She is the dancing queen, young and sweet only 17, but not for much longer. My birthday is this week, and I’m going to be 18. Officially an adult, legally allowed to smoke my lungs black, to gamble away all my money, to vote in this awful election, to get my own loans, to go to a strip club, to get married! The list goes on. Now, I’m not going to actually go out and get a pack of cigarettes or run off and elope or even visit the strip club, nonetheless, it is still exciting.
I’ve always had a tremendous amount of freedom in my life. My mom let me do nearly anything (except walk to the park alone because I guess that’s very dangerous) as a kid. I got a tattoo at 17, I traveled on my own at 15, I’ve even drank alcohol with my mom. Going to college wasn’t a huge shock to me because when I was going to go somewhere or have a sleepover, I asked my mom out of formality. I knew she trusted me (a trust I earned). Turning 18 is exciting, but also a bit mundane. I’m already on my own at college, really the only thing new is that I’m going to vote. However, that’s a political can of worms I am not opening on this blog.
I’ve never really liked my birthday to be honest. It’s so close to my favorite holiday (Halloween) that it almost feels in the way. I’ve never been a huge birthday person, mostly because I hate gifts and attention. Okay, as a birthday gift to all of you, I will get real personal.
My dad is a jerk. Gosh I so hope he never finds this blog. Basically, he has done a lot to hurt me throughout my life. My parents are divorced, that’s no secret, but my dad and I never got along well. Throughout my life he made me feel worse and worse about myself. He’d indirectly call me fat or tell me I’m too short to be pretty or that I hurt him so badly whenever I couldn’t come over to his house one weekend. It wasn’t too bad, I could handle it. However, he would always get me cheap gifts. I would come to his house and a cheap CD player would be on my bed, or a coloring book, or a pack of gum. Stupid little things he would get me to buy my love. Stupid little things to make himself look like the better parent. Meanwhile he would neglect child support and never open the college fund he was court ordered to put money in every month for me. Then I made a mistake. I went on a suicide hotline one night, not because I was going to hurt myself, just because I needed someone to talk to. It’s probably my greatest regret. I talked about my dad to the person online. I told them everything. Things I had never ever told anyone before in my entire life. I told them about everything he did, I guess they thought it was bad enough to find out my name and call CPS. CPS investigated my life. They interviewed me, my brothers, my dad, my mom, my step parents. The tore my life apart. I lied. I told them how much I loved my dad. I told them what a great father he was. They, in turn, told me I was wasting their time. I was a perfectly happy and healthy teen, and I shouldn’t have gotten a suicide hotline involved. After that, everything got so much worse.
He sued for custody of me. He lost and won. He got more custody of me, but not full. I had to see him every Tuesday and Thursday and every other weekend. Things got bad. He would do the same things to me, more often. The things he said were harsher. I never loved my grandma who had just passed away. I hate my step mom. I don’t care about my step brothers. My mother is evil. My step father is a nut case. Why don’t I work out more? But mostly he would tell me about how much I’ve hurt him. He would tell me over and over and over and freaking over that I didn’t love him nearly enough. He told me that so many times that it became true. He would say that all I ever want to do is hurt him. My mom has turned me against him. He would say how he knows I’ll try and never see him again when I go to college. He knows I’ll keep his grandkids away from him one day. Finally we got into the biggest fight we’d ever been in.
He came into my room and started yelling the same things he’d always said calmly to me. I hate him, I hurt him, I don’t care about him, my mom ruined his life, my mom turned me against him. He was kicking my door over and over. When that wasn’t enough, he opened my door and slammed it closed and opened it again and slammed it back again and again. To this day every slam of a door is a fist clenching my heart in its palm. I can’t hear the slam of a door without jumping and remembering. I texted my mom to pick me up as soon as she could. I ran out of my room and he ran after me. I made it outside before fear froze me completely. All those awful things he had done to me. I don’t know what happened next. My mom said she found me laying and shaking on the pavement with him trying to pick me up and hug me.
After that, I got his custody taken away. That was the summer of junior year. My lawyer told me that if I still want child support, I have to still see him sometimes. My mom told me he’s still my dad so I have to see him. I would see him every few month my senior year. Now that I’m in college, I talk to him more than ever. He’s near my college a lot because of his job and he texts me almost every other day. I broke my step brothers’ hearts by leaving. I made my dad’s side of the family hate me. I’m not making that up either, my cousins sent me a letter describing, in detail, how much they hate me. They included picture of me and on the backs of the picture they said horrible things to me. What kills me is that after I went and made my whole dad’s side of the family hate me, I still have to see him. In high school I used to say to myself I only have to go through three more years, only two more years, one more year. Now I find myself doing that again. Only four more years until I can have my degree and go anywhere in the USA in search for a teaching job. I’m hoping my willingness to leave my current state will help me find a job. A lot of teachers can’t find jobs because they want to stay home, however I want to be almost anywhere but home. Hopefully that helps me.
So I’m sorry I said all this stuff. I know it wasn’t the happiest of posts I could’ve made for my birthday, but I share so much here, it hasn’t made sense to me that I never said this before. I apologize about some of the blanks in this story, there are still some things I’m not comfortable sharing. I left out a lot of things because I just don’t like to be reminded. If anything maybe my story will be a comfort to anyone out there with family issues. I know what it’s like to have no one believe that you are being abused mentally or physically (I don’t like to say that I’ve been abused because then people assume things, and I know I had it easy compared to some kids. While my dad did harm me a lot mentally and physically, I know it’s nothing next to some stories. Also, my dad always victimized himself and told me I was hurting him, I refuse to play the victim). I know what it’s like to have to lie so that you don’t hurt other people. If you ever need someone to talk to, I am here for you. I wouldn’t trust suicide hotlines anymore, but I would never disclose information to anyone. I promise my next post will be more upbeat! I think I’ll talk about Halloween next time. I loooove Halloween so it should be a bit happier. Happy birthday to me, I love you guys, here’s to another year of blogging!
-AcuteAnimosity ❤
AcuteAnimosity 