Thank you Anita, writing down my unfiltered and honest thoughts on things is a lot more freeing than I used to think. The brother thing was something I was a bit afraid to talk about, as my family in general is a sensitive subject for me.

Hey Anita, the two brothers I currently live with are both low functioning, one of them cannot speak, and actually lives in a residential at the moment as his behaviour got to a point that my parents could no longer handle (my Mum has a heart condition that drastically affects her ability to wake up from sleeping) and my Dad eventually found it too much. He gets angry very easily and it almost always ends in him physically lashing out and doing so for however long he wants to, but it tends to be when you are in the way of what he wants. My other brother is far more placid, and can just about speak, but mostly points to what he wants. I used to treat my more placid brother horribly as a child, and what scared me out of it is the way my eldest brother (who also has autism but is very high functioning) used to treat Rhys (the placid brother.) He would intimidate him whenever Rhys would come into the kitchen, there was a time where he deliberately made sure he sat on the opposite side of the bus from Rhys etc. But I still feel this irrational resentment for my brothers, as if I wish they weren’t there. I know they are just doing the best they know how and that I need to care for them, but I feel as if I will be forcing myself to have a relationship with them if and when I cut off my parents (I seem to have an issue with people getting “too close” to me.) When my eldest sister cut off my parents, she mentioned the fact that she felt as if Rhys and Callum (my brother currently in a residential) got more attention than everyone else and that she sometimes felt invisible. I don’t feel this way specifically, but I can’t think of where the resentment is coming from.

Oh, I meant that my brother lashes out physically, although my Dad has an extremely short temper, and the worst it’s gotten is when I said he threatened to kill me when he found out I was gay. I have two older sisters, and the one with the girlfriend is the one who is now speaking to my Mum again. My other sister has nothing to do with either of my parents. I turn 18 in 6 months, and during the entire “me being outed by my Mum” incident, I had twisted my testicle and it had died within that same week. By the time I had surgery, it was at the end of that same week and my testicle was quite dead at that point. My Mum always says I should basically “cut my Dad some slack” for what happened because if he was really such a terrible father, he would never have came, but I was 14 at the time, so it’s not as if I could check myself out of the hospital. I am also getting £13,000 when I turn 18 due to the negligence of the organisation that eventually dealt with me, but my Dad was the one who came up with this idea, and this is one of the other reasons I feel as though I will be called ungrateful if I cut off my parents ; I feel as if I quite literally owe my Dad.

Well, he grew up in Nigeria, so whenever we would complain about his mistreatment, he would tell us stories about how his father was far more stricter than he is and that he was grateful for it because it “made him who he is.” One story involved him having to stand in a corner all day (he was 23) because he didn’t say good morning to his Dad. He would tell us how he and his other siblings were hit with hoover pipes, how his Dad had 2-3 wives living in the same house, etc.  80% of the time, my parents have a point, but they go one step further, and that’s where the emotional abuse I was talking about comes in. My Dad often spoke to me in a condescending manner, he would call me an idiot, stupid etc. There was a time I told him I was tired of him talking to me like a piece of dirt, he kicked me behind my legs, chased me outside, and slapped me across the face twice. This is one of a few instances this has happened, and there have been times where he has said to my Rhys (Rhys is quite big for his age) “Look at how big you are”, among other remarks about his weight. I haven’t had a good relationship with my Dad since I was 7-8, and even then he was just as strict. In short, by the time I was 14, I hated him. That incident was just the straw that broke the camel’s back I think.

I understand, all of this, and I’m not sure I said this in my last post, started after Nigel (my eldest brother) became estranged from us. He began pushing us harder and harder. And there was a time where my sister Naomi (the one who felt like Rhys and Callum got all the attention growing up) just over 2 and a half years ago had called the police (she was 20 at the time, and she was living with us again because she had been kicked out of University, a University she felt that my Dad practically forced her into.) I can also attest to this, as my Dad has said on various occasions that University is the only place we should be going after College, and is very hostile if you mention any other plans you have besides going to University. She had been kicked out because her friend had been killed in a car crash earlier in the year and she eventually felt like her course (Psychology I think) was becoming too hard. She almost never left her room and my parents main gripe is that she “never did any chores” while she lived there. Because of how hostile my Dad could be, she didn’t feel as if she could talk to him about moving out. The day she called the police, she had an argument with my Mum about something Nigel had said about Naomi. I remember Naomi, who was in tears at this point, saying “Well you didn’t need to say anything did you?” and my mum telling her to “Shut the f*ck up!” I was then awoken maybe an hour and a half later to my Dad saying Naomi had called the police. I guess what I’m trying to say is he seems to have gotten harsher and harsher over the years.

No, it’s not, but I don’t think my Dad has ever taken kindly to us saying something to the effect of “What if I wanted to do something other than university” or “I don’t want to go to University.” Even my Mum would guilt trip us into doing things, or they’d bring up the fact that they put food on the table, clothes on our backs etc. So we “owe” them. She would also be passive aggressive and resort to attention seeking behaviour on occasions to get a rise out of someone, and in the message Naomi sent Mum and Dad in which she cut them off, she bought up the pity parties my Mum throws for herself, and also uses the same “I had it worse than you”  line, and to be honest, she has. (She has told us she was sexually abused by her father as a child, found out she was adopted during her teenage years, got into fights at school and was permanently excluded at one point, she always had at least 2 people telling her off at any given time, among various other things that no-one should be going through.) I said all that to say I don’t think my parents are bad people, and I sympathise with the both of them, but I just don’t feel as if I want a relationship with them anymore.