Hi everyone! Thanks for your replies, I always feel better when I read them 🙂

It has been a tough month. Although I realized that my mom wasn’t the responsible adult I need her to be, to actually stop feeling guilty about it, is another story. It’s getting better, though.

I guess the fact that I see this clearly makes it easier to spot her actions. For example, I can see now when she puts her job before us, like when my sister had to go to her first appointment with the psychologist a few weeks ago, and I had to take her because my mom was working. That happened twice. Also, it’s interesting, to say the least, the fact that she stopped getting angry at my sister in the mornings. Every morning was like a battle field with my mom yelling because they were late. But now that my sister goes to school on her own and my mom goes to her work alone, the fights stopped. It turns out my mom was never worried of my sister going late to class, she was worried of what people would think of her if she comes late to work.

There are times when my mom is extremely tired, but if something related to work or to people she knows, comes up, she will immediately do something about it like working extra hours or offering help to other people even if they don’t ask for it. In the other hand, if it is something related to my sister, like going to talk about a teacher who’s being rude to her, my mom would postpone it because “she’s tired”. And don’t make me start when it comes to me, it’s like I’m invisible. She often says I don’t help her at all…

If we look at the bright side, these actions have helped me to emotionally detach more and more from her. I mean, my whole life, and until two months ago, I thought we were all in the same boat, rowing in the same direction and now I see I’m the only one doing the work. Guilt has almost gone.

We are facing new challenges now. In the last three weeks, my sister has fainted four times. She went to the doctor and we are waiting for the results of the tests. But I’m 99% sure her episodes are because of the extreme stress we have.

It turns out that adults around her are telling things that make her feel awful. Her homeroom teacher (someone she trusts) told her “you have to think that your mom is tired too, try to help her, just hang in there”. We are sick and tired of people (who would never move a finger to try to help us) saying “hang in there”. Also our grandma told her to “stop feeling sick (wtf?) because she was making my mom worried.” Apparently she thinks that because my father is no longer at home we should be instantly recovered. To top it all, we found out that our family (from our father’s side) thinks that we are ungrateful, spoiled, and that we took advantage of our “poor” father. Not surprising, but it still sucks. Seriously, where did all the responsible adults go?

As for me, I think I reached my limit, at least when it comes to studies. Months ago I decided to drop one subject, because I thought I could pass the other three. Then, I dropped two subjects… and now I can’t bring myself to study anything. I dread the thought of opening a book. I can’t concentrate, I can’t remember pieces of information I’m supposed to know. When I have to do work in class my mind goes blank, I can’t get anything done. And I know I have it bad when the mere possiblity of dropping a third subject lifts SO much weight from my shoulders that I feel I can breathe normally again for a little while.

I have talked to my friends about this, they all say “keep going, just keep trying” and as much as I love them, I’m getting sick of those answers too. Because, what do they mean by “keep going”? I know studies are important. I know that it will improve my chances to have a good job in the future. I know the fastest I finish studying, the fastest I’m getting out of here. But which one is more important NOW? Studies or my health?

I’m burnt out. I don’t want to study anymore until next semester (which starts three weeks from now). Why does “keep going” seems to only mean “keep studying”? I could “keep going” focusing on my health, right? I really think I need to focus on my health right now. Everyday my body hurts: my back, my neck, my legs, headaches, stomach ache. I wake up in the middle of the night several times. Sometimes I feel dizzy, sometimes, out of the blue, my heart rate goes up and down and I start to sweat… not to mention my mood swings.

What do you think? Should I keep studying or should I say no for now and start again next semester?

There are more things bugging my mind right now but I think this post is already long enough ^^’

I really would like to hear/read your point of view 🙂

I’m always grateful to people who takes time to read this <3

Hello again
Thanks for your kind words Anita 🙂 You are right. I prefer to take my time before acting. This month’s events however, have made really difficult to stop and think.

Before the hearing I went to the Women National Service, because they deal with this kind of issues but it didn’t went exactly as I expected. I knew before hand that I was going to receive advice only, because that service offers legal help to women being abused by their partner/boyfriend/husband which of course it is not my case. There isn’t an Adult-Daughters-Who-Are-Going-To-Sue-Their-Father National Service(?) When I was telling the story I was continuosly interrupted by the person listening and the worst part is… that it was the same kind of interrogatory I went through when I filed the complaint. It went something like this:
Me: He usually yells and that scares us-
Person: Oh BUT does he insult you?
Me: No, he doesn’t. He usually yells and hit things-
Person: I see BUT does he hit you?
Me: No, he hasn’t hit me. He did hurt my mom once-
Person: Oh BUT ONLY ONCE?
Me: At least that I know of…
Person: Did he threaten you?
Me: He often says that he will stop paying for my studies if I don’t do as he says-
Person: Oh BUT not that he is going to hurt you?

Every BUT felt like a “But it is not that bad” and I hated it. Few times in my life I have felt so humiliated. Because that was the feeling. I know my father is supposed to be “innocent until proven otherwise” but that kind of interrogatory made me feel like I was “guilty of making up everything until proven otherwise”. Later that week I received a call from my sister’s school. After much thought (that’s what they said) and after knowing that I had filed a complaint, they decided to file a complaint too. The teacher asked me to tell the story again and as it was a bad joke… she interrupted me with the same BUTs and the same questions!

I couldn’t believe it. I felt so angry, defeated and humiliated. Everything seems to point out that: if there are not insults “it is not that bad”, if he had not hit me “it is not that bad”, if he had not threatened me to hurt me “it is not that bad”, if he physically hurt my mom only once “it is not that bad”. I went to the point of thinking that maybe it wasn’t that bad. But in the exact second I thought that I remembered my sister and any doubt dissipated.

So I went to the hearing anyways, completely defeated and expecting nothing. At least I could say “I tried” I told myself. I have never been so happy, glad and relieved for being wrong!

Apparently, everything that could have gone wrong went great. First, when my statement was read by the judge (something really similar to what I wrote in my first post) everyone said it was true, including my father (I guess he firmly believed he was right and thought the judge would agree with him) so it wasn’t necessary to give evidence. Then, when the judge asked him if he wanted a lawyer he said no, that he wouldn’t need it. That made the whole process shorter. After answering the judge’s questions for an hour or so she took her decision: my father had to leave home for at least a year, he has to receive treatment in a specialized center for a year too and if he refuses to go he’ll end in jail. The judge also gave us a restriction order, he can’t come near us for the next 3 months.

My sister is going to receive specialized treatment too, which is something I’m really happy about. I’ll go with her this wednesday for her first appointment. My mom was told to go to the Women National Service to receive treatment too. I couldn’t have ask for more.

These 20 days have been weird and sometimes a bit difficult to adjust to. Being in an toxic environment your whole life and then suddenly being out of it is bewildering to say the least. But a good kind of bewildering(?).

There is something else that deeply concerned me though, and it is what I’m facing up now. At the hearing, the judge told my mom she has to calculate our monthly expenses because my father has to pay half of it. I asked my mom several times about it and she said she already did it. I suspected something so this week, instead of asking if she did it I asked her how much had to pay my father. She seemed to doubt and replied “I’m not sure, I have to talk to him about it”. I thought it was weird so I asked her “Why do you have to talk to him? the judge said he has to pay half of it, there’s nothing to talk about”. Her answer left me baffled “He has so many debts, I’m worried he won’t be able to pay for them if we add this”

As my beloved aunt would say: I wanted to rip my eyes out and squeeze my brain! After everything we have been going through, after all I did recently, she’s still more worried for him than for us! However, I let it pass for the moment. I thought that it had to be hard for her to adjust to this new environment without him. That maybe she needs time.

But that doesn’t explain what happened this saturday and I’m deeply worried.

My mom, my sister and I were having breakfast. Out of the blue, my mom said she wanted that our cats start living in the backyard because she hated the smell of their sandbox (my 2 cats live inside our house, the sandbox is usually in the backyard and they go when they need it. A few days ago my cat went into heat so we can’t let her out, she could get pregnant. Because of that we had to put the sandbox inside the house for now). I clean their sandbox often because, of course, I dislike the smell too and I told my mom it was just until my cat was back to normal but she didn’t want to hear any of it. My sister and I were upset. We love our cats, it is so true that pets can help to heal. Our first cat came in 2014, two weeks after my sister’s attempt and I’m 100% sure it helped her go through those hard times.

The thing is I, again, decided to let it pass. My sister is other story. She was really upset so she got up and went to her room. My mom was angry, she snapped at me saying “why didn’t you say something?!” I told her it was because I didn’t agree with her but thought it wouldn’t be ok to say so in front of my sister. She also got up and went to her room like I had offended her or something. At that moment my sister came out of her room and told me she wanted to go to my grandma’s house.

For experience, I know that when she wants to go there it is because she’s trying to avoid an upcoming panic attack. Sadly, my mom doesn’t know this and felt like my sister was insulting her. She came back from her room yelling “I’m worth less than a cat!” and started slamming doors “I can’t believe a cat is more important than me!” She was totally out of control. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My sister started crying and I could see it was taking everything on her to not freak out. I told her to go to her room and we were at her door when my mom came back with the sandbox in her hands. She looked at me and yelled “if you like that smell so much, let’s get the whole house to smell that way! Let’s live in this smell!” and she threw all the content of the sandbox around the house.

I was in shock. I really thought she was going to hit me with the sandbox. My stomach turns just by thinking about it. I was genuinely scared. But I had to snap out of it when I saw my sister on the floor with a panic attack. I ran to her, gave her her pills, hugged her and tried to help her to breath, all of this with my mom still yelling in the background. As I said, pets can help, and they are smarter than we think. My two cats came running to my sister’s side, jumped on her lap and my sister stopped moving frantically inmediately. Then she started breathing again and my cats never left her side until she felt better.

At some point my mom entered the room and crying tried to apologize but my sister was too tired to care. My mom called my grandparents for help and when they came, they asked what happened. My mom said crying “I told them I wanted the cats to start living outside. They got angry and I also got angry”. I had to tell them the whole story and they calmed they things a bit. These days my mom has been taking her sleeping pills so she’s not exactly present at the moment.

That day seemed to come from one of my worst nightmares. How did this happen? I thought I could finally have this safe and peaceful environment to live in, but now I’m living the fear again.

The saddest part is that my heart/head is trying to tell me something and I’m afraid it will turn out to be true. After all those years of abuse, my mom did nothing. I thought it was because she was afraid. When my sister attempted suicide and when she cut herself, my mom did nothing. I thought it was because she was in shock. When she changed her mind about the divorce I thought it was because she wanted to try to save the family one more time. When the only thing she said at the court was a yes when the judge asked her if my statement was true, I thought it was because it was hard for her. When she told me she was worried about my father’s debts, I thought it was because she still cares for him.

But what I’m seeing now is that she failed to protect my sister and me. If after all these years she has not stood up for us, and now she has these random episodes of rage that scared the hell out of me… she isn’t in the position to be a parent. She is too hurt for that, just like my father. And this is scary for me because, if it turns out to be true, it means that I’m virtually a person without parents! That thought makes me feel half empty and lonely. This is what I’m reflecting on lately. I thought writing it down would help.

As always, thanks so much t those who take their time to read this and to people who reply. You are awesome 🙂

Thank you so much for all of your replies and good wishes.

I’ll give you an update. I was told that leaving a notice at the police station wouldn’t help at all unless there was a legal complaint (I think that’s the word). So that’s what I did yesterday. I have to admit I was dissapointed at first because I thought, given the situation, the process would be faster, but it won’t be fast because there aren’t “risk factors” as they call them, like physical abuse, drugs consumption or alcoholism. Thinking about it later, a bit more calm, I realized that is a normal thing to do because they have to start an investigation in order to gather evidence.

So I’ll have to wait. I have to go again on June 8th, for the first court hearing. My parents and my sister have to go too. I told my mom that I filed the legal complaint and she reacted better than I thought. I thought she would cry and try to make me change my mind, but she was more shocked by the fact that I took a big decision without asking her. I was told I don’t have to notify my father because the court will do it, so I don’t know what his reaction will be.

I thought again about taking a break from studies and decided to better not to do so. I don’t know what the results from this legal process will be or how long will it take. In the worst scenery, nothing will change and because of that I should have a plan B: leaving home with my sister. For that to happen it would be the best if I had a job, an better yet, if I had graduated and had a job. My major is one of the longest ones and I’m only half way, so it wouldn’t be wise (I think) to drop a whole semester.

So I decided for a less drastic plan. I’m going to drop only one subject (the most difficult so far) this semester and try my best with the others.

To answer watercolorskyz, my sister has come a long way. After all the things she has experienced in her short life I’m amazed of how strong she is and I’m glad to say that one of the biggest changes on her these 2 years is that she realized that the problems at home aren’t her fault and that she doesn’t deserve to be treated like this by our parents. So yes, she is with me in this.

Again, thank you so much for your support and good wishes <3 I really appreciate it.