Tear me apart

I want to improve my humility. Analyze me, criticize me, psychologize me. Do anything but flatter me. Be anything but politically correct. I am not your friend or enemy here, I am just another specimen of the human race.

Oh, and your mom's a whore.

Go.

You're right, I do have some kind of deep rooted anger in me. I can be caustically sarcastic at times and unfairly critical. I don't want to be this way of course.

Consciously I've become more aware when I'm like this and I immediately feel regret by it. I apologize in my moments of strength and I know I should apologize whenever it happens.

Only about a year ago I became aware when I was feeling depressed. This feeling would especially be present when I was around other people, particularly groups (like a party.) I wouldn't want to talk to anyone when I'm in this state because I hate lying to people. I don't want to fake being happy.

I remember when I was young, maybe around 10-12 I could love my Mom so easily. I got along with my younger sister too. Currently my relationship with my younger sister is shit. We don't talk. We have little in common. She's your typical college female. She wears uggz, watches paris hilton's new bff tv show, spends 2 hours getting ready before she can go out.

I can't help but feel somewhat responsible for the way she is though. There was a time, it was around middle school when I completely divorced myself from my sister. I was very mean to her, especially when she would put on make-up. I would say hurtful things, things I'd rather not repeat. This went on for years, up until the end of my senior year.

I've since told her how sorry I am for being so mean but we're worlds apart now.

As for my Mom I have trouble even saying "I love you" to her. Many nights, while I'm lying in bed about to go to sleep all my thoughts will change and I'll want to tell my mom I love her and how I should be a better person to so and so and then my chest will well up and I'll call to my mom and tell her I love her. It's difficult for me though. It's uncomfortable for me. I think I have vulnerability issues like you said.

I haven't mentioned my dad yet. Well my mom and dad divorced when I was about 8 I think. She said she divorced him because he had a drinking problem. When me and my sisters were young he had a terrible temper. I remember one night clearly I think my dog (copper) peed on the floor when he was a puppy and in a fit of rage my dad picked him up by the collar and threw him outside like someone would throw a bag of garbage.

I've always had some resentment towards him. After the divorce he eventually found my step-mom and married her. They slowly accumulated some wealth through my dad's painting business and my step-mom's jewelery business and did pretty well for themselves. Eventually they built a big house down the street from my mom's house. They are well off.

I always felt they were greedy. Me and my two sisters chose to live at our mom's house. This was pretty much because there was a lot of freedom there because she was out working all day. If we had gone to dad's we knew we wouldn't be able to sneak out and do what we wanted and plus we all loved mom.

Well the only financial help we'd get from our dad (besides 400 a month from the divorce) was vacations. He'd take us on vacations. Instead of all that money he'd spend on vacations I would have been happier if he had just given it to help our mom out (set up a college fund or something.) She's like a workaholic. She felt that we all HAD to go to college and so she was saving and working vigorously to accomplish this. By the time I was 17 I didn't have the fortitude or direction to go my own way and so I just applied to one, cheap college that I knew I could get into.

I felt guilty putting this burden on my mom and so I lived as frugally as possible at college. I got a job on campus the second semester but I could only work something like 10 hours a week, it wasn't much but any help is better than no help. After 2 years I still didn't know what I wanted to do so I decided to take some time off and not waste any more money.

My mom has since, herself, put my older sister through college and me and my younger sister through 2 years. My dad didn't help at all. I don't know who owes what or who's fault it is. I just feel like he's some idiot social climber. I don't understand it. He gets a new car every 2 years. He has a big SUV, a big house, a big christmas tree, a big work shed. It makes me hate materialism. And on top of it all he's been taken in by some kind of christian-type cult and he's sure he knows the truth. He's a functioning alcoholic at this point. He drinks wine almost every night, or at least the nights I've seen, I'm not there much anymore. There are many things I don't like about him.

This story goes even deeper but there are some things that are too personal for me to share right now.

Thank you Decius for your honest account. You compared this thread to cutting. I have never cut myself but when I was at college me and this girl somehow ended up in the same acting class and kind of clinging to each other. She was weird but we were strangely comfortable around each other. She had huge self-inflicted cuts all down her leg and on her arms. It was jarring to see. I don't know what this adds to everything but I thought the similarity was interesting.

Perhaps this thread should be called...

Put me back together.

As it seems the tearing has been done.

I didn't see the brilliance of the thread as Decius did, perhaps due to my own lack of it, but I did see how brilliant he made it appear due to his own. Or was it just the ability to relate...

Either way credit would be due to the insight of the relatability as mine did not surface untill your second post Chris. Though he may have cheated relating from previous threads prior to his posting, but as usual, I digress.

Though I did want to add that I was smiling a little on the inside when you asked to be torn apart in hopes of humility and I watched for some time as you were continually given one of the perfect responses to cater to doing just that, ....silence.

Ultimately I was curious Chris, if any, which would you say you may fear more, deep down, becoming your dad, or not being able to?

Perhaps niether really matter and you are simply worried about ending up in your mother's shoes.

But no matter what, your likely feelings of guilt for coveting conflictingly derived successes, financial, and personal character, while facing potential lack of direction and drive to attain them yourself and shame for probable natural fear of having to suffer the unpleasant realities that accompany them as witnessed in starkly contrasting ends of the spectrum also liekly furthing your possible lack to see a direction which appears to end well and therefore worth your efforts and potential sacrifices.

But I'm tired at this point and probably just babbling.

"Ultimately I was curious Chris, if any, which would you say you may fear more, deep down, becoming your dad, or not being able to?

Perhaps niether really matter and you are simply worried about ending up in your mother's shoes."

I'm not worried about becoming either of them. I realized sometime last night that my family is broken and split in all kinds of ways. There is no cohesive unit.. at all. I was listening to a cassette tape that me and my sisters kind of made by accident. Some of it was my older sister singing "Summer Days" (grease) with her friend and other parts of it were us trying to get each other in trouble. We were all really young, still in elementary school and we all sounded so innocent and nice. Even when we were being mean it wasn't really mean. It wasn't that grown-up kind of mean.

A part of me misses that kind of bond and vulnerability that we had and another part is scared by it. I've built up all these blocks and walls that don't allow me to just be. I want that purity and confidence that I can hear in the cassette tape and I can see on the old home videos. It's what I've always wanted really. I look upon my childhood very fondly. They were the best days of my life.

Well, that was kind of what I meant, not so much become them as become or inheret their circumstances, you have witnessed different paths taken both producing some positive and coveted results while both seem to present paths devoid of that which you truly seek, regardless of whether you can properly define it or not, all while producing equally disdained negativities that you want nothing to do with.

You were not alone in building your walls, that is basic social conditioning, some as positive and as necessary as growing skin to both hold in your guts and keep out foreign elements that would destroy you.

Aknowledging and learning from your limitations and any destructive behaviors while working towards positivity, honesty, and the general betterment of yourself and mankind is really the key to the balance between humility and the purity based confidence you speak of.

The opposite key is avoiding arrogance and the exploitation of mankinds weaknesses for personal gain over others.

Because the ulitmate reality of our unity even in the face of our manipulated yet self perpetuated illusions of division will always win out, so helping yourself and others in their NEEDS helps all, just as the doing the opposite does just that, the opposite.

But this you all know, but it seems we cycle through our clarity of such obviousness and therefore repetitive reminders seem to be what keeps the world turning.

And that, of course, is why we are talking.

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As a very basic level, do you feel sexually attracted to your step-mom, or would you be satisfied at all if she took you in sexually?

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My step mom is pretty I guess. It's very difficult for me to divorce her personality from her body though. In a lot of ways I feel she's a snake that is manipulating him. She's not stupid. She's practical. She is a business woman and likes material things.

When I think of my dad after the divorce before he met my step mom and in the early stages of dating her, he was a different person. He was more active and fun. I also don't think he was drinking at the time or at least cut back a lot.

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Despite disliking your dad, do you tend to want him to notice your deeds and/or skills and respect you?

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Both my dad and my stepmom always assume the worst of me. They think I'm some lazy college drop-out who just plays video games all day. Truth is I play almost no video games anymore (I was addicted for maybe 2 years of my life.) I kicked the habit during college. I've been waiting since September for a glass studio to be setup so I can begin being taught glass blowing by a friend of my mom and I. I've known the guy who's teaching me since I was young. He and my mom work together and he's like another father/uncle to me. He and my mom have also been kind of unofficially dating since my parents split. He's a great guy and I have a lot of respect for him.

I don't really tell my dad or my step mom what I do or what I like (besides the fact that my father and I both play guitar) because they ask me in the most condescending way. It's not like their asking so much as accusing, making me stand trial. It's offensive to me. Really I just let them believe what they assume already.

It irritates me though when they've got my little brother and sister thinking these things about me (I also have a little brother and sister who are really step-siblings but I don't consider them like that, I love them both dearly - one is 6 and the other is 7.) It's like they're pouring their poison into my little brother and sister.

I remember one time me and my little sister were talking about religion somehow (she's really smart) and I told her about karma and what it meant. Well apparently she used the word while she was at a "play-date" (yes, they have "play-dates" ) and the mom of the house that my little sister was over told my step-mom. I was confronted about it and called weird and told that karma was weird and ordered never to talk to their kids about weird ideas ever again or religion at all. They're Christians I guess. Though the only Christian rites or holidays I've ever seen them celebrate were Christmas and Easter. And oh god, the mountains of cheap plastic toys they have from holidays and birthdays is staggering.

My dad would have been happy if I played and enjoyed golf. I find it really boring though. He's good at it. He plays it competitively and wins. I played golf in highschool for 2 years. I've been told by numerous people that I have a natural swing and my dad had been telling me that since I was a kid. I remember throughout my childhood my dad would be indignant at the fact that I didn't appreciate that he'd take me golfing all the time. I never liked golf though.

There was a time when I did try to earn his respect but it was at the cost of putting on an act. I had to be a certain way and dress a certain way. The same went for my sisters. Because of this there was a dichotomy between how we'd act at our mom's house and how we'd act at our dad's house. At our dad's we'd sit at the table together to eat dinner. Me and my sisters would never fight at dad's house. We would never have friends over at dad's house. We'd be bored over there. We'd usually end up playing super nintendo with each other.

At mom's it would be like anarchy. We ate wherever we wanted to. Sometimes we'd fight with each other and yell at each other and other times we'd get along and play video games or board games or hang out with friends together.

Sometimes we'd pretend we were at a friend's house when dad came to pick us up so we wouldn't have to go over there.

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I think an important missing element right now is determining who your mom is - you haven't said much about her. I don't want to know what you think, because you could be biased. I want to know what you know - is she passive? Happy? Angry? Aggressive? Depressed? Describe her personality as an individual.

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My mom is what you'd call a bleeding heart liberal. She's the kind of woman who would be extra nice to a black guy or a black family just because they're black. She gives to charity sometimes and she gave a lot of money to the democratic party for this election (I was angry at her for that.) During the election I stopped picking up the house phone because so many interest groups were calling for donations.

My mom isn't depressed at all which is strange because 3 out of her 4 sisters are depressed. She was depressed for a while when the burden she was trying to maintain (putting us all through college) became too much. At that time I don't think she had anyone to really vent to and I filled in that spot for her. She's good now though and throughout my knowing her that is really the only time I've seen her depressed.

One of the most irritating things about her to me is that she will help others at the expense of herself. Both of my sisters take and take and take from her and she can't refuse them. They will make her feel guilty about something when it's not her fault and she just takes the guilt, as if it were hers. That irritates me the most. Of course I can do the same, and I have in the past, but I don't allow myself to. I've been trying to give her a backbone over the years so she has the ability to say "no." When my sisters do this to her I harbor resentment for them because of this. It's gotten better over the years though.

My mom is also an extremely fair woman. If someone did something underhanded in business (she owns a small real-estate agency) she can turn indignantly bitter and will confront and attack that person about it. Or if me or my sisters were ever treated unfairly she would get this way.

She has taught Sunday school over the years at a local church to little kids and her motivation behind it is to "give kids a heart" in her own words.

Sorry, I got a little off topic in the above post - I'll try to stay as focused as possible from now on.

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which would you say you may fear more, deep down, becoming your dad, or not being able to?

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I could easily become him if I wanted to. I'm definitely smarter than him. To become him though I would have to put on an act. I don't think I could naturally become him.

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As a very basic level, do you feel sexually attracted to your step-mom, or would you be satisfied at all if she took you in sexually?

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Sexuality in general is a very confusing area for me. I could count my sexual encounters on one hand and they were all kind of weird. Only one of them was free of stress for the most part and it was when I was pretty young. I won't go into details about it here though.

It feels like such a fine line for me between which I'm attracted to more, male or female. You'd think it would be obvious. This has caused me a lot of stress throughout my life.

I think I have body-image issues. I have always been very skinny throughout my life. I was like the skinniest of the skinny kids. I was kind of teased about it but I was the class clown throughout school so I didn't get it so bad. But people would always be surprised at how skinny my wrists were - they're still very skinny. On top of it all I have a prominent adam's apple.

I've tried working out numerous times throughout my life but was never able to keep any weight on.

I don't want pity for any of this. I've heard it all about my body and have become pretty thick-skinned about it. I'm only sharing this for any possible insight.

Thinking about it, these are my biggest fears with sexual encounters:

1. Not being able to get it up.
2. Not being able to satisfy my partner.

I guess I feel inadequate when it comes to sex.

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Despite disliking your dad, do you tend to want him to notice your deeds and/or skills and respect you?

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Yes, I want him to respect me. I actually had an argument with my step-mom a couple months ago about just that. I said I wanted to be treated as their equal (her and my dad). She said that I wasn't their equal.

I believe you can't have a healthy relationship unless both parties regard each other as their equal or at least give them equal respect.

They both have such a bad image of me and paint a terrible picture to my little brother and sister. I know they do this because my siblings repeat things they've been told that they wouldn't come up with on their own.

I'm a loser and a weirdo to them. They wouldn't dare have me over when their friends are over. I think they care a lot about what their friends think.

A couple of months ago I was a bit confrontational with them because I really felt that there was some underlying issue that wasn't resolved between us. Maybe I didn't go about it the right way, I don't know. Instead of getting to the root and fixing whatever's wrong, I've been shunned and cursed.

I can't talk to them about anything remotely deep because it just leads to them getting angry and yelling - but I don't return it. Sometimes I laugh because it gets so ridiculous and I know I shouldn't because that only serves infuriate them more. Our conversations are limited to the mundane things in life by their own mandate.

I'm in a tough situation right now because I want to spend time with my little brother and sister but I can't go over there because I'm a weirdo. Just the other day my dad suggested to my mom (a very chance occurrence that would normally never happen - my mom and dad talking) that she should have me see a psychiatrist. That's just like him too, to have my mom pay for all the important things while he gives us fancy dinners and vacations. If he cared wouldn't he offer to send me to a psychiatrist? Oh and he just had a big brand new work shed built in his yard. My mom hasn't treated herself in years and the roof of the house is starting to give.

I still have anger towards him and I'm not sure exactly what to do with it. I've heard I should let it surface and feel the emotion but I'm not sure if I'm doing it or not. I'd still like to have a relationship with him and have him respect me but it seems like I have to wait for him to change for that to happen.

I don't know. I'm open to suggestions.

When we were children all our thoughts were clean.They were also focused on ourselves.I think that is the key.Focus on what you want and stop looking to other people to make you cover up all the dirtiness collected along the way through puberty and adulthood.Its like stacking shit on shit if you do it that way.Remember,i mean really try and remember what you did as a child.Totally different than what goes on now i bet.You just were.Not trying to be.