Hi dad, unfortunately my biological dad doesn't offer me his support, so I write here.
I am 26 years old and I am living with my parents but I really wish I had the energies to move out. My parents are physically abusive towards one another, my mother suffers from schizophrenia and thinks everyone hates her, uses me as a punchbag for her emotions and criticizes all of my choices. My father cheats on her and is emotionally unavailable for me. If I were a normal person I'd just head out of here, but unfortunately "normal" I am not as I myself suffer from diagnosed general (and quite strong) anxiety and I think some depression as well and everything seems so difficult for me.
I also feel really ashamed for having failed college, sometimes I even feel 'stupid' because of it. Now I’m working as an unskilled employee, and it makes me afraid to move out because I constantly worry: will I be able to find another job?
On top of that, I feel a lot of pressure at work. I’m the only one who can maintain and develop the company’s software. While we have other team members, like an AI prompt engineer, a backup engineer, several people in sales, and a graphic designer, I’m the only actual developer. My colleagues have told me that if I left it would be very difficult for them to keep things running, and some even said they'd have to quit too. That kind of responsibility weighs heavily on me.
I'd also love to go back at college but time is running up before I lose the credits I acquired. But I don't know how I could study while also maintaining myself with a full time job.
Sorry dad for pouring all that on you. I really don't know what to do and I feel really lost. A hug would be more than enough.
Fifteen years ago I was back with my parents in a health crisis, with both mental and physical problems. My career had collapsed and I had declared bankruptcy.
While I was living there, my mother's health failed due to COPD, and she was still addicted to cigarettes and wanting us to get them for her.
Her mental health deteriorated, and living there became hellos.
When I has first moved in, my life was in shambles and my sister was in a mental health crisis and getting a divorce.
My mom started sobbing that she had failed as a mother.
Within three years of that date she was dead because of cigarettes.
Since then I figured out my health situation (IBS and a complicating hernia) and started to sort out my mental health.
I met a woman (actually got my hernia operation at her insistence) and we own a home together. My sister sorted her shit out and rekindled her relationship with her estranged son. We have both gotten degrees. And my mom is sadly no longer here to see that we made it through.
So that was 15 years ago and I'm 51 now.
You never know what doors will open or close for you. Opportunities are not delivered evenly, and life is not fair.
But you can build a life in the moments given to you - what you do with your time, how you present yourself to the world, what you choose to learn - and this will bleed into the rest of your life.
Finally, once you have the resources, live alone or with others. Get out of that toxic situation, so that your family can be at arm's length.
Find out who you are outside of that. I think you'll learn a lot more about yourself and your parents with some distance.
Nobody expects to be toxic or mentally unstable. Maybe you'll find some sympathy for them, maybe you'll want to never return. Both are valid, and both might also leave you with regrets.
But they're your choices to make, not theirs.
And I've never regretted being there with my mother until the end, even if there were bad times during it. She wasn't always insane though, her conditions made things more difficult.
Find friends, if you haven't. Leaning on my friends helped me through that time and I am due to join them now for some online D&D.