Hello. As a precursor to this post, I just want to say that there will be mentions of sexual grooming online, physical (and emotional) abuse from my parents (I truly love them, but I do need to be honest with what has happened to me), self harm, suicidal ideation, and intrusive thoughts. I do not go overly in depth into everything, however that is just a heads-up.
I am in no way self-diagnosing myself with OSDD by asking this question, I am just rather looking at possibilities; I am a very sheltered person, and I cannot go out and get therapy, nor talk to a doctor due to my circumstances. I barely get to go out and talk to anyone outside my family unless it is online, and I do not have my own money to deal with anything over the internet; I also unfortunately would not be able to talk to my parents due to how they've shown to act when I/my siblings show any sort of vulnerability in front of them. Thank you in advance for reading and your responses.
As of late, I've been researching many different things, along with being aware of the clear mental issues my family has a history of--not going out and saying anything, but my family has a very clear history of things such as bipolar disorder, depression, autism, so on and so forth. I feel my parents both likely having untreated issues, whether entirely disorders or not, may have worsened how they treated me and led me to having a lot worse issues that could've been avoided to an extent.
Nonetheless, I've noticed that OSDD may or may not fit with many of the things I've been experiencing but I'm not entirely sure.
I have very quick shifts in mood and I have ever since I was 12, being quicker to anger or depressive moods than normal. When I am experiencing heavy hormone imbalances like before my menstrual cycle (I am AFAB), I experience very heavy depression and have nearly tried to kill myself before because of it. Clearly I have not, but unfortunately, the intention was still there.
My depressive moods have been heightened as of late for the last several months since October of last year. I can be having a fantastic day and even then I'll still be thinking in the back of my mind, "when will this end? Do I need to begin writing my suicide note?"
I specifically remember October because of a very heavy incident that happened between me and my family, mainly my mother and father. I should put a heads-up here, this is where most of the physical/emotional abuse mentions will be in.
I love my parents. I really, really do love my parents. They are very kind to me when it comes to material things--they keep a roof over my head, they feed me, they give me everything they can, things that their parents wouldn't. I love them so much for that, I can't explain that nor give my gratitude to them enough, but the way they treat me emotionally and verbally hurts so, so bad. I feel like a terrible child every time I recount it, like I did something terrible to even warrant them treating me like this.
My mom and dad before this incident in October already showed this behavior MANY times before: my dad has shown to be heavily verbally abusive by berating me in front of my siblings, berating them as well, constantly calling me harsh names and insulting my intelligence, threatening to hurt me, so on and so forth. I've been trying to say it doesn't bother me but as of late, it really has. A few days ago, unfortunately, we were both preparing to go to the store in the morning and he treated me poorly once more by calling me a "fucking dumbass" and proceeding to storm off to go fix something up, which led to a very upset response from me--and this experience is actually one of the reasons why I'm making this post based on what happened, but I'll go into that more later.
My dad has also physically disciplined me and my siblings before by spanking us, my mother as well, but my father has done it a lot more during my years of dealing with them. I don't think there's anything wrong with them disciplining me like that I guess, I mean, maybe there's something wrong with it but I don't really. know. I mean, it's been a few years since it's happened but. the main thing that would always hurt me more than the beatings though was how my dad treated me throughout them. He'd berate me before, after, and during, cursing at me when I flinched, saying he wasn't hitting me hard and that he could give me a reason to cry. I am aware he was beat before as a child, so I can at least understand what perspective he is coming at it from. But it still really hurt. I may have not bled the same way he did when he was a child but being berated in front of my siblings provides a very uncomfortable sense of humiliation that feels terrible. He used to spank me and my siblings with this belt of his. Me and my siblings hid it away, leading us to get in trouble but at least he had nothing to spank us with. Then, he found this very tough, plastic spoon that was very large--he spanked me with that one the most out of all my siblings as my sister was older and matured quicker and my brother was given more protection from my mother. He spanked me with it often until one day it broke; his next resort was to use this handheld carwashing brush. I remember it because of how hard it hurt to sit after being hit by it and how badly I was trained when hearing a literal plastic box open for years straight due to him hiding the brush within a specific type of box. I would shake and nearly start crying for years if I heard a noise similar to it.
My mother on the other hand... she'd spank me and my siblings as well, but less often. She, never to my brother but mainly my sister at first, then me, would resort to a more aggressive type fighting, like me and my sister were girls who were attempting to curse her out on the street. It barely happened to me when I was younger, but she'd always corner my sister and tug at her hair, hitting her upside the face, screaming at her and telling her to shut up. She would also verbally insult us heavily, telling my sister when she was not even near 18 that she would get kicked out the house without any money, being told that she'd have to resort to sex work to even get anything. Physical intimidation was a very huge thing for her as my mother is a very tall woman and my sister was much shorter than her and still is.
My mother, when I was smaller than her, would physically intimidate me too, once pushing me against the table so much to the point I knocked into something and broke it, I cannot remember what it was, but it was something plastic. All I remember was crying and feeling terrible afterwards. Instead of heavily harsh sexual comments towards me, she had instead said things like I'll be going to hell and that she'll disown me, yadadada, I mean, like... I kind of laugh at it because who are you to be speaking to me like that???? Telling me I have a "dark heart" (yes, she literally told a ten year old this) when I'm a little kid, proceeding to go on and ""disown"" me multiple times in the course of 16, going on 17 years.
Due to me being around her height though much quicker due to a growth spurt (I'm a bit taller than her), she was not able to physically intimidate me as much. It would still terrify me, yes, and she'd mock me for it, but she did it much less once she realized I was strong enough to fight back. She resorted to quicker physical attacks, such as intentionally hitting me against my nose under my glasses so I'd bleed.
Nonetheless, to wrap back around to the point before this, my parents have had a history of behaving like this. This nowhere includes how they treat one another due to their strained marital relationship and have unfortunately included me and my sister into it (due to us having the audacity to even speak! SMH!)
I truly do love my parents, but I loathe how they've treated me and my siblings. I understand that a part of it is how they were raised--they were both from very poor environments, my dad an immigrant and my mom a poor black woman when she was younger, the two of them facing heavy discrimination many places they went, but it's like.... hey. what did WE DO!!!!!!!!!!! Why do I have to get cursed at every single time YOU get mad over something!!! What'd I do!!!!!
But, I'll get back to explaining the October incident due to the fact I have a theory something could've heavily happened here.
To put a very long (even if it happened quickly during the time) story short...
Mother is a Christian, sister is a Christian who became one on her own will even after her religious trauma with Mother. Father is not. I am not. My brother is not either, but goes to Church with Mother either way.
I try going to Church to appease Mother due to fights that have arisen before this. I do not enjoy it. I feel very estranged, I feel like I do not belong. I do not understand anything there. I try to bring this up. My Father supports me, Mother does not. Fights between them happen, it is my fault.
Things are very tense. There has been fight after fight based around Christianity, no matter who was involved.
This fight is on a Sunday, things have finally reached a breaking point.
Mother, Sister, and Father all get into a fight. I was in the room, making lunch, yet I unfortunately can not recall what the entire fight was. My Mother was telling my Father he'd go to Hell over and over, and tried to act out and hurt him by hitting him heavily (funnily enough, my household has a bit of a different dynamic! The wife beats the husband here! Yay!), but misses and breaks something. I recall it being made of sterofoam, because it fell apart easily.
Mother leaves to go on a drive. Father and Sister talk in the kitchen, I go downstairs.
It is peaceful somewhat, I assume it is the end. Sister leaves kitchen, comes back to me. We play around for a little while, before Mother comes back home.
Mother tries to talk to us, but it is clear she has not calmed down. My sister has had a very long history with talking to her--she knows all her signs.
She tells Mother that she is tired of her trying to guilt-trip us into accepting her unacceptable behavior. Mother fights back with her, and this all happens so fast that the next thing I see is my Mother actively tugging harshly on her hair, trying to hurt her and causing her to cry out painfully.
I quickly get up, and I try to diffuse the situation, but it did not feel like me acting out. I have a very long history of struggling with my identity, figuring out what thoughts belong to me, having a very long history of heavy and violent intrusive and impulsive thoughts, along with having heavy splits in my identity based on how 'I' wanted to be named, so on and so forth. I will not go into that explicitly, but I supposed it was worth stating.
I attempt to choke my mom from behind to disarm her, but I'm stupid so that goes miserably and my mom sees it as us trying to jump her even if she was attacking my sister first.
Many things happen, and due to my clouded brain, I cannot remember them in proper order. However, I do recall getting my hair pulled, getting bitten by my mom, her trying to break my thumb (she sprained it very badly), her threatening to kill my sister and I by shooting up our house (my dad has guns inside it), and some other things? like her trying to hit me with a bottle to knock me out. Which is really funny because how much beef do you need to have with someone 29+ years younger than you to attempt hitting them with a steel water bottle to attempt knocking them out, along with breaking a picture and getting glass on the floor? I wonder today still what she attempted to do with the glass. Oh well.
I recall us getting on the floor, my sister underneath my mom, and me on top my mom. "I" was beating my mom in her ribs as hard I could, hitting her side very harshly, or at least, to how much I could do. And yet, it didn't feel like I was hitting her. I have a lot of deep-seated pain towards my mom, and it felt like something inside me knew that and was acting on it in that moment.
More things happened, and my dad finally came into the room, being so surprised at everything that had happened due to the fact he was in the bathroom and came into some random shitshow. He tried to defuse it, and as he did, I was one of the ones to get out first, quickly telling my brother to get a phone and call 911, but he didn't really care nor understand why I was asking.
I eventually dial 911, and my dad asks what I'm doing with the phone, until he quickly realizes. He immediately snatches it, and screams at me, quickly trying to hang up the phone. He calls me a fucking idiot, asking me why the fuck I would do that.
My mother attempts and threatens to kill me and my sister. I call the police. I get screamed at for it. Wonderful!
I was terrified that night, nearly pissing myself like a child would at how terrified I was. I had scratches all over my hands, fresh ones that were still bleeding. The police came and I couldn't stop crying as I was screamed at to shut up before going outside in the rain (it felt like one of those really asscheek straight to tv movies), shaking and unable to stop crying.
My sister--god, now that I think about it, she was insanely valiant for this what the hell?!?--was able to act and deal with it, taking the blame for my mother and unfortunately she was the one hit with the charge.
I was screamed at several times that night, told I was stupid and no one even attempted to hear out why I called the police in the first place. I really wanted to kill myself after that, feeling terrible and unable to even get proper sleep, my body hurting so badly from how much anxiety was going through it. That feeling that was not mine was gone so quickly, just leaving me alone to be terrified. My mom, of course, blamed me for the incident more than my sister, using it against me a few times later in the future, like its a reference to a season in a tv show.
Sorry, I'm aware the quality of this is dropping, I'm just. getting shaken up remembering all of this because of how vivid my imagination gets, how well memories like this are stored in my head because it. really feels like I'm there again. anyways.
My dad, because my sister had to go to court, forced us all to make up. I lied through my teeth to get it over with. I've never seen any of my family especially my mom the same since.
My intrusive thoughts since that day along with my depressive moods got a lot worse after that incident. I've had a very long history unfortunately due to what I've been exposed to from grooming online of doing things like sexually abusing my mother, attacking and killing her, even doing disgusting things like attempting to cannibalize her. That is unfortunately a thought that whatever inside me that holds so much rage loves to entertain. I've thought about it far too much and have hated myself for it every single time because it feels like a thought that I can not stop no matter what, because whatever this is inside me must think about it.
To say EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY ISSUES would be. Really hard actually because it's like. I guess I can't really explain a lot of my trauma in a reddit post.
But, I guess I'll make it quicker for the rest of this.
9-10 year old is groomed online through a video game, is led to external sites, exposed to porn by older kids and even young adults, kid develops hypersexual traits (I mean what was anyone expecting), kid develops very heavy intrusive thoughts about sexual things, kid gets depressed because of that, yeahhhh. kid sees sexual things as their own escape however from. (turns to look at family fighting) whatever the fuck is going on over there
Kid is 14 now, develops lust towards a fictional character that is freshly 18, kid shows a lot of attachment to this character and that includes sexual association with them, kid gets into a friend group, kid falls out of that friend group, those friends decide to take screenshots of what kid said about that character and post them to humiliate kid into feeling disgusting, kid tries to overdose and kill themself after leaving a suicide post online.
Kid of course survives (heyyy guyssss . waves my hand!!!) still has. a lot of trauma from. being humiliated just to see fellow kids get into similar situations with characters but are never bullied and never humiliated for it. kid feels. Embitterment and a sense of being wronged and. well i suppose that really does fuck with a kid huhh .
kid constantly experiences heavy intrusive thoughts whether towards themself or others. kid has multiple other suicide attempts. family never finds out. kid constantly is masking--i can't tell whether or not they're good at masking or if the family just doesnt gaf
they're dissociating so heavily now, and barely even can properly interact with their family now,,,, kid has a lot of physical health issues due to their depression, father mainly berates kid for this calling them a burden and they properly were a burden due to the fact they got hurt so much they had to go to the hospital and get physical therapy and man. in this economy. Damn. sorry dad i lowkey would be screaming and punishing me too
october incident happens, yeahhh fun stuff. man. there's. A fucking lot . i could make a tv show off this (sorry i like making jokes to make myself feel better this is a really heavy thing on me im sorry.
The main thing here though on which I am asking about OSDD is that although I've had these identity problems for YEARS, things are getting really bad with my intrusive thoughts and now I'm deadass having conversations in my head and shit...
And what's weird is that although I speak in mainly the same head voice, I can feel somewhat when it's NOT my main voice. I know, one brain and all, but I can feel it. It's such a weird sensation.
I can feel when it's me talking to myself (I do it all the time!!) vs something that sounds like me. Does that make sense?
I can feel when it's a rage that isn't entirely mine, like I can feel when I'm angry at myself, vs. something else being angry at myself. I've felt this for many years, but things are DEFINITELY getting a lot cloudier and a lot harsher.
And the weird thing is, I don't have heavy memory gaps, it's rather during the day I'll be doing something and then wonder okay how did I even get here???? I'll put something down and then spend 5 minutes looking for it just to realize where I put it. I'm the dumbass who searches for their glasses when they're literally on my face just because I don't recall putting them on. I've also done things like put things away and then go checking again, and again, and again like Okay. did i put that thing away. okay good. But Did I Really. and then I just waste a bunch of time doing checks Over and Over again .
I literally have to force myself to stop even if something inside is gnawing at me like but I wanted to check again. LET ME CHECK like No. No buddy. Not right now buddy.
It's gotten so bad in the last few months that after October, two of the main 'voices' in my head had names!! Something subconsciously must have named them because. Huh. what. I did NOT WILLINGLY give them titles. But my brain was willing to recognize them as that nonetheless. They got quiet though, so that was good. Until lately.
One of those voices definitely has more presence now. Like, way too much. And the worst part is that they're genuinely the more angry one like they hold literally all my rage. ragebaby. and for What.
This is now where I want to talk about the incident from a few days ago. Essentially, I felt like I was going to cry after my dad came back, but it felt like there were feelings bunching up behind my eyes that weren't mine, and everytime I felt myself responding to my dad, it did not feel like my responses. This feeling has happened to me before, where I feel like I'm sitting in the passenger seat of my own body just watching someone else do bullshit at the wheel, but this time... maybe it was just the fact I was paying attention now? But it felt a lot worse.
suffice to say, afterwards, I felt physically sick when I was "given back my body". I didn't feel nearly as terrible with this other presence, but when I was alone again, I felt awful.
This seems to be a new pattern and. Maybe I'm yapping way too much now but. I just. Really. want to know. What could be going on??? Is OSDD a possibility based on what I've been through?
Sorry, I know this is probably both too much and not enough information but. uh. I've cried a bit a few times while trying to write this so I think I'll take a seat back and just. post this now but. Yeah.
There's voices with the associations of feelings and names in my head now! #WATDATMEAN
NOTE!!! I AM NOT ASKING FOR A DIAGNOSIS! I AM JUST. Curious. Like, once I finally turn 18, is this something I can ask a therapist about? You know? Because it's just a curiosity. Sorry, I just wanted to get that out because of rules 4 and rules 8. I'm not asking for a diagnosis WHATSOEVER! I just want to know of possibilities.
I really hope this isn't against the rules but if it is I'm so so so sorry I know it'll be deleted if it is so i'll just say that if it is i'm really sorry i misunderstood the rules, mods 😭😭😭 this is messy i dont know if i have the mental bandwidth to read back through it