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My friend killed himself a few years ago, and it really started me on a sequence of events, that caused me to realize an awful lot of people in my life were abusing me. When my friend died, it was a shocker to me, we hadn't talked much in the past year or so, but I knew him for like 24 years, we had grown apart it seemed, but I still cared a lot about him, even if we couldn't connect. When I found this out, I was devastated. I ended up journaling about it a ton, writing like 5-7 poems. I connected to his mother a lot, and thought we became great, close friends. I talked to her a lot about it, and since I was taking good care of myself emotionally, and had a lot of wisdom to give, I ended up supporting her as much as I could, as a way to pay homage to my friend, and I suppose somewhat out of guilt too, because I wanted so badly to help my friend, but it was too late to do so. Also, I just sympathized with her a lot, and also I wanted someone to connect to about it. I was quite forward at talking to her, but she seemed to like it a lot of the time.

The friend who lived with him, kind of ghosted, and I chased a bit after him, trying to help, but he just wanted to talk about himself a lot, and trivial stuff. I tried to give them both space about it when I found it appropriate, but I also felt guilty about not doing more proactively for my friend, so I did sometimes nag a bit much and was too forward with both of them. I tried to alternate giving them space, and then being forward. I tried to work with them on whatever level I could, even just talking about random stuff. I tried hard to connect. I did talk about it to my Dad sometimes, and shared my poems with my dead friends mother, and my Dad, and even my sister. My sister and Dad barely gave me credit for them, and either did his Mom. I was always considerate and flexible with how I gave them to people, and let them read them in their own time.

His mom ended up ghosting me when things went south, I got a bit rude, because I suffered codependent burnout, I was super patient and understanding with her most of the time though, and considerate.  I also ended up trying to make friends with another girl, because I felt lonely, and sad that his mom ghosted me. I opened up to a lot of people about my friends suicide, not dumping, just a bit here and there. And I went to my friends memorial on video call. During this time, so many things didn't feel right at all.

My Dad acted really rude to me, when I was journaling about my friend and crying, laughing in my face, about something on TV, as I cried. He also got angry that I gave myself credit for doing well at the poems and said he didn't care about hearing about my friend, because it wasn't his friend. My sister was told my friend did that, and she offered no condolences, and I had to ask my Dad to even get her to mention it, and seemed put upon when I wanted to share one or two poems. My friends mother was all over the place about those poems, acting like it was no big deal, taking months to read them, then later in the relationship, acting like they were too heavy. Also my friends mom was erratic and pulling away, withholding important stuff like the video of his memorial, crossing boundaries I set, acting like she's magically healed, acting like how I feel doesn't matter at all. And that new girl I was talking to, who I shared the eulogy I wrote with, sucked me dry, and played the suicide card, which I was a sucker for, and then stonewalled me, when I needed support afterwards. She also started some victim thing, where she wanted me to martyr myself for her, even though I literally had nothing to give.

The girl who tried to drain me before, and play the victim card after my friends memorial, caused me to realize that she probably had BPD, just like my ex-gf who I was with for 10 years (haven't been with her for about 13 years, I'd say), I felt so betrayed, and horrified. Then I analyzed my neighbor, who I used to be friends with, the neighbor, that would bulldoze me all the time, force help on me, and neglected and killed a bunch of cats, that I constantly stood up for, even ones that were important to me. She always twisted everything around, and acted like things were accidents, or someone else's fault. I wasn't a complete fool, but as she had abused me for years, I was so confused by her, and such.

So I went, and I kept researching it all, researching the manipulations, and analyzing my relationships. I then called my Dad out and said "I think you're hurting me on purpose", because he had hurt me so many times over the past few years, abandoning me on my birthday, after building it up, abandoning me, and being erratic and cruel to me and the old sick dog, and the other dog who was recently diabetic, I stood up for both of them and fought my Dad a lot over them. I was busting my butt for everyone, including my Dad, over COVID, and he was just complaining about everything 24/7. Later after my friend died, I also had a back injury, and my Dad "cared" for me, guilt tripped me into hurting myself further, and hurt me physically during it, and then abandoned me, and I had a mental breakdown, with which my counselor basically wanted me to just think positive. Which actually is my normal mode, whenever possible, because I like taking responsibility for my own happiness.

So yeah, I analyzed all of these relationships, and I realized, it's all very similar behavior. Guilt trips, gas lighting, abandoning at key times, just really degrading, disregardful behavior. Everything felt so one sided, I was giving, and giving, working on my mental health, trying not to feel like a burden to anyone. But no matter what, I was. Anyways, this all led me down this long road, that I am going down, where I've learned how to assert myself, and I feel so much anger, towards all of them, especially my Dad, who I live with, and sometimes the neighbor. Since they still mess with me, even though I've asserted the crap out of myself.

As I pulled away from my Dad, and asked for help from my sister too, she was unsympathetic, and gaslit my experience away, as I told it to her, and tried to create more dependency on her, and twisted everything around, and did the same freaking crap!

My sense of trust is so shattered, further compounded by the fact that I cut off my counselor too, a few days ago, because he did some crazy stuff recently, that caused me to realize the same thing about him. I posted that on another thread.

And my Mom, I now realize she probably was abused by my Dad and sister, and ultimately died from that and health complications. She had so many things I had from it all. The crippling self doubt, the breathing problems, the constant martyrdom to keep everything afloat, the restless leg syndrome (emotionally related, just like I have), the mental and physical decline. And although I know some of all of this stuff is just our own issues, every single one is amplified so much by all the abuse. I used to get angry often, at night, and growl and scream into my pillow, and journal, and have mental breakdowns, and I now realize it was the abuse that caused it, that and the codependency that I'd ultimately fall into, as I was the only one in the house, that had a heart enough to take responsibility for things.

I know my story, is so unlikely. And normally, when a person has an issue with everyone, it's them. But in this instance, it's not that at all. I know my codependency played into it all, and I have been working on that hard lately, along with assigning responsibility, and working through trauma, and all sorts of stuff. I've come a long way, I've cut off a lot of people, asserted myself with a lot of people, am letting people make their own mistakes more, having great boundaries. But on an emotional level, I am so devastated, and often filled with anger, except when I am grounded. The sadness and depression are creeping in. I've suffered so much loss, so much betrayal. My sense of trust shattered. It's so difficult.

I want healthy relationships now, or at least ones with people who aren't this freaking abusive! My friend probably got abused by his mom, and my friend, yes me and him did have codependency that affected our relationship negatively. But no one deserves abuse like this. No one deserves to be maliciously, and systematically destroyed. No one deserved to be given all this phony love, fooled into trusting, backstabbed, confused, attacked, disregarded, dehumanized, used, and destroyed. No one deserves to have their boundaries worn down, until they have no voice. No one deserves to be just a tool, in another persons sick, self centered game, especially to such a personal degree. It all makes me so sick to think about, that people even exist, doing things like this, and that they get away with it so much. It enrages me, that they have little to no remorse, because there's little to no empathy there. That they just let themselves off the hook, because they are too afraid to face their own pain, so they take it out on everyone else. It's really hard to feel a damned bit of sympathy for people who act like this, it's gross to me.

I do actually realize many of my mistakes, trying to force my Dad to help, over helping the pets at the cost of myself, sometimes hurting the pets a bit due to fear or stress, being too bossy, and such. I realize if I injure myself due to guilt trips, that's my responsibility too.  But it was impossible to gauge things with these people, because #1, they lie a lot, and their personality is not genuine, also they don't answer honestly, so there is no discerning what they need or want, #2, they were abusing me, distorting my reality.

So, that's where I'm at. Good luck out there, find the courage, and support you need to heal, you deserve it, we all deserved so much better than this crap. So did my friend, and my mom, and my dog, and those cats, we deserved so much better, and it breaks my freaking heart that this happened.

Hi NE—thanks for sharing your story. We all deserve healthy, happy relationships. And I hope you find that.

Thanks cranmango,

I think I will, just gotta get out into the world more, heal more, and connect in various spaces more. I think breaking the habit of connecting to unhealthy people too much, is something that is logically, consciously, easy, but subconsciously, it's my norm, so my instincts are self-sabotaging. Also, I need realistic expectations of myself and others, which lately is more out of wack, as I am more sensitive, less trusting and under more pressure.

I think finding the courage to have a voice, and both feel like I have a right to have one, and to be myself unapologetically, is the first step, towards accepting myself, and connecting to others.

Agreed. Right there with you, my friend.

Thanks cranmango, hope you find your voice too!