For context I am the baby. I have two older brothers my mom dad and grandma. For a lot of reasons i have decided I need to take space from my family. I feel like my family loves me but they don’t appreciate me. This became obvious on my birthday last year when nobody planned anything and the day of they were scrambling to throw something together. This year I was having panics attacks so I decided to start pulling away from them. My family doesn’t communicate well, they are the type to say everything is fine or have explosive arguments. I’m known for being the one who calls people out on their bullshit and then years later they praise me for how wise I was about a situation they vilified me for in the moment. I recently have been struggling with my gender identity especially knowing they will not fully accept me as anything but the baby girl. They accept that I am gay, but they don’t put in the effort to understand the gender related stuff. I also have a lot of trauma associated with my parents house because my ex assaulted me in my old bedroom. My parents kinda know I have trauma , they know I won’t sleep in there but they have never asked me why. They have never asked me about my mental health despite knowing I’ve struggled with suicidal ideation. They are very supportive in other ways , always willing to give me advice on my job and things. I can’t rely on them financially because they are broke. I’m really invested on fixing my life so I can take care of them someday but when the holidays come up and they want to pretend like we are a happy family I really can’t do it anymore. I feel like I’m an adult, and most people reach a point where they decenter their family but is that true? When I didn’t celebrate my birthday with them apparently it made my mom cry. Mother’s Day is coming up and they will most likely do brunch at my parents place, I feel bad but being around them is not good for my own mental health right now. I already passed off my gift to my mom a week ago but I feel like that’s not enough. And I can’t talk to them about it because they will make me feel bad for it. I fall into a depression easy and I’m finally finding my footing again I don’t want to slip up. Has anyone gone through something similar?
u/hawaianredfruitpunch
Im realizing that I think my family has been having more of an impact on my mental health recently and im in a place where I think I want to take space but im feeling incredibly guilty for it.
My family loves me but they don’t appreciate me. My father confirmed this recently, my birthday has always been a stressful time for me but he admitted they don’t really put a lot of effort into celebrating it. Last year was Easter and nobody planned anything because we are broke and when everything was closed I was forced to watch everyone try to throw something together last minute. They always talk about the importance of coming together but it doesn’t seem to apply to me. I noticed this but didn’t want to speak on it because I felt guilty but when my dad admitted this it made me realize there are so many things I wish could be different.
I know they love me and want to see me, but we don’t talk about things beyond surface level. I need to verbally process things, I’ve always been this way and because my family sweeps things under the rug I have deep trauma and anxiety about interacting with them. On top of that I am the baby, the only "girl" outside of my mom and grandma and the only openly queer one. I often feel like no one understands me, the few times I try to speak up it causes explosive fights so I stopped speaking up. I’ve had my dad thank me for speaking truth to scenarios that emotionally scared me but created change once people finally took me serious. My uncle is homophobic and nobody calls him out on it. It’s something I have growing resentment towards my other family members for because why nobody gonna defend me? And recently I’ve been questioning my gender identity but god forbid I bring it to them, the few times I’ve tried to hint at it they keep saying they will be supportive but I’m tired of the bare minimum effort I get from them. I decided not to spend my recent birthday with them because I was having panic attacks and crying and the thought of showing up and being the fake version of me they know was too painful. I explained to everyone beforehand why I was feeling this way and yet come the day of everyone is surprised I didn’t want to celebrate, and yet nobody asks me to talk on it. My dad let it slip that it made my mom break down and cry but then why not call me and ask to talk about it instead of asking me about work? Since then my parents have been calling in to check on me every other day and it’s something I feel like I should be grateful for but I find it overbearing because when I pickup they are just talking about surface level stuff. Or my mom is calling to ask me for money or when I do ask her how her day is it’s very negative because she hasn’t unpacked her own depression yet so of course she can’t treat mine as valid. I moved out of my parents place a few years ago because living there was so bad for my mental health it was making me suicidal, I thought the space was enough but I’m realizing now it was just a bandaid. I don’t know what to do, I know they want to see me but I’m so very avoidant right now. I’m an adult and I feel like a kid.