Hello, my thoughts are fragmented right now but I’ll try my best explaining my situation. I’m a 29 year eldest daughter who’s very much parentified and I feel like somewhere along the line it stunted my growth as a person. I know parents often say they don’t have a favourite and I’d like to believe that’s true but my parents always favoured my sister, especially my dad. She would get allowance and be spoiled and somehow I never would because I was considered too old while we’re only 4 years apart, she’s my only sibling. My dad is very much a covert narcissist who used to physically beat me until I bruised and bled in the name of god and discipline. My mother tried her best but was the very people pleasing kind of person which made her susceptible to my dad’s actions. I never hated my sister despite her being given everything I’ve ever wanted, part of me was envious but that would be all. I tried to cope with the physical abuse and environment at home for the sake of my mother, she was the only person who’s shown me kindness and empathy and I clung to that warmth with everything I could, I built everything around my mother. I wanted to get good grades so I can grow up and get a good job so I can buy her a big house and give her everything she’s ever wanted. She became my rock and my anchor and for the longest time until I hit 21, I made it work.
We used to live in Saudi Arabia and only visit my home country Egypt on weekends. We got news that my grandmother on my mother’s side grew very ill so we left Saudi Arabia to go tend to her in the family house. My mom and I would help her shower every single day, take care of her diapers and I would sleep next to her in bed because she had Alzheimer’s and we didn’t want her to get up and possibly harm herself. After a while of that routine my mother got very sick, terribly so and she had to be hospitalised so my day would be between taking care of grandmother, younger sister and my visiting my mom. Other family members would try to chip in and help but they do have their own lives but the pressure was crushing that my grades started to tank. My dad who at the time lived in Saudi Arabia still would wire us money for mother’s treatment and groceries etc. My mother ended up passing away before my grandmother did and that’s when my aforementioned anchor came undone, I centred my life around my mom. I know that’s not healthy and it’s very dependant on her but I needed to latch onto something to endure the abuse at home. A year after my mother’s passing my grandmother ended up passing as well shortly after my 22nd birthday. My dad had to leave Saudi Arabia and come live with us in Egypt and usually how it would play out is he would try to instigate a fight and then tell me that I’m overreacting/emotional/a rotten child, an insect, worthless and list goes on, many belittling names all centred around me amounting to nothing. He would also ask me to go die and that he would disown me. Usually at times like these my mom would intervene and try to get him to stop but I no longer had that and so he’d freely berate me at home. I tried to take my own life twice and failed. I’ve realised I didn’t really want to die I just lacked a sense of direction and felt aimless and it was only fuelled further by insults. My sister at the time would only echo my dad’s words every time we had a sibling fight, as in she’d ask me to kill myself and call me the same names my dad would but I still did not blame her for it. She did not know better. I was barely able to complete university but I eventually graduated after failing two years, I’m not sure how I did but this is why I’m ashamed. I isolated for 2-3 years after my mom died because I didn’t know how to process that she’s no longer here. I developed agoraphobia and every time I’d go out I’d panic and start hyperventilating. I’m ashamed and sad to admit that after years my situation hasn’t changed despite me trying, everything has derailed. My mental health, my appearance, I feel my brain rotting away and I’m forgetting things quite often and I’ve noticed my memory deteriorating. I was diagnosed with C-PTSD but take no medications for it and I was asked to leave home because you can’t heal in the same environment but I financially can not do that. I do not work and I’ve been hauled up in my room for the past few years unable to escape the same mindset that all is lost and there is nothing I can do about it and no reason to work towards something.
I don’t know what to do, I’m ashamed and I’m miserable. Matter of fact I don’t even know why I’m typing in this subreddit but I .. I just wish I had parents? Is that stupid to say? I feel like I have no guidance and I know it should be shameful to admit that as a 29 year old overgrown baby but I don’t know what to do anymore. Literally any advice helps, I’m sorry.
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I would share this with the group, raised by narcissists. You’ll get feedback from many survivors, I’ve been reading and practicing yoga myself. Letting go is the hardest mindset for me.
No, it’s not shameful or stupid to seek help, and the love of a parent you were very badly starved of. It’s natural for a child to seek love and affection, but can understand subconsciously when it’s not given and try to adapt to find a way to receive it no matter the cost. Be proud of finding the courage to seek help, even if it’s from strangers just like yourself (to us commenters).
I myself am 29, with an 8 year old daughter, and I’m still lost on how to naturally love my child as it was denied to me by own narcissistic mother, my father driven off by her as a toddler so I lost any and all connections to him mentally after he was allowed back into my life. I finally managed to get some psychological help and medications to help with my past trauma and hopefully help me connect to my child but I’m still lost, hoping I can start talking to a therapist this year to try to help more.
Literally the best thing for you right now is to take a step back, take a deep breath, and try to ground yourself to the present so you can take steps to break from your father. You have seen death too much when you weren’t prepared for it, losing your only safety line in the process, and it’s detrimental to a normal person, but even more so to someone so deeply broken and abused for so long and I understand that same pain, having suffered it myself so long ago.
You need to get yourself into some sort of therapy, grief support group, or really anything that has to deal with death or abuse as the first step to take care of your mental health. Depending on where you can get in they might also be able to direct you to resources to get away from your father as well. Don’t beat yourself up for leaving your sister behind in all this chaos, the best way to help her is by helping yourself first and getting your thoughts and grief back into a manageable state to start the healing process. You didn’t mention how old she is, as far as I remember, but there may be time to get her help later in time too, though it will be one hell of a fight and you need to be as strong as you can for it (but I can’t make any promises, but there’s hope too look forward to.)