giancoli Posted January 2, 2014 Share Posted January 2, 2014 Hi there! I'm new here and would like to introduce my self. I'm 29 years old, male and from Norway. some info about my family: I grew up in a "traditional family" I have three sisters; one 6 years older, one 4 years younger and one 10 years younger. My parents also had a child who only got to be one year old before she died of meningitis (brain infection) I also had an older sister with a genetic error which made her retarded and unable to move, she basically sat in a wheel chair and played with a piece of string all day (from what I can remember). She died at 12 years old, don't know how old I was then but I think about 7 (I can remember my mother coming to school and tell me about it). The truth is that most of my childhood is completely forgotten, I try to recall memories, but there are only a few vague images that pops up here and there. As I said my family had a traditional setup; my father worked a lot (engineer like all the rest of the men in my extended family), and my mother was a stay at home wife. My disabled sister took up a lot of her attention, although we had several older women who came and took care of her. I can't really remember a single moment where my parents really connected with me and shared any meaningful with me. The family dinners had an uncomfortable tension covered with topics such as the weather etc. When my sisters got older they used to argue a lot, and my oldest one was very aggressive. I remember one episode where she hit my mother so hard that she almost broke her ribs (not completely through, don't know the English word for it). I remember talking about it on a family visit to my grandmother (on my mothers side), then my mother looked at me with a cold face indicating I shouldn't talk about it. I remember feeling stupid, off course this should be a secret I thought. The sister in the middle was the most beautiful one (although all my sisters are very pretty), she used to be the center of attention and the most social one. Apart for my dads emotional detachment and general silence I also remember he had a face indicating he was not very happy. We used to complain about it, and he would deny it. We would repeat and complain that he was in a bad mood. And he would say I'm not in a bad mood! With a angry irritated tone of voice. The winter vacations where spent at my grandfathers (my fathers father) place. We where forced to go skiing, or rather I pretended to enjoy it. I felt that I didn't have any option and that complaining about it made me ungrateful. My grandfather was extremely strict and authoritarian. I remember making fun of my cousin for wearing glasses (not a good thing admittedly) my grandfather would explode completely. He would, quite clearly favor my cousin in subtle ways and they made fun of me when I made mistakes when playing card games (which I also hated). My grandmother was manically depressed and she eventually took her own life (overdose with pills). My grandfather is now dead, I used to visit him sometimes before he died. He always used to control the conversation and we always talked about superficial stuff. But one time I managed share my problem of not connecting with anyone. He admitted that he never had connected with anyone himself. He then went out of the room, and when he came back I could smell alcohol from his breath. I clearly touched on something painful. My father did not have good relationship with my grandfather, we lived far apart and would only visit a couple of times each year. Still apparently it was natural and right that all grandchildren were sent on vacation there. When I finally got a break from school (which I hated) then I had to visit someone I did not like and do stuff I did not like while pretending to like it so my grandfather could feel good about himself. My ant is a world champion in a sport (which I want mention to keep my anonymity). There was quite a pressure to do sports and I discovered I had a talent for it as well. I formed my identity around that sport and remember I decided to put all my effort into it and become the best in the world. I used to be ridiculed in school for doing this sport and I was quite an outcaster/loner. Also I was very late in puberty, I was basically a boy when my class mates grew up to be men. Except for the first three to five years of my education or so where I was extremely popular both among the boys and the girls (I was the funny one and looked quite attractive or cute which is the ideal at that age), I was a very socially isolated person. I have never formed any deep meaningful relationship with any person my entire life. The few "friends" I had didn't respect me at all. As an example I can remember a bully ridiculing me while I was waiting for the buss at the buss stop after school. My "friend" just stood there and didn't say anything, I remember being extremely disappointed in him after that. Around 16 years old, I gradually decided to quit my sport and basically used all my time in front of the computer (a very expensive one I build on my own from own earned money). I would put minimal effort into school and just sit in front of my computer all day. I was extremely depressed and lonely. But my parents did not seem to notice, not one conversation on my inner life. I was so used to it, it didn't even cross my mind. My parents didn't use any violence towards me, just complete lack of care. I remember my mother used to pull me in my ears and drag me to my room when I was a young boy though. After I watched the witches by Roald Dahl, which scared the hell out of me, my mother used to pretend she was a witch. This is an example of how fucked up my mother is mentally. For most people this sounds like a funny story, but I was really scared and unsure if my mother was indeed was a witch. My parents are also very religious and my mother would sing a song thanking god for everything, every night before I went to sleep, brainwashing! I did confirm at 16, but soon realized the falsehood of it afterwards. I later had big arguments with my parents about it. I pushed my dad on it, do you really believe there is a life after death, do you really believe there is this all powerful being? He would admit that he did not, but believed in the values that they represented. I got a little disappointed about that. That meant he had lied to me all those years, before my brain was enough developed to figure it out on my own. My mother still believes and there is no point arguing with her about it (about anything really) After education I went to the military as a guardsman, another miserable year of my life. Lots of bullies, and endless of meaningless brain dead soul crushing tasks. At a family dinner with my extended family on visit, I remember my family laughing at me while they where talking about me being in the military. I remember asking to my self, why are they laughing? What's so funny. They had told me I had to do this to be a good person and serve my country, now they where laughing, I did not get it. When I left for university after the military I stopped picking up the phone from my parents. This was a pretty good time for me relatively speaking. Although I isolated myself and didn't form any relationships as usual. My study went really well, I worked really hard and got good grades (I took a bachelor degree in physics, then later a bachelor degree in mathematics) . After a few years of study my father would call me and I took the phone. He explained he was sitting in his boat. I immediately understood what that meant; troubles in the marriage. I didn't know what to respond. The truth was I didn't really care. After all these years of no attachment, no intimacy and no meaningful conversations and now he expected me to care about his situation? I felt guilty about not caring though and tried to pretend to care. My father lived alone between half a year and one year before they got back together again. They claim to be happy together again, but I don't believe them. Apparently what made my father almost divorce my mother was that after he had just bought a new house (which she had been nagging him for for years) when they finally moved in she would immediately start nagging about something else. He couldn't take it anymore. Now they are back together again and keeps improving the house. Apparently building a balcony and a new kitchen. My father has something between 2 and 3 million dollars in loans, he will be in big trouble when the economy crashes. After my grandfather died, I was allowed to live in his house for half a year before they eventually sold it. When cleaning out the house. At one dinner I would confront my father and ant (which would receive the prize of the house) on their endless empty conversations. I also told that my father had never really shared anything with me. My ant got really aggressive and hit me several times on my leg. I got really upset and walked out of the room. I spent a few seconds in another room, then thought to my self : don't be a coward and went back. When I went back something happened to me, I just looked my ant straight into her face and eyes. And boom I lost all respect for her, it was like an illusion just evaporated and here was this old corrupt control freak, she looked so weak. I immediately could observe that she could read my emotions: a mixture of disgust and disappointment. She walked out of the kitchen and out in the garden and behind some trees. When she came back she was really angry and said I should be ashamed of myself, she didn't look me in the eyes though. Another thing that made me increasingly frustrated before this boil up, was the strange childish behavior from my dad and ant. It was like they where acting, very strange behavior, but I could tell they where faking it. One of my sisters has gotten married, a huge party which I went to out of pure guilt and obligation. Also my oldest sister is now a mother which is half a year, but I have not seen him yet. I have just been informed my "middle" sister is pregnant. I'm planning to never see my family again. I know I want it, but my mother tries to pull me back with guilt. Also I have received about hundred thousand dollars from my grandfather (as all my cousins have), is it immoral of me to take them if I decide to brake away from my family and never see and talk to them again? I'm also thinking about starting to go to a therapist, I went to two psychologist in the past both made me worse. The last one didn't even bother to pretend to care about me and only wanted me to start taking pills. Sorry for the somewhat incomplete, disorganized text and for my bad English. Giancoli Oh, maybe that was a little much info about my family history. When it comes to politics I have never really cared much for it to be honest. History was always very boring in school, it was so complicated and disorganised. It felt like it was just about memorizing random facts which didn't seem to fit into a bigger picture. I was more into science and mathematics. I have always liked to think and philosophize about stuff though, but it has always been centered around scientific questions, not humans. That might have something to do with my complete withdrawal from humans in general, perhaps an unconscious choice to avoid everything relating to humans? I'm starting to get more interested in society and humans now though. And Stefan Molyneux's content seems to make a lot of sense to me. It's not just memorization, it fits into an overall structure, that makes it more exciting. I'm dedicated to learn more about this stuff! At my current ignorant stage I cant say I'm convinced that complete anarchy (no state would work) although it is clear to me that what we have is fundamentally immoral as well as unsustainable. I have spent a lot of time reading topics related to MGTOW (men going their own way) philosophy. I'm quite burned out about it now however and want to explore something new, hence my interest in stefan's content (also I'm in desperate need to figure out my self and get out of the depression and isolation). I'm not sure I want a relationship with a woman in the future. The truth is I'm skeptical I would ever be able to find someone I could enjoy the company with. And I don't want to be exploited and manipulated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lians Posted January 2, 2014 Share Posted January 2, 2014 What a story! I could feel your pain seeping through the lines and I'm sorry you had to go through all this. I don't think there's anything immoral about taking your grandfather's inheritance and leaving. Consider it a tiny form of restitution for what you have gone through. It was wise of you to avoid relationships. You had a terrible template for that. It's probably a good idea to dig into Stef's content on self-knowledge/psychology before you set out to find a good therapist. Oh, and one last thing... Welcome to the board! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
giancoli Posted January 2, 2014 Author Share Posted January 2, 2014 Hi Lians, thanks for your response. I'm sure other people had it worse in some ways. But at least hitting is overt and obvious, manipulation and just detachment takes so long time to realize and question (at least for me). I'm always been the very nice boy who wanted to do the right thing. Extremely depressing to realize that is a weakness that people pretend to respect, while actually trying to take advantage of. Well I don't know objectively speaking how bad my upbringing was. I talked to my mother the other day and expressed this, she claims I'm making it up to justify my rather dark position in life and that I want to put the blame on someone else (my parents) rather than my self. I said that from now on I'm going to take full responsibility for my actions and what happens to me in my life. I then tried to apply the same logic to them, that they are responsible for their behavior in my childhood. She just took the "we did the best we could" approach. She then tried to make me doubt my own judgement by comparing my views to what is most common (argument from numbers of people sharing a view). I said I did not care what everybody else thinks. I'm scared that one of my parents will commit suicide or something like that as a consequence of my choice to leave them. It seems they know I don't like them and that the only thing they can use is guilt and social aggression. I have made it clear that I don't care what my extended family thinks of me when my mother tries to say something like (we are so worried about you, your uncles and ants and cousins we all really care about you...). It's so cynical to use that to pull me in. It's so far from my nature, I think that's why I used so much time figuring out that it was not genuine. But like I said I don't care about that, so the only thing they got left is guilt. It's almost like I want them to pull some shit on me so that I'm sure I'm making the right decision. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lians Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 Sounds like you're there intellectually but lack the emotional closure. Have a look at Stef's Real-Time Relationships if you haven't read it already. It will help you with the emotional side of the issue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
giancoli Posted January 6, 2014 Author Share Posted January 6, 2014 I found this rather interesting and somewhat similar to my story, relating to my father i particular. Predatory Depression 1/3: http://cdn.media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_931_Predatory_Depression_Part_1.mp3 Predatory Depression 2/3: http://cdn.media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_932_Predatory_Depression_Part_2.mp3 Predatory Depression 3/3: http://cdn.media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_933_Predatory_Depression_Part_3_Father.mp3 I'm reading realtime relationships now, by the way. Love this Greg guy, I can really identify with him. Greg and the Dating: http://cdn.media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_1028_Greg_and_the_Dating.mp3 I'm collecting podcasts that feel relevant social anxiety convo: http://cdn.media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_1950_social_anxiety_convo.mp3 sexual obsession: http://board.freedomainradio.com/files/file/105-sexual-obsession/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
giancoli Posted January 10, 2014 Author Share Posted January 10, 2014 I just donated 100$. Feels great! Thanks Stefan for all your insights! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lians Posted January 10, 2014 Share Posted January 10, 2014 I'm glad you found value in philosophy! You'll reap even more benefits as the insights settle in your mind over time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts