Actually, it was 1 week precisely after my 11th birthday that mom died at the hospital. I didn’t know how to live without the woman that raised me. Dad was still around, but he was out working most of the time providing his family with money so I mostly spent time with mom. Dad is very harsh. He’s the kind of man that doesn’t really like being around people unless he has to. And in his ideal world you can only go out of the house if you gain something personal from it. Which meant no hanging out with friends after school. My older sister couldn’t bare living under the same roof as dad. At the time I didn’t see the problem, but once I grew older I realised something was wrong. Sis ran away from home when she was 14. Right after mom died. That’s when the child welfare system came into the situation which didn’t make things better at all. In fact, things got very much worse. All kind of rumours swirled around in the neighbourhood. Things like dad hitting and sexually abusing me. In fact, dad never laid a hand on me. We barely hugged. Which was a bit sad coz I really wanted to be hugged from the one person in my life that I could trust and share my thoughts with. My days until I was 18 pretty much went like this: I went to school, came home. Had several long talks with dad. It was really nice having those conversations with dad coz at the time he was the only one I felt I could talk to. Everyone else seemed to twist and twirl my words so I ended up saying as little as possible and be as invisible as possible. I sometimes went a full day without saying a word. Really! I guess that’s when I started to talk to myself. It was simply to make sure my voice was still working. Coz I was a bit worried that my voice would be gone if I didn’t talk for a certain period of time. But my voice is fine.
I think the problems started when I was 15. At that point I already wanted to move away from dad, but I knew he was still trying to cope with the loss of his wife and I was the only person in his life that had meaning to him. But at the same time tried to push his own dreams about the future on me. And the fact that he didn’t want me to move and start my own life… He wanted me to stay by his side, day and night until he died. He treated me almost like a wife without the sexual intimacy. There were never anything related to such thing ever. But we were a bit too close for a father-daughter relationship. Spending too much time together made it difficult to grow. Dad didn’t mind it at all. I talked to dad a lot about moving away. Starting my own life. He was so negative. And he always said that if I wanted my own life I was welcome to run away just like sis. And he would treat me the same. Which mean cutting me off as his daughter. The thing is, I didn’t really run away. I simply moved out of my childhood home. I grew up.
This might be the time to say I’m a Norwegian girl. Early February 2010 I ran out of my dads house in the middle of the night with a suitcase and a backpack heading for the airport. My destination was Australia. The Down Under Country. The other side of the world. I thought I was heading for a better life but sure I was wrong. It’s one thing to run away from something like that and in such a traumatic way. Another thing is to start University for the first time and you don’t really know anyone yet. My first semester at University went pretty bad. I failed half of my subjects. I went to a Christian camp which is when I started making friends. That’s probably the best decision I’ve made in Australia so far. Coz I was thinking about not attending that camp. But after that camp I got a lot of new friends and now I have a bunch of friends which in a way feels a bit weird considering I didn’t have any friends in Norway.
I’ve been suicidal since mom died. Throughout the years while living with dad I had his fantasy about cutting my wrist. Either on the kitchen floor or in the bathtub. I never did it coz I was too scared and I didn’t want to disappoint mom. I know she wants me to succeed in life.
When I came to Australia, as said, I thought things would be better since I no longer had to deal with everything in Norway. But the horror about my life in Norway kept haunting me to the point when I didn’t care about my life anymore. Last semester at Uni I had a major breakdown. My mind was just a big mess. I couldn’t focus on anything. My University assignments was not to save so I had to seek help. Actually my friend insisted on taking me to the doctor and speak to someone on campus to save my studies. I was put on medication which made a huge difference at the time. Finally I could organise my thoughts and start to rebuild my strength. Shortly after put on medication I moved house coz I felt very unsafe from myself and others. Moving house helped. A while after moving house I started to cut myself. It started superficial. But then it got worse and worse. I’ve never cut as serious as needing medical assistance. Which is something that frustrates me. That I couldn’t cut deeper. But it was too painful. I Haven’t cut myself for quite a while but I have taken OD of medication I was subscribed. That happened several times. But still not serious to the point of needing medical attention.
I’m back at University now after quite a long summer holiday. The thing I’m fearing is that I’ll have a major breakdown again, and I’m not sure if I’m strong enough to make it through this time. The difference between then and now is that I got heaps of friends that want to help me. Last year at University I did Screen Arts which is film and television, but this year I’m doing Management. So hopefully that will work out better and I’ll pass some subjects. That would be nice.
Thank you for reading. God Bless.
4 comments
I think you are strong enough to make it through you’ve already come so far and it would be a shame to give up now. Best of luck this year for classes. 🙂
Wow…..ya can’t not be touched by that. I’m truly impressed..truly. Amazing.
There’s a way to clear your head up some more should you feel you want to chat with someone who knows your scenario very well. Parents carry pain and project it on to their kids and then you had to parent your dad in a way cause he was in pain and cause he’s old school, like mine….locked his hurt and pain away. The reality is, it doesn’t go away, and your body lets you know there are issues to deal with, ie…depression, illness…
An ideal situation would’ve been your dad saying “hey, I’m grieving your mom..and it’s difficult for me.”….we’re so scared to show our vulnerability, we’d rather pretend and hide our hurt for fear of what others might think, when actually, others opinions don’t mean a thing.
You never got the chance to cultivate a relationship with yourself that wasn’t based on fear….you need to find a way to be motivated by your passions and just focus on that…that is a good guiding force that will get you on a better track…Time for you to look after you…mourn what you need to , cry when you need to, and support your being on every level…you deserve it. softsoul9 should you want to skype…Cheers.
Sorry to hear bout you parents 🙁 Im from Australia where abouts are you?
In the recent past I could have not said a word to anyone for almost a week. I also talked to myself to make sure I still had a voice!