I am 22 years of age and have always lived with my mum and dad. My dad has been an alcoholic ever since I could remember. I don’t have many happy memories from my childhood. The majority of my memories are consumed by him aggressively shouting with my mum, verbally abusing her, punching walls, him getting so angry and aggressive that his face becomes red with anger and his mouth froathing. My dad is one of those dads who stick around while I was growing up and still is around but was never actually present. He never treated me like a kid and always tried to force things on me, activities that i didn’t want to participate in etc. As a kid growing up, I was always hopeful that one day our relationship might change and we might become a normal dad and daughter like I would see my other friends with their dads, hanging out, bonding. My dad’s idea of bonding is going down to the local pub together for mum and I (both non drinkers btw) to watch him get pissed drunk, to the point where he slurs his words, can’t walk straight, throws up while attempting to flirt with girls half his age. Anyway, his behaviour and the circumstances and environment I grew up in had a significant and devastating impact on me. Something which I didn’t realise up until the last two years or so. Because of him, I passed up the opportunity to move out and move to university due to the fears and worries I had for my mum’s safety and wellbeing (both physically and emotionally), I struggled with getting a job for 15 months (fortunately I am doing an apprenticeship now) and I have watched all of my childhood friends who I went to school with grow up, move out, go to university, make friends for life, have boyfriends and watched them build up their lives and move on while I feel like I am stuck in an infinite loop where every day is the same. I didn’t get to experience any of those normal things and I honestly feel like it’s too late for me now. I am trying my best and my hardest to concentrate on myself, on my goals, my work and my mum who fortunately is the opposite of my dad in every way possible however that doesn’t mean that I am happy. No where near actually. I feel really isolated and incredibly lonely and abnormal. I feel like some of my best years have gotten snatched away from me all because of my dad and his addiction and narcissistic, toxic, abusive behaviour. No one knows the reality of my life apart from mum and some people here at nacoa and that’s exhausting. The fact that I have to “hide” things and my real thoughts and feelings every day and carry on and pretend that everything is okay when it isn’t, it’s so draining and hard. Sometimes, I get to the point where I just want to pack a bag and leave in the middle of the night. It’s not realistic so I don’t do it obviously but the temptation is there. Along with some other dark thoughts like who would even miss me if I was gone or does anybody truly love and care about me etc. fortunately these fade as well within time but the fact that they are there in the first place, is what makes me feel even more abnormal about myself. The last couple of years have been extremely tough with mum and I having had to temporarily move out and away from dad due to his aggressive nature, only for him to manipulate us back into living with him again. Truthfully mum and I don’t have the ability and the resources to be able to live independently on our own, away from him but I so wish we could because I feel like until I stay here, no matter how hard I try and work on things and no matter what I do, it won’t help. I will always have this emptiness inside me because this is not where I belong. Here. With him. I should be like my other friends. Living life with a supportive, loving boyfriend or with great, supportive friends or even on my own (but I love my mum too much to leave her!). It’s just not fair. I truly feel like I am so far behind in every aspect of my life and the worst part is, that no one seems to understand or relate. Not unless they have grown up or experienced a similar situation. That’s why I don’t open up to people about it because I have tried to in the past and the person who I thought was my close friend at the time, pretended to be understanding and super sweet and supportive and then later on, when we had an argument, threw it back into my face and said “I feel like you’re being a bit over sensitive and crazy and feel like you are blaming me for everything that’s going wrong in your life” like thanks for that. Just what I needed to hear from my only friend who I poured my heart and soul out to. Just because her life is stable in every way possible so based on that terrible experience, i have stopped trying to open up to people who I know for a fact won’t understand what I am talking about. Growing up with my dad has had so many consequences on my health and wellbeing. It’s lead to severe anxiety which I continue to battle every day with the majority of people in my life telling me to get a grip and to get my sh** together. It’s lead to depression where some days all I want to do is just stay in bed, not get dressed, sleep and forget that I even exist in this world. It’s also led to me possibly having Bordeline personality disorder which is something I am in the middle of receiving a possible diagnosis for. It’s also just led to severe physical and emotional intimacy issues. I want to be able to get close to people but it feels like I’m almost paralysed by fear most of the time.