Preety_India

You clearly haven't been in an abusive relationship. Talk about victim shaming. I never chose to be with an abuser. I trusted my ex because that's the picture that was painted during the window dressing period of the relationship. We attracted each other because he was very smart and gentle and attractive looking. It was a win win for me because he was an absolute gentleman and charmer. The abuse only began in the 3rd month of the relationship and grew slowly in increments leading me confused and I hadn't known anything about narcissistic abuse at that point so I was ignorant or unaware of such relationship dynamics. I stayed in the abusive relationship not because I wanted to be abused but in the hopes that things would change and things did get better and got worse again, so I reached my breaking point and left, it's my true love for him that made me stick with him for so long, not weakness, people blame the woman who stays in an abusive relationship, quit victim blaming, they don't understand how complicated relationships are and the emotional bonding is so strong so its not that easy to simply break off and walk away. If it was that easy, no woman would need any sort of advice or help in relationships, we wouldn't have so many life coaches, marriage counselors and therapists pitching tent everywhere. Women are very emotional that's why they need a ton of coaxing and coaching to gradually desensitize them away from that relationship with the abuser and slowly break that bond. Relationships are too complex for you to simply base it on high self esteem and low self esteem These are just one of the few parameters within a relationship but at the top level, huge factors are at play within a relationship than just self esteem.

He is as believable as a unicorn.

@EternalForest Often times such a complex situation arises out of not being able to give enough autonomy and freedom to the other person. Once you let them free and let them do what they want without your opinion coloring their decisions, everything falls right into place. When you give freedom, in the same moment, you also become free I always known that freedom is the greatest form of love. When you love everyone you Free everyone.

If that's the case, then nobody did anything wrong here. You are not wrong because in your mind you did absolutely nothing to deserve it. They are not wrong because they experienced an impediment and felt guilty for not being able to do enough. Hence their impediment absolves them of their guilt. So there is nobody to forgive here. You simply got hurt as a by product of an unfortunate situation between you and them. Neither is wrong and neither is guilty. The hurt is caused without intention or wrongdoing. So you have to simply let go. Consider it similar to an accident. The

That can be considered as self righteousness. This can be a combination of selfishness, unconsciousness and ignorance. But in any case, whatever may have been their opinion of you, ghosting is usually a sign that the person who doesn't care much. Because even if they thought you were needy, they would end things in a more meaningful manner and give you closure if they cared enough. But the other side is possible as well. You could think that you did something that made it look like you deserved the ghosting, you could be feeling a sense of Insecurity that you irked them by acting needy. This means your own Insecurity is hounding you and you aren't able to decide if what they did was right or wrong because somewhere you guilt yourself into thinking and believing that it must be your fault that they did this. If that's the case, you need to reverse the title and put it as "how to forgive myself." The mind has an incredible capacity to generate infinite scenarios and contexts and your situation could fit right into any of those scenarios. This is a see-saw Paradox.

Ghosting is a common technique used by narcissists to make the victim feel punished, isolated, abandoned or inferior.

@EternalForest What you're describing as selfishness can be considered as exploitation, scamming and using. Selfishness is a general tendency to only think about the self with complete disregard for another's feelings. For example if some amount of toilet paper or sanitizer is stocked on the shelf of a store and a man buys all of it knowing fully well that others might also need it, is not exactly exploitation because he isn't exploiting a particular person but simply doesn't care for other's needs but only his needs. This is selfish behavior. Similarly when someone is ghosting you they only care about their own goals and motives with complete disregard for the feelings and emotional state of the person being ghosted. This is again selfish because they don't care to address how you feel, like abandoning a pet on the roadside.. Ghosting can cause temporary trauma and feelings of abandonment. But selfish people don't care about that. They hurt others freely and go on their way like nothing happened.

@EternalForest Ghosting is a part of narcissistic behavior that has its roots in selfishness. So it fits into the top 5 reasons.

I agree with Keyhole. People with low self esteem don't deserve abuse or bad relationships. They deserve more love and understanding than others because of their weaknesses and sensitive natures, they need and deserve a lover who is a helper and a healer, not an abuser. The world works upside down and downside up. Paradox.

The outside light should be okay for you. The problem is with your retina. Or you are not used to it because of always living that way with blinds closed.

I will definitely practice this fire visualization explosion of spirituality exercise every day. It is really helping me in a big way. This is a big breakthrough in such a long time.

What I summarize this fire exercise is like this The fire represents creative energy. So when the fire fades or diminishes it means that the creative energy has been blocked because of toxins. But as soon as this purging of emotional toxins happens, the fire spark lights up again. Also it can also mean that the fire is fading as a sign of restoration of peace to the planet. Once the balance, order and peace has been restored, the energy of chaos has receded itself in the fire and the fire begins to diminish It can mean a lot of different things.

The silver lining What I suffer from are PTSD symptoms. I have known that for some time. My own healing has taken a hit because of the coronavirus. I was going to the therapist fairly regularly before the coronavirus to seek treatment for my PTSD but that's not possible now. When you grow up in a severely dysfunctional home, you accept it as your new normal. You normalize abuse and dysfunction. You don't think that much about it. You either block it as an escape mechanism and never really discuss it with anyone or you just accept it as your fate and don't feel the motivation to do much about it. I went through both of these mechanisms. One of my favorite ways to cope with the trauma during teen years was to jam the music loud into my ears or play a video game to the point of exhaustion, it wasn't for fun, it was only an escape. Escape would protect the mind from ruminating or just block the reaction to abuse. This way I wouldn't have to feel that something wrong was going on. I only had to block it and go back to my video games. For many years I never talked about it to people. I swallowed it. I was an expert at putting on a fake smile and pretending like I was happy around people. One day my teacher asked me "why do you always look so tensed and scared? I had no answer. I simply walked away. Often times abuse is not visible on the surface especially if you try consciously to hide it. Like pulling down your shirt sleeves, stuff like that. I was very shy at school. I remember that I never talked a single word to anyone till the age of 12. My teacher called in my mother for evaluation one day. She asked her "your daughter doesn't talk a single word for a whole year, what's wrong with her?" My mother just dismissed it as some habit. I only began to feel comfortable enough to talk to people starting age 13. But not much. Maybe only during break hours.. I used to have great difficulty in articulating or describing something to people. I have always struggled with that. I learned early on that hiding was an important mechanism. Everything had to be hidden. Opening up was out of question. I always found that hiding myself helped me to stay away from bullies. There were many things that I would hide from my mom. Not bad things. I never did any bad things. But generally I used to hide from her. Like if I lost a book I would hide it from her out of fear. This habit continued. I used to hide my boyfriends from her. One distinct reaction I remember from my childhood was sweaty hands and a pounding heart. Whenever my mom was standing close to me, my body would swell up, my palms would instantly get sweaty and my heart pounding out of my chest. Even nightmares. Many of them. It took many years for these symptoms to subside. Despite all of this I was a first ranker in school, nearly every time, a straight A student for 10 years. I had a huge appetite for learning and studying and generally excelling at things. I earned a lot of certificates and awards at school for my top performances in every subject. Teachers used to brag about me. Although I never received any support at home, I was a popular at school despite my shyness. I accepted that my miserable life was a norm for a very long time, not wanting or motivated to do anything about it. Every time I thought about doing something to get better, I would give up out of hopelessness realizing that the devil was somehow stronger than me. There was no point in trying to get better. Every time I tried, something would go wrong and I would go back to my miserable self destructive self pitying ways.. It's easier said than done. It's easy for people to say "why don't you do something about it? Why didn't you do something about it?" Dysfunctional homes are very complex and often times the person living in such an environment is not aware how really bad it is. They are used to that abuse. They can't look at their own abuse and degradation from an outside person's perspective. So complacency is usually a critical problem with children raised in dysfunctional homes. It's difficult to get them to realize how bad their situation is. How serious they must be to take action against it. This is human nature. Humans just like animals learn to get used to things no matter how destructive and dysfunctional they are.. Still, there's a silver lining to all of this mayhem. And that is "awareness".... I have been massively triggered by my constant journaling process to actually take radical steps towards my healing. The journal has been for the most part, an absolutely amazing gift in pushing me towards realizing what's wrong with me and taking steps to better and fasten my healing.

However I don't want my life to be revolved around someone who is bipolar. So I will only be adding glimpses of it in my journal, here and there. Not a full account Enough to say that you as a caregiver get drained psychologically dealing with a person with severe mental illness. I don't hate mentally ill people. But I want the world to understand the troubles and tribulations of being a caregiver at the same time and the magnitude of the impact of mental illnesses on a family and not just the person who is ill. I witnessed a whole family destroyed by suicide and death because of one mentally ill person, my mother. Words will never be enough to describe my pain.

The coronavirus has really hit me hard especially. Not only did I go through a 10 day starvation period and felt very feeble and weak at the end of it, the bigger curse was not being able to take my mom to the psychiatrist. She had very recently in mid February expressed the need to get treatment for her bipolar disorder after a lot of back and forth between me and her where I confronted her about all the childhood abuse and trauma she put me through. She would try to deny it and then she would blame it on her bipolar condition. She is extremely abusive and domineering and controlling. (I have already written a long purging account on that on this same page after the purging visualization I did) So she decided that she would do something about it. Something that she suffered from more than 30 years. We planned to go to a psychiatrist and we found one. We had to switch many psychiatrists in the course of just 10 days This is because she would throw a huge tantrum at the psychiatrist's office and keep pacing back and forth and hurl abuses at everyone. Not to mention how embarrassing it was got for me. The doctor had to literally reassure her to take the medication. She also suffers from OCD so she obsessively keeps cleaning and washing everything to the point of exhaustion. One day she called me 30 times a day and I couldn't pick her calls because I was in a crowded bus holding books and stuff in my hand and no place to move. It was terrible. And there are many more situations like this where being with her in public can be extremely embarrassing and people telling me to take her away and get out of the place.. The pharmacy store where she would go get medication stopped allowing her in because one day she attacked some of the employees there. Things like this makes it very difficult for me to get anything done for her.. She cannot be in a psych ward because I know that the treatment they give there is horrible and they will probably just keep her drugged up I don't show her a lot of love because it's tough for me to have those feelings knowing whatever happened to me since childhood, I try to help her but showing affection to her is impossible, those feelings don't arise even if I force myself. The relationship has been so embittered by her constant abuse that there is no point of return or reconciliation. I just try to be this person who helps her when she needs me. The coronavirus has dampened my hope big time. She was ready at last to get some treatment. It was the last week of February and I was hustling back and forth between different psychiatrist offices. It was very expensive too since her insurance doesn't cover mental health expenses. And the psychiatrists charge a whole lot for just 1 session that hardly lasts an hour. So it was the second week of March somewhere around March 12 when I realized that something is happening and I began to pay much more attention to news, I am not the kind of person who watches news or even bothers to pay a lot of attention to news in general, but somehow the news of Italy's death toll reaching 827 and lockdown kinda gripped me. I was scared for the first time. I was constantly watching news. I knew that this wasn't good. I was expecting a lockdown in my country as well. I was trying to book an appointment with the psychiatrist but they weren't responding. By March 25, a national lockdown was announced in my country and all hopes to get some treatment for my mother went to drain. I'm hoping when the clinical practice opens again, she will be ready to get help. It's very difficult to deal with bipolar individuals if you are caring for them, because often times they are reluctant to get treatment and they don't respond very well to psychological treatment and advice. Mild bipolar disorder is curable. But extremely resistant bipolar cases are very tough to deal with. I'm giving an account here of dealing with someone with bipolar disorder and how tough it is from a caregiver's perspective.

Understand that people's perceptions of you should never matter much. This is the first step to freeing yourself truly and irreversibly. If you think that what people think about you matters, then you have confined yourself and created your own cage. You are also breaking down the whole echo chamber rhetoric that most people rely on to feel validated. You don't need validation unless you are actively seeking it It's your mind that makes you feel and believe that people praising you is going to make your life better, this is a fallacy and only makes you vulnerable to people's judgement. This is a paradox. By creating a circuit of dependency, you have created your own dependency cycle, and now you can't be free of it. In order to be truly free, you have to be truly independent. You have to be your own support and you have to be your own critic. Relying on people is the first sign of codependency. The same people who supported you once can be the same people who backstab you when you really need them. What good does that bring? You need to learn to be precarious with trusting people. Trusting too easily can be a source of vulnerability and trusting too little can deprive you of the benefit they can bring to your life. It's a tightrope walk. To deal with this issue, the people issue, always have a gradation system in mind. Give more weightage to people who have always stood by your side, so even if they criticize, they could be doing it in good spirit and wait for them to make good afterwards. If they really care about you, they will invest their interest and time into you. And if they don't, take it as a sign that they never really bothered. If you have a person or a colleague at work or an acquaintance, don't give their opinions much weightage, because these are not the people who have known you, so they will be very quick to judge and end up hurting you. Their opinions shouldn't matter much. What you make of what people say depends a lot on you. If you change for them simply to impress them, then you are falling into the people pleaser trap. This is a very low conscious dangerous trap. You become a slave to people. Conversely, even praise can become a trap. It creates a sugar loop. You do more of what people want because you want that sugar. That's a drug. You become a clown. You get addicted to praise and adulation and that sets the tone of your life. This again puts you in the people pleasing trap. So both praise and criticism can become a trap depending on how you react to it. The simple answer is..... Be neutral You should be true to yourself. That's all that matters. Now.. A lot of the time people think that a person who enjoys a lot of support and praise from everyone is the best person. And the person that most people do not like has to be automatically a bad person This is very bad. Because it creates an echo chamber groupthink mentality which is based on cornering and isolating a person and making them feel bad for themselves because nobody likes them. This is no different than a mild form of cyber bullying. You are basically attacking that person's self esteem by reminding them how much they are disliked or hated. Since most people depend on public opinion and validation, they are obviously going to experience some sort of mental stress and agony knowing that most people don't like them. It's important that such a person be called out for their actions. In a truly loving community, nobody needs to feel isolated or cornered. Nobody needs to feel judged. A truly loving community values everyone equally. So If someone says to you that you are not loved by everyone or how you are the only one who nobody likes, that's a good sign that person is trying to lowkey bully you by using public opinion or approval as a vantage point to leverage his hate or bias against you I have come across different kinds of people in my life journey. Both national and international. I had good experiences and bad experiences. Happy times and sad times. Good memories and bad memories. I have come across many people who misunderstood me or simply chose to misunderstand me, and were very quick to judge me, these things used to bother me a few years ago, but now I have gotten used to people misunderstanding me and using bias or preconceived judgement in forming their image about me, I can't help it if they are biased, I can't go around defending myself forever, I can't cure them of their cognitive biases, it's not up to me to show them the right direction, those who love me will hold my hand forever, those who hate me will hate me no matter what, so when confronted with such people, all I do is simply let go and not think much about what they think of me and not let their opinions matter to me.. There is no other non laborious way to deal with this. (all of this came from the bullying experiences from my college and work place)

Usually with the fire visualization technique, the purging happens at the end of it. Life after completing the visualization.

Also understand that your basic framework of life remains the same. You don't need to change that. You can make little changes in your diet and stuff but overall it remains the same. Consider the framework of your life like an ocean floor. There is dust and sediment constantly deposited on the ocean floor. Some of this dust is also flying upwards and mixing with the ocean water and getting transferred elsewhere. The ocean floor remains the same..its the same floor as before. It has not metamorphosed into something else. It hasn't turned into a disco floor or lost its basic properties in any way. It is still the same floor what it was before.. But the sediment keeps depositing and washed off it like a continuous process. This is how spiritual growth works. When the dust comes off or flies off the ground, imagine it like purging. When the sediment deposits, imagine it to be a new layer of learning added to your life You can keep something on the ocean floor or remove something off the floor. In both cases the floor remains the same. This is how your life is. You remove aspects and purge them. And you add new layers of growth to your life. But your basic substratum or foundation or framework remains the same. Why?????? Because a basic framework gives you a sense of stability. Without an ocean floor, the whole ocean would look very chaotic.. The constant movement of sea animals is already adding to the chaos. Now if the floor disappears or reappears or breaks, this will create panic.. So there has to be at least something in your life that remains stable and static to give you that sense of stability. Because growth in any form, by its own nature, is very chaotic, incremental, uncertain and at the mercy of the circumstances and situations. Therefore when it comes to mental and spiritual growth, nothing is fixed so a lot of it can look very daunting but having that surfboard under your feet means you never have to feel like you are losing control, you can still ride all kinds of waves, high waves, strong waves, weak waves as long as you have perfect control and stability with your surfboard, then go surfing as much as you want, go explore spirituality as much as you want, you know you are not going to fail or lose anything as long as you have that inner sense of control, that inner surfboard and a proper basic framework. Your growth can look like a fascinating ocean floor decorated with all the learnings you earned attached to the floor. You create your own floor, you fashion your own life.

Benefits of the fire visualization experience /exercise I was randomly trying out some visualization exercises in the past few days and I kept exploring a lot of these exercises. I wanted to create my own exercise that would suit my needs. So I kept mulling over what I would do. I had done some nature visualization exercises but they weren't very helpful beyond making me feel calm.. So I got this idea of trying to incorporate fire into my visualization exercise.. And boom!!!! It was like magic. I can't call it instant healing but it was taking a huge leap in that direction. So this fireball exercise not only represents all art and all beauty and all creativity in the universe coming together into this ball. But it also means purging. Purging can also create intense emotional stress. You are letting out your inner distress. You are telling all your distress stories to the fireball. This fireball is absorbing your negativity and hearing all your purging and slowly absorbing it. Since fire remains neutral even after whatever you put in it, the fire would remain the same even after your purging. The fire would remain the same. So don't worry about the fire becoming negative. It won't. (warning - don't take this exercise very literally. Sometimes visualization exercises can really cause some stress. Do it at your own risk because visualizations are very powerful so do in low doses. Be careful. Since it's a fire visualization, be careful)... A similar exercise is with pranayam breathing. You inhale all the goodness You exhale all the bullshit and trauma. While inhaling you visualize that all the good things are entering your body and mind While exhaling you visualize that all the bad things and toxins are leaving you. Note The fire exercise can feel a bit brutal and intense. So I would suggest try some general visualizations at first like nature visualization and breathing visualization to prep your mind to visualization. If you do any mental exercise intensely it will have intense effects. Whether meditation or visualization. If you do meditation very intensely you can get a panic attack. This can even happen with visualizations. As much as these exercises are helpful, there is also a dark side to them that practitioners should be aware of beforehand. The only way is to do in low doses or small sessions and take it slowly and gradually. Don't make your meditations and visualizations too intense, you can run the risk of having mental breakdowns. So just wanted to leave a warning to be careful about these mental and spiritual exercises. And other important thing is not to rely on what I say or others say. Not to simply copy an exercise or meditation routine. These have to be highly customized. What I mean is this. If I do meditation for 1 hour, doesn't mean you have to do it for 1 hour. You need to have your own version that suits you. My version of an exercise might not suit you. Over experience you will have to invent your own version of meditations and use standard meditation practices and techniques only as a base It's almost like you are using an image as a support for your painting but then you create your own painting based on it. The image only serves as a base support

This fire exercise has helped me tremendously in the past 2 days. Huge difference in my feelings and general disposition.

Thank you for your encouraging words. I am grateful that my story can help people be strong in their own struggles. Thank you for telling me to stay strong. Those words are the best words to say to anyone. Those words make a lot of difference. So thank you. ❤️❤️ My days are not really that great. I still suffer from the effects, both physically and mentally from whatever I went through. The emotional scars are quite strong. But I am trying my best to heal every day but I still suffer from self destructive erratic behavior that I'm trying to work on. My main focus will be self love to reduce that self destructive behavior. Hopefully I will reach a point where I will feel normal physically and mentally and not have to continue with these bad habits that were a part of my destructive behavior. Watching elephant videos has been very helpful. When I saw the abuse that circus Elephants went through, it reminded me of my own abuse. But seeing how these majestic animals don't lose courage and come back to normal after so much suffering, it gave me a lot of hope. Elephants are the most loving creatures I accidentally came across the elephant videos and it came as a huge blessing. Although other people will look at it as a normal video, I am always in the habit of attaching meaning to things, so in my mind I felt as if those elephants were talking to me and telling me to love myself despite all the suffering and absence of love. It was hugely gratifying. I didn't expect that an elephant video would be a significant part of my healing. It was very unexpected. But then God moves in mysterious ways. Maybe this was just a sign from God to signal me to start working towards my healing. But those videos made a tremendous impact on my emotions. I am very emotionally chaotic day to day and I struggle with emotional stability. But I guess one day it will all get better. If I have come so far, I can still go a little further and create something good out of my life. I am looking forward to a brighter future, all the negativity in my past hasn't killed me.. And sometimes I think that even if it kills me, my death or suffering would not go in vain, even if things don't get better, my death would be a lion's death, because I fought extremely hard to come so far so I don't see my struggles as a regret, they made me who I am today, obviously I would have wanted a better life a better childhood, but then, who knows, maybe this is the nature of life, we also learn from our sufferings and sometimes we inspire others from our sufferings, so I don't think any suffering goes in vain. Even if I became hopeless and disintegrated into a downspiral (I very much hope I don't) At least I have this journal here and my words here that will always inspire people to be strong in their lives. So some good might have come forth from my suffering. That would be a satisfaction to my soul. Thank you for all your kind words. It means a lot to me. I won't give up my fight and never easily. I'm a positive spirit so I look forward to a bright future and doing well in my life. Blessings to you to stay strong in your journey as well. ❤️❤️

Thank you for your kind words. You are awesome. Bless you. ❤️❤️

You are a kind soul. Thank you so much for your kindness and support. ❤️❤️

This is the first time in my journal I'm opening up fully about the childhood trauma I went through. I went through a lot of trauma in childhood and also a lot of abuse in 3 abusive relationships. All of my 3 exes were abusive. The 2nd ex was extremely abusive and controlling. I was very close to death in that relationship that's when I broke it when I was admitted in the emergency ward. My liver had ruptured as a result of the continuous abuse of the relationship. That's when I decided to end it. This was in late in 2017. By December 2017, I met Joseph and I thought that I had found the love of my life. I was in recovery from liver damage when I found Joseph. The next two years went like a roller coaster and Joseph was extremely violent and abusive which I had no inkling of at first. He was very sweet in the beginning. I went through extensive trauma during this period where I slashed my wrist in the month of October 2018 where he was having a tensed argument with me and talked about breaking up with me. I flew in a rage because I felt exploited by him and immediately grabbed a knife and slashed myself. That's when he cooled down but he continued to threaten me.. From then on, it was a very on off relationship that I discussed at much length in the dating section. This was November 2019. That was probably my sixth attempt at breaking up with Joseph and I stopped talking to him at that time. I thought I had broken up with him but once again in January 2020 we started talking again so once again the abuse continued. It was finally March 13, 2020 that I was able to escape the relationship. I finally ended things with him for good. My first ex was also abusive but I ended that relationship in only 6 months. My childhood was brutal. I used to run away from home many many times. I made a successful attempt to run away from home at age 14. But I was brought back to my abusive mom. She was very violent and abusive with me. I started cutting myself early on to cope with her neglect and abuse My first suicide attempt was at 18. I tried to burn myself. But I was rescued by my family. I was considered a high risk for suicide and kept on suicide watch. My second suicide attempt was when I was 21 and I was unable to escape my abusive mother So one day I grabbed a knife from the kitchen and cut my wrists. I had extensive bleeding and hospitalization. My dad wouldn't stand up to my mom's abuse because he was being abused as well Still my dad helped me in trying to cope with the abuse I finally broke free just a few years ago, so now I live in a rented apartment but it's not easy. I have to sometimes take my mom to a psychiatrist frequently because she suffers mental breakdowns. My mom suffered from bipolar disorder for a very long time. That explains her violent and abusive behavior towards my dad and me She still suffers her bipolar episodes and she recently stopped her medication. The last time I visited her, just a month ago, she was very violent with me and I sustained some injuries after her attack. I was very traumatized as a child by her violence and abuse and that caused to seek refuge in relationships with men but these men turned out to be abusers as well. I noticed that whenever I opened up to my boyfriends about my mother's abuse, they would slowly change and become abusive towards me. It was as if they wanted to put fuel in the fire, instead of trying to help me out, they saw me as a opportunity to perpetrate their abuse on me After a long struggle and numerous suicide attempts and realizations, I finally got some freedom. I'm not completely free because I still have this dysfunctional bonding with my mother. I'm her caregiver. She is usually sick.. So I have to constantly take her to the hospital. I forgave her but sometimes I lash out at her for the stuff she put me through. It's a very dysfunctional estranged relationship that I share with my mother. I rarely talk about it to anyone. I try to do my duty as a daughter and take care of her in whatever way I can. But it is difficult for me to have feelings of love for my mother because of all the trauma I understand that her bipolar condition has been responsible for her physically and emotionally abusive behavior but at the same time all the trauma and abuse she put me through took a toll on my physical and mental health. So it's kinda hard for me to sympathize her I have to take care of her and her sickness and be there for her despite knowing that she is my abuser. This is a bit tough for me. I have to show love and care to a person who I trusted and who abused me all my life. This has created intense mental conflict in me. Despite all the self destructive behavior and trauma I went through, I always felt that I had a certain degree of duty towards my mom. I never forsake her After all she is my mom, even if she was the most horrible mom, the person responsible for all of my troubles and trauma, I sometimes let it go. But exactly when I let it go is when she gets more violent. I have been having some peace since being away from her. But whenever there is a doctor's appointment, I have to be with her and during times when she needs my help. I try to heal from alll the garbage I had to go through. I felt severely neglected as a child.. All of that could explain my chaotic behavior. My family was always dysfunctional. The earliest memory of abuse and violence is when I was 7 years old. There was not a single day that was free from the dysfunction.. I never knew what order or routine felt like. Everyday was a very uncertain day not knowing what to expect and what she would do. She would do anything. We as a family didn't know at the time that she was mentally ill. She was severely mentally ill. But my dad used to dismiss her behavior as mood swings and put up with her. My dad used to always be at work, he was a workaholic so there was no way for him to know the extent of the psychological damage happening to me at the hands of my mom. So overall I went through a very painful childhood and the trauma of 3 abusive failed relationships weighed heavily on me. I just hope that my future won't be so bad as my past. And I plan on healing myself completely from this garbage past.