My Story

So, I’m 15 years old and I’m the youngest of 5 children from my mother. The 3 oldest have different dads and are much older than I am. My relationship with them was never good, mostly because my dad (their stepdad) was very abusive towards them but not me.  They felt that I was being factorized and wanted nothing to do with me. I witnessed my dad beating on my older siblings countless times while my mom just stood there and watched. And while I wasn’t the one getting the abuse it still took a toll on me to witness that. I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t afraid of my father. He just seemed so angry. My mom wasn’t much better. As a small child I was able to stay out of my parents way and remain mostly oblivious to my parents toxic ways. My dad told me that it was okay for him to abuse them because he was just teaching them a lesson. I was always my dads favorite because a side from my older brother I was the only kid he really had. My brother was autistic so my dad pretty much rejected him and my mother babied him to the point where nothing was ever expected of him and he could get away with anything he wanted. Including beating the shit out of me, locking me up for hours while my parents weren’t home, etc.

My sister was the first to leave, I was 7 and she was 17. I didn’t understand why she left until a little bit later, when my mom started to fight with me the same way she’d fight with her. It started out small. My mom would try to worm her way into my life suddenly caring about what I was doing when I was so used to being left alone. She would demand my attention and tried to force me to do activities that she thought were fit for me regardless if I wanted to or not. She couldn’t stand the fact that I was no longer that small child who just blindly followed her around and did everything with out any question. I was starting to develop my own interest and grow into my own person and my mother hated it. When I was 8 we finally moved. Before that we had been staying in a crowned two bedroom house filled with about 9 people and a dog. Once we moved I was finally able to have my own room and a small grain of privacy. My mother would make insulting comments here and there and she was still trying to force me into things that she liked as a kid, but it wasn’t as bad. Then when I turned nine she started volunteering at my school. It was like I couldn’t get away from her for 5 seconds. At home when she started to bother me I would just walk away but I couldn’t do that at school there were other people. She started staying after school and criticizing me during my art club. She’d hover over me and insult me for everything I did. “Ew why would you choose that color its ugly. Ugh I can’t believe you like that” And I would try to say stuff back but all the kids around me would attack me and say I was being disrespectful. I couldn’t ever stick up with myself when she started her stuff. I started to feel really trapped.

There was this art teacher at school that I really didn’t get along with. He used to purposely exclude me from every single activity even when I was on my best behavior. He would start yelling at me when I would raise my hand and ask him for paint or clay since I was the only kid who didn’t have any. One day it got pretty bad. He told the class to be quiet and sit nicely and he would pass out clay. So I did as I was told and folded my arms like everyone else and waited while he called on everyone else. Then once everyone had been called on he still hadn’t paid me any attention. I tried raising my hand and talking to him and he got this attitude with me and said I didn’t deserve any clay. And I tried asking why and he didn’t really give me an answer and as a nine year old, I got pretty upset. And I asked him why he always did this to me and he got really mad. He yelled at me in front of the whole class and threatened to write me up and all this stuff. Eventually I was told to go to the hall, so I did. When he came out to talk to me he grabbed my shoulders and backed me into the wall and just started screaming in my face. And I broke down because I just felt like I didn’t deserve this is he was so close that it was making me uncomfortable. I tried telling him to back up and he wouldn’t. Eventually I was sent into another classroom for the rest of that period. Then my parents were contacted. And I tried to explain to them what happened but they just didn’t care. And I know it’s stupid but I just felt so hopeless and upset that I thought I would attempt suicide.

I had heard of suicide before, my mom used to get into these angry rants where she screamed about how much she hated all of us or my dad and she would threaten to kill herself or harm herself in someway. I had cried for hours and my dad just told me to shut up. And I thought that if I died nothing would ever happen again so I was going to take a belt and try to hang myself from a hook that was on the ceiling in my basement. I can’t remember exactly what happened after that. When I was younger I was able to blank out the bad things and pretend they never happened. I think I tried it and the belt broke, but I also think maybe I didn’t actually attempt it. I do know for sure that I had brought a chair downstairs with the belt. But I’m not sure if I changed my mind or failed. Either way I survived. And that’s when I started seeing my life as a box or a prison. I did the math and figured I had 9 more years to go. I started counting down telling myself that I was half way there and maybe one day my mom won’t be so crazy and demanding and my dad won’t be so angry and abusive and maybe I’ll turn out to be a beautiful teenager.

3rd grade was also the first time I got a bladder infection, which is something that happens quite often now. But back then I wasn’t sure what it was and I was embarrassed but when I finally tried to tell my mom, she wouldn’t listen. Eventually she had gotten to many calls home saying that I peed myself because the teachers wouldn’t let me go to the bathroom that she took me to the hospital. Of course she pretended like I had never told her about it and told the school that she had no clue it was happening. Then I also started to get really bad ear aches and got really sick. There was strange white stuff oozing out of my ears and I would go to my mom and show her and she would ignore me. I had to go to school and I would start crying in class because it hurt so much. Eventually they let me stay home, because I had thrown up quite a lot one night. That’s when my dad noticed the ooze and took me to the hospital. If he hadn’t of done it when he did I could’ve lost my hearing or worse. Again my mom pretended like she had no clue that was happening and tried to punish me for not saying anything, even tho I did. Third grade was also when I met my life time best friend. She has autism, like my brother, so she didn’t really understand anything I was going through but I could use her house as an escape from mine.

Things only got worse from there. When I was in 4th grade I started having problems with another teacher. The art teacher had been fired, so I didn’t have to worry about him, but now my main teacher had a problem. And I will admit that I wasn’t a prefect student or anything, but the most I ever did was talk to much and at the wrong time. And yes I understood that was a problem. But she would just go out of her way to yell at me and punish me. I was the only kid who ever had to stand in the corner. She would accuse me of something, true or not and then tell me to stand in the corner for at least an hour. She excluded me from most activities and never wanted to call on me or anything. She made a lot of phone calls home to my parents and would tell them all these things that never really happened or she would exaggerate the truth quite a bit. Now my parents are very big on their reflection and rather than seeing me as my own person they sort of see me as an extension of them. And they think they always have to look perfect and clean and look like their the best parents. And that meant that I had to be their exact definition of perfect and if I wasn’t then everyone would think they were bad parents and that just wasn’t aloud, even though it was the truth. There were many, many, maaaany meetings between my parents and various different people in the school where they tried to go out of their way to make themselves look good. And I hated it. I hated that they were making such a big deal out of everything.

Fourth grade was also the first time I had conflict with a girl my age. There was this new girl that I tried to befriend. And it worked and we were friends for a while and she told me all this personal stuff that she had been through and I didn’t really get it because I was 10 at the time and I wasn’t very empathetic yet. So I was just like “Wow that’s really bad”. Well eventually something happened and we weren’t friends anymore. And she started to make up stories to get me in trouble she tried turning people against me even starting a little group called the “I hate *my name* club” and they went out of their way to make me look bad and they started talking about me and things. That led to more calls home and more conferences and by the end of the year my parents decided I could not return to that school for 5th grade. This meant leaving my best friend, the only person who had ever been there for me. But it was also a plus because there was this boy who had been stalking me quite a lot and would try to touch me inappropriately during class and I was glad to get away from him. But this also meant giving up my art class and my MMA class which I was really fond of.

At the beginning of 5th grade my 2nd oldest sibling left for college. Then it was just my parents and 2 of my brothers. The oldest brother was hardly home and he got to stay at his high school, while me and my other brother had to start online school. Online school did not work well for me. I was accused of cheating, (I used the textbook to answer a question which was aloud and the teacher said that she googled my answer and found it on some website.) I proved to my mom that I hadn’t cheated but I still had to leave the school. Which was fine because I didn’t like it anyways.

I started school at a public school in the area. This was the first time I was ever seriously bullied. There was a whole group of girls that just hated me. Since my first day of school. I was the ugly new kid who was tall and already getting pimples at age 11. Right after I started school there I got my first period. My mom didn’t really teach me anything about it she just gave me some pads and told me to wear them. I had no clue what to do if I bled through or how to deal with the pain or get rid of the smell. I didn’t know how often to switch pads or even really how long it would last. And since I was in 5th grade and most girls didn’t start until they’re in 7th or 8th I wasn’t really aloud to carry a purse around with me and I couldn’t fit a pad in my pocket either. So long story short I bled through several times. And my school had uniforms, so it wasn’t like I could just wrap a jacket around my waste or pull my shirt over it because that wasn’t aloud. There was nothing I could do about it so I ended up getting mad fun of even more for that.

5th grade was also when I had my 1st boyfriend. Of course we didn’t really do anything. I never saw him out side of school and I didn’t even really like him. I had only agreed to go out with him because he would message me asking me to date him so much on face book. He never talked to me during school and there was this rumor that he was dating another girl while he was dating me. This made me really upset since that girl was in my new art class that I had gotten into and I thought we were friends. I didn’t really believe it tho and stayed with that boy for 2 months until he called one of my other friends cute and tried to ask her out then I left. He started dating the girl from my art class right afterwards. This mad me upset, but I quickly moved on to a new boy. I thought he was really cute and wanted to get to know him so bad. He was friends with the girl from my art class who was dating my first ex. And so to get to him I befriended her after her and my ‘ex’ broke up. Then I was accepted into their little circle. I was so proud because my crush and all his friends were in 6th grade and I was only in 5th. I started hanging out with them and got really close to the girl from my art class. Then I found out that my other friend (the one with autism I was just talking about) was moving out of state and I wouldn’t be able to spend all my free time with her anymore. This took a huge toll on me because it meant I would have to spend all my time at home listening to my parents argue and trying to avoid their nasty comments. Also in 5th grade my mom started her own girl scouts troop. Which wasn’t too crazy since she did girl scouts with my older sister when she was younger. She even tried it with me but I wasn’t interested. The thing about the girl scouts that bothered me was that my mother would devote all her time to them and my dad was the only one working, but she would take his money and go buy snacks and little crafts for them instead of paying the bills. And I think this is only because she loves little kids and rejected me and my other siblings because we were no longer small and obedient.

Things got even worse the summer after 5th grade because we got evicted from our house. We had been moving about once each year since I was 8 in and out of dirty houses with mice and bugs. And it wasn’t uncommon for my parents to get evicted. This was because my mom is very impulsive and likes to spend money on all kinds of stuff for herself rather than the rent. (As I mentioned with the girl scouts, she would also go out to eat a lot and buy little things for herself but she hated buying me and my brother clothes and other things we needed she always acted like we were demanding too much) We ended up homeless. No one would rent to us because we had too many evictions and our credit was horrible. At first we were straying in dirt motels with huge roaches. And I would have to sleep in the bed with my mom while my dad and brother shared a bed. My dad never let me and my brother sleep together or even really play together not even when we were kids. I think he feared we would have sex or something which made no sense to me at all. And my oldest half sibling was still around but my mom let him go stay with friends and do whatever he wanted. I hated being that close to my parents. It was total shit we argued every single day there was no way to get away from them at all no matter what I did they were in my face. We were in and out of motels until they ran out of money and then we checked into a homeless shelter. I had to share a small room with my parents and brother again but there were 2 bunk beds so we didn’t have to sleep together anymore. The shelter had many rules. Kids under 13 had to be in the rooms asleep by 9:30. Kids over 13 had to be in there by 10. You couldn’t leave before 9am unless you could prove that you had a job to be at or you were a kid waiting on the school bus. You had to be there by 8pm again unless you had work. You had to go to break fast lunch and dinner when they served them. Parents had to do chores such as sweeping, moping, cleaning the bathroom etc. It was really stupid. But we stayed there for several months. I started 6th grade in the area and made a bunch of friends and then my parents finally got an apartment and I had to switch schools again. My new school was full of kids who were really immature for 6th graders and they just seemed really spoiled and didn’t really care for me. I was pretty depressed and kept to myself mostly.

I started hanging out with the girl from my art class that I met in 5th grade again after that. My mom would take me over to her house and we’d hang out. Then one day she told me the guy I liked was having a sleep over we convinced my mom to let me go, but I couldn’t stay the night. That was mostly fine I mean my first ex was there and he said somethings that made me feel like shit, but I was just happy to be with my crush. Then I went over to his house again and I stayed the night. I knew he had a girlfriend, but he flirted with me so much that I had kind of forgot about her. He started kissing on me and touching me and after everyone fell asleep he convinced me to go into another room and I was really scared to do anything with him but he pressured me really hard and well I ended up giving my first blow job and I probably would’ve lost my virginity if my friend hadn’t of walked in and stopped it.

Later that year I went out with that guy, but it didn’t last very long. He dumped me for being ‘too depressing’. The fights with my mom had gotten more frequent it seemed like every single day she was after me. She would attack me with insults as soon as I came home. And I started to cut myself. The first time I cut was technically in 5th grade where I took a piece of glass and tried to see if it was sharp. But I consider this my first time because it had meaning behind it. I carved the word ‘*****’ into my leg with a sharp piece of plastic that I had broken since I couldn’t get the blade out of my pencil sharpener. I started cutting a lot more after that. Then I started this other guy that I had met through that same friend from my 5th grade art class. I honestly thought I was in love with him. He was my first love. I would see him while I was at my friends house and I was doing a good job of keeping him secret from my parents until that summer.

In June I went to visit my friend who had moved out of state. It was the best thing ever. I was treated like I mattered and I felt like I was apart of their family. While I was there my mother called me and texted several times to tell me I was a horrible child for leaving and I was a ***** because I wasn’t there on Father’s day. It made me really upset and she just put me down really bad. But when I got back I hadn’t seen my boyfriend in a while and I wanted to. I found out he was around my area and decided to leave. My parents weren’t supposed to be home for a few hours, so I figured I would be able to leave and not get caught. Well they came home early to get something and found out I was gone and started texting me threats. So I came home and my dad blew up on me and started yelling at me. He said I was acting like a whore and accused me of being pregnant. He wouldn’t listen to anything I had to say. He just kept insisting that I was a whore and I was pregnant and he said he would take me to the hospital and make them stick shit up my vagina and he just called me all this shit and made me feel really bad about myself. And this moment has had long term effects on me. After that I wasn’t aloud to go anywhere. My dad made lots of degrading comments about everything I did. I was grounded until school started which mean no internet, no leaving the house, no leaving my room, and limited food. They made it really hard for me to do anything. I got yelled at for eating cereal because “People who act like whores don’t need sugar”. They would go out and get fast food for my brother and tell me I didn’t deserve any. My mom also found out about my cutting and promised to get me a therapist, but that turned out to be a lie like everything else she ever promised me.

On my 13th birthday I was supposed to get a laptop that they bought back in June before I even got grounded and my dad wouldn’t give it to me because he said I was going to go flash my boobs to random guys on Skype. They didn’t even tell me happy birthday. Me and that boy broke up soon after I started the 7th grade. I then dated that girl I had been friends with from 5th grade who set me and him up. We lasted two weeks she said she wasn’t into girls anymore and dumped me. Then I went out with that boys friend. This was a very dumb idea. He cheated on me and we broke up. I was really stressed out from all the things I had been through and one day I just exploded in class and that was my first mental break down. I stayed home from school for 3 days. While I was gone some friends of mine when to the school counselor and told her I was batshit crazy and they called my mom and told her about this therapy program at my school.  I ended up going to that for a while.

Then I was talking to 2 other guys who were friends. One of them asked me out and I said yes but I really wanted the other one. Yeah so I ended up cheating on the one guy and left him for the other. Then that guy hit me and cheated on me and made me feel really insecure and I left and ended back with the 1st guy. During that time I was in and out of hotels for a while before we ended up staying with my older sister.

I dated that guy all through out 8th grade but I wasn’t doing so well with friends. Every girl I got close to went behind my back and did sneak shit and they all just fucked me over. I was dealing with genetic depression and severe anxiety. Therapy wasn’t much help either. I couldn’t really talk to them about much of anything because they would tell my parents. They also didn’t really understand my situation with my parents and assumed that it was my fault our relationship was trash. But in all honesty they’re both extremely toxic people. I would try to talk to them and do the things they suggested and my parents would just get pissed and argue with me. I would try to talk to them nicely and they would ask me what the fuck I wanted and tell me to leave. So I pretty much gave up on ever working things out with them.

Then that summer I got dumped with no explanation. And I was hurt and didn’t know what to do. I started talking to my 1st love again, but he didn’t really have any interest in taking me back. Then I met his cousin who was 17 turning 18. I went to his house a few days after we met just because I was so desperate to get out of my house and find something to distract me from my broken heart. I told my mom I was going to hang out with a girl and went to his house. I stayed the night and ended up giving him my virginity. I had done sexual things with the two guys before him, but I hadn’t even had sex. I felt really dirty for giving it up to a stranger who was 3 years older than me. I ended up staying with him for quite a while even tho he was very clingy and physically and mentally abusive. Once we had sex the 1st time he wanted it all the time. He didn’t really care if I said no he would just do it anyways. Sometimes I’d start crying because it hurt so much and he would just pretend not to notice. And he was basically raping me. But I stayed with him because I didn’t think anyone else would ever love me. He would force me to come over every single weekend and while I was on break from school. He got pissed when I went out of state to see my friend and accused me of cheating. He got pissed when my mom wouldn’t take me to his house on Christmas and forced his aunt to come get me. He made me call him every single day. Even during school sometimes. He never let me hang out with anyone other then him. He’d get mad of I talked to anyone girl or guy and accused me of cheating. He liked to grab me and hold me down. He often left bruises during sex. And I tried to leave him several times and he would just break down and threaten to kill himself. Actually he threatened to kill himself over everything. When I first tried to talk to him about the sex he said he couldn’t help it and that he was gonna kill him self. He would cut himself while I was at his house and I would have to pry the razors away from him. He tried overdosing on his depression medicine several times and I had to stick my hand in his mouth and get the pills out.

I had tried really hard to leave him but he just made it so damn hard. I was so miserable. Then one day I started talking to this guy in my class. And at first if was just a conversation but then I couldn’t get him out of my head. He made me realize that I wasn’t worthless and that I don’t have to stay with that guy forever. So I tried again to dump him. And he said no and convinced me to come to his house that weekend. I went but only to get my stuff. I tried really hard to tell him it was over but he wouldn’t let me go home. I tried texting my mom and he took my phone. He wanted to fuck me again I begged him not to but he did it anyways. And then he found out about the other guy and started to physically hurt me and he threatened to kill himself. And it was a very scary situation. He would act like we were still together one minute and call me babe and try to watch movies or have sex or something then the next he was calling me names and saying I never cared. It was horrible and when I finally got to go home he wouldn’t even let me take all of my stuff. He wanted to believe that I had no reason to leave and that I would be back.

Of course I ended up dating that guy I had been talking to. He just seemed so different from anyone I had ever met. And I’m still with him now. I want to say that things have gotten better for me. My mother is still really toxic and I still don’t really want a relationship with my parents. But my dad has been talking to me more. He’s apologized for some of the stuff he’s done of course he won’t admit to everything. He just expects me to forgive him this time, but I know he’s still the same person. I did learn that he was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder and my mom had been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder. Of course neither of them believe this to be accurate and they aren’t medicated. It makes a lot of sense to me tho especially since my therapist believes I’m showing early traits of Bipolar Disorder. I think I’ve finally found God. I’m still o the fence about it, but I think I believe now. I finally figured out what I want to do with my life and I’m just hoping that I can get through these next 2 and a half years until I’m an adult.