The abuse i endure under the hands of her schizophrenia. It hurts too much to write it. I will just borrow from the words of other victims
As I kept shopping, I mulled over the events of my childhood and teenage years. I remembered all of the abuses I endured, how I was called a bitch, a tramp, a whore. She bet me $50 that I'd be pregnant by my fifteenth birthday; she lost the bet, but never paid. I remembered how I began cutting myself to cope with the pain and was reminded of the ugly, hateful scars still adorning my body. All of those therapy sessions came back to me. A sea of sad, lonely moments and feelings of worthlessness swept over me as I dove into the ocean of my memories.
Im scared of turning her in because im afraid that this might happen
As I kept shopping, I mulled over the events of my childhood and teenage years. I remembered all of the abuses I endured, how I was called a bitch, a tramp, a whore. She bet me $50 that I'd be pregnant by my fifteenth birthday; she lost the bet, but never paid. I remembered how I began cutting myself to cope with the pain and was reminded of the ugly, hateful scars still adorning my body. All of those therapy sessions came back to me. A sea of sad, lonely moments and feelings of worthlessness swept over me as I dove into the ocean of my memories.
Im scared of turning her in because im afraid that this might happen
That wasn't the only time. Once she needed to switch medications, and they had to hospitalize her again. We went to see her everyday, and she begged us to take her home. She told us they were treating her so cruelly, but we knew it wasn't true. It was one of the nicest, most luxurious mental hospitals around. She was so paranoid. Even then I could recognize it, as a thirteen year-old girl. It was around then that I started realizing just how sick she was. I began to understand, but that didn't make living with it any easier or any less painful. I knew that she had something called "psychotic bipolar disorder with paranoid schizophrenia," but I didn't really understand it. Most people don't. I don't think even the psychaitrists fully get it.
My parents split when I was 14, and when I was 15, I had to go visit my mother in the summer. I dreaded those visits as much as I looked forward to them. I ended up spending that first summer with my grandmother. My mother and I could not get along. It was like she bottled up all of her anger and frustration so that she could take it out on me upon my arrival. She threw a dirty diaper at me and chased me out of her home with one of those large, heavy cordless phones from the 90s--calling me a bitch and a whore. I ran across the street to call my grandmother. I visited my mother several times a week, but most of the time it ended in argument. She would end up insulting me, kicking me out, and trying to do me harm. My brother would, as usual, be treated like a prince.
I had to visit again when I was 16, and this time I spent more of the visit at my mother's house. My stepsisters were visiting, too, hence the reason I was able to survive my mother's company. She took everything out on my oldest stepsister, Shari, who was two years younger than me. I found myself sympathizing with her so much, but feeling grateful that it wasn't me in her shoes anymore. She would make fun of her for no reason, lunge at her for the smallest thing. I couldn't take it for very long. I called my stepsisters' mother to tell her how my mother had been treating them. I began to stand up for Shari, refusing to let my mother do to her as she once did to me. That was when my mother would turn on me as well. Shari and I ended up both going to my grandmother's house several times that summer. Our time there was so much more pleasant.
I didn't go visit her the summer after I turned 17. By then I had graduated high school and was working. Right after I turned 18, I moved out of my father's place and into my own apartment. I supported myself on my own, despite how difficult it was to survive on my meager earnings from Blockbuster. That whole year, my mother and I got along so much better. Occasionally we had an argument on the phone, but as long as I walked on egg shells when talking to her, we could have pleasant conversations. She actually sympathized with me, knowing how little I had to live on.
I dont dare to live with her because im scared that this will happen
By then my brother was living with her and her new son, and he was the one dealing with her temper and her rage instead of me.
I felt awful for him. For years he had been the baby, her favorite. Now that she had a new son, he experienced what I had to go through for all of those years. She accused him of so many things, from drug use to thievery. He eventually did both, and I think she drove him to it. She called his girlfriends sluts and whores, accused them of having had abortions. Once she threw a large, family-size glass jar of pickles down the stars at him. Had it hit him, it could have hurt him very badly. It was so hard for him to deal with all of this, after having been immune to her disease for so long. He changed as a person after it began, and he hasn't been the same since.
Im afraid that this will happen in the future
To this day I am still enduring her abuse. When we visit her, she badmouths me to Corey when I am out of the room, and he doesn't know how to respond. She lies to me, telling me that relatives have said horrible things about me--that they never really said. I have to listen to her talk badly about all of my family members, and if I ask her to stop, if I disagree with anything she says, she tells me that I'm a bad daughter. She says that I put up a wall between us--even though she refuses to hear anything I have to say and hangs up on me all the time. She accuses me of being the reason she and I can't get along. She says I have no respect for her or anyone else and that I don't care about her, even when I'm trying to help her. When I bring up the abuse, she denies all of it. Her story is that I was misbehaving and that she always disciplined me properly. Sometimes she admits it, but says I deserved it all. I have to be very careful when talking to her, because she can still explode at any moment. Having a mother with schizophrenia is an emotional roller coaster.
So maybe she has bi-polar schizophrenia. Thats why she never admits her mistakes
It can be so hard to cope with a loved one who has bipolar disorder, especially when they take it out on you. Bipolar people are known to be most hateful to the people they love the most, but that's no comfort to a ten year-old with a bruised heart. Many people find it hard to accept having a bipolar loved one. They notice that they can never admit the harm they've done, and they are angry when they don't admit that something is wrong with them or cooperate with treatment. Denial is part of bipolar disorder for many people, especially when the person has schizophrenia as well. They are capable of creating entire alternate worlds for themselves to live in. Anyone with an bipolar, schizophrenic parent needs to understand that their erratic behavior is all related to the illness. Some people may use it as an excuse to avoid responsibility--and feel they can do whatever they want because of it. That, too, is part of the disease. These people are very sick, and they aren't right and don't think as a normal person does.
I remember being the 10 year old with the bruised heart.
im normal im normal
. It is common for children of schizophrenics to feel guilty about their parent's illness, fear about developing schizophrenia or being an inadequate parent themselves, and depression or anxiety about their situation and life in general.
I just want to be able to tell people about my dad and not have them look at me differently and treat him like he is some crazy mad person. I just wish I had someone to talk to that would understand how I'm feeling. My parents are divorced so that makes it twice as hard. I feel bad for not being around my dad as much and like it's my fault that he is like this right now.
The sad thing about this illness is that they don't think they are sick. They really believe there are voices and most of the times will not take the meds or want help.
The constant mental and emotional torture is causing my heart to go numb - I have to leave but if I abandon her completely and she hurts herself or others then it will be equally traumatic -
However this is by the by as my mother has an almost supernatural ability to imitate a normal person should a psychiatrist pass within five miles of her (thus the UNdiagnosed).
