What do I do?

[ohdear]

I apologise in advance for the long story, but I will try and keep it short and sweet.

I'm currently under a lot of pressure at the moment and I'm struggling quite a bit with my mental health, so I would like an outsiders point of view.

Thing is, growing up my mum and step-dad (now broken up, and I don't see him any more) were not nice to me. I don't want to go into the details but it has and still is affecting me every day of my life. I had nothing, absolutely nothing.

Now I've grown up, I am actually very close with my mother. I know, though, that a lot of it was my step-dad, he was a disgusting, horrible person and he brought out the worst in everyone. She has been separated from my step-dad for some year now, but every day I remember another thing that happened during my childhood. It really gets to me and I find I'm starting to avoid her, which is a shame, because she is lovely.

At the moment, I'm getting annoyed because I had no opportunities as a child, (I really wanted to get into performing arts) and I had no support and was constantly being told thing that you shouldn't say to a child. I knocked my confidence then, and it's just got worse and worse and now I'm at one of the lowest points in my life. I don't have any confidence in myself, and I beat myself up about everything, all the time.

My question is, can I rebuild my confidence? And can I forgive and forget about my childhood?

[Ticktock]

Forgive yes, forget, no never, the reality is that your step dad emotionally abused you, but you know your mother was complicit in this. After all she brought him in to your family and didn't stop the relationship until after it had damaged you.

Stepfamilies are difficult beasts at the best of times, but when a parent forgets that kids ultimately come first to preserve a relationship then things can get very bad very quickly.

You need to talk to your mother about why she continued the relationship when she knew her partner was hurting you, let go of some of the anger you must justifiably feel. I would also recommend counselling as unfortunately confronting your step father is probably not possible.

The interesting thing with abuse victims is they often carry on the abusers wishes voluntarily, you are still in some way caged behind your stepfathers expectations on what you can do. If you want to try the performing arts then why not go to a voluntary performing arts group, most cities have a couple, the only person stopping you doing this as an adult is you.

[Aurelie]

The important part of this is that you are in the position to see what has happened before this point in your life.

Your ability to acknowledge what has gone before shows your strength. All people are human and make mistakes, you suggest from your writing that you do not wish to hold your mother accountable for what had happened before. Have faith in your strength to do this. The world is yours going forward.

[Lilacarn]

This is a sad story and one that many people will relate to. There is nothing stopping you now from seizing opportunities that you didnt have in the past, except you being stuck in the past. Counselling can help with this, you dont mention the word anger towards your mother, but I suspect that you are very angry, and this may be conscious or unconscious.