Feel the need to escape but can't!

LegacyUser

For years now all I've wanted to do is escape a violent home. I am now 19 years old and since I can remember (think 15/16 years) I have been physically and verbally abused by my dad.

I moved out from home there last year and decided to move away as far from home as possible, however I still travel home every weekend. I literally spend six hours on a bus each way just to get home!

I suppose what I'm trying to get at is I literally can't stay away from my family, they have all been through this but the rest of them seem to just ignore it but I can't

Over the last few weeks I stayed away for three weeks and it was living hell for me...I do love where I'm living now but it was just been on the other end of a phone call after a domestic at home.

As a result, I have been really depressed. I was put on meds over nine months ago, and seeing a councellor since then also. I've felt like doing things to myself on so many occasions, its not right, not normal for some one my age to feel this way...is it?

I have discussed all this with my councellor and doctor and they have tried to give me strategies but the literally go in one ear and out the other. I can't even concentrate while talking/listening to them or indeed a normal conversation as their is so much going on in my head.

Is there anything I can do for myself to get me out of this mess??

tenchi-fan

I was in the same situation and I still haven't gotten over it!

My dad made my life a misery and my mother made constant excuses for him. My relationship with my mother and other family members was quite good.

I moved to Dublin to meet new people but I never did.. I just survived in Dublin all week and every friday evening I travelled home. I stayed at home all weekend and then got a feeling of dread on Sunday at the thoughts of going back to Dublin. My whole week was a wait to return home, and my whole weekend was a dread of going back!

Basically, my life was made in my home town. All my friends are here and my family is here. I didn't click with anyone I met in Dublin and I didn't enjoy my job.

You said you like your place and if that's the case you need to find a LOT of good friends there and maybe a boy/girlfriend to spend time with in the evenings and at weekends. You need to join a few clubs or something. You need to make your life there so you're too busy you literally won't find the time to go home!!

My solution was to move back to my home town (which I love) but NOT to my family "home." I am a lot happier living in my town but completely independent of my family.

I flat out told my mother not to phone me every day! I found it very soul destroying in a way because like it or not she was part of the problem - if she phoned me and I was feeling down I just felt so pitied. And then I'd start thinking about home, and I'd get angry and then depressed - before I knew it I was in the pits of depression (ask your councillor for coping techniques for victims of abuse!). Or my mother would always ask did I want to come out for dinner... she just couldn't understand that I needed my own space!

I think it's also normal for a victim or that kind of domestic abuse to find it hard to let go and maybe that's why you have this unhealthy link to what you consider home. You need to move on with your own life.

I hope I'm not too far off target because I'm just speaking from my own experience.