Nothing in common with my family.

[Kalden]

Greetings Freedomain Radio forum.  As this is my first post I think it might be appropriate for me to give a kind of (brief) background of myself.  I am a 20 y/o male currently living in New South Wales, Australia, studying IT at university. I have an ACE score of 5. There was a LOT of yelling and passive-aggressive bitchiness between my parents and from my parents to my brother and I, although there were never any drugs, alcohol or physical violence (there was spanking however, maybe once or twice per week). They spanked my brother and I for our crimes against humanity and then again when my brother and I learned that a good way to resolve problems is to hit the other person (go figure). Though they never got divorced, it was on the table at one point when I was about 16, and even before that, when I was about 8 to 10 I remember constantly being terrified that they would get divorced and I would have to split my time between them, or that my mother would commit suicide (her way of winning any dispute was always to make her opponent feel sorry for her, which you can imagine the effect that would have on a child if repeated several times a week for several years). 

Through reasons which I won't mention here for the sake of your time taken to read this, although some of it has already been mentioned, I became obese as a child and eventually developed vastly different interests, hobbies and opinions to those in my family. For example, my brother (who is as thin as a rake, interestingly enough) is a self-identified communist, and my parents (who are amplified photocopies of their parents in their ideas) think that the big problem in society that causes all problems; violence, poverty etc. is not the state, poor childhood experiences or inherited overwhelming debt, NO, ITS THE F****ING DRUMS IN THE MUSIC. (yes, really) (their IQ is about 90-105, my IQ is 129-135 BTW). My cousins, uncles and aunties think a good way to spend a day (or more) is to sit and watch rugby or cricket on TV and cheer whenever the team whose members happened to be born in the same country as them score a goal (wait how does cricket work again? ).

So my problem is basically this: even though I now live in a different country to my parents, I still live in quite close proximity to and frequently rely on my extended family (mothers parents and their family), who I have absolutely nothing in common with except that we live in the same country and are both warm-blooded organisms (although I do have my doubts about my grandmother  ), and I kind of feel trapped here because I rely on them for meals at least once a week etc. What can be done? 

[Kevin Beal]

Heya Kalden! 

 

I'm sorry about the pettiness and selfishness, and the hitting. I can imagine that could get pretty maddening, and it's a terrible example to be setting, of course.

 

I just want to make sure – you're saying that they think that drums in music cause social problems? Is it like all drums? Certain kinds of drumming? Is it like hypnotizing or something? This sounds completely psychotic...

 

What can be done? What I did was I immediately got myself into therapy and took any work I could find to pay for it, living on couches, doing some really shitty landscaping work inhaling shredded poison oak, whatever I had to do to get professional help, and find a way to manage my life outside of my codependent relationships. (I was basically unemployed at the time). My therapist helped me stay sane as I gradually removed myself from dysfunctional situations and trying to establish a career. And I eventually got my current job in software development. With that financial security, I stopped relying on any help from family.

 

I would have been completely overwhelmed without therapy. I wouldn't have even tried without that emotional support. I might have drowned out in the ocean of my life. When I realized that there was a way out, I fought like hell.

 

My suggestion would be to take your life incredibly seriously and fight like hell to reclaim the potential that was lost, and taken from you.

[AccuTron]

Drums represent unfettered sexuality, possibly the (twisted) root of that aversion.

[Ivann]

Hi Kalden,

Just thought I would send you this message to say that there are other FDR members in NSW. We have a Sydney Meetup Group and have meetups fairly regularly. We are looking to have one at the end of January this year.

Link to facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/FreedomainRadioSydney/
Link to Meetup Page: http://www.meetup.com/Sydney-Freedomain-Radio-Meetup/

 

In terms of the question, my answer would be - The first aim for yourself is to become financially free from your family. Do not try and change any of your extended families behaviours. Just use that one meal a week from them to get by and start to build your own future. So you need to find a job that is going to pay for your accomodation and living expenses if you don't already have one.

 

I'm going to assume that at 20yrs old your very confused about your up bringing and what to do with your life (as you have asked ) so you really just want to create some space for yourself between that old environment and any attachment to it. That space will then be used for your new environment (which you will have to create) in a sense creating a 'vacuum' for new experiences.

 

If your in Sydney, I can hook you up with an entry level job within the IT field. Private message me on here if you wanted to talk more.

Regards,
Ivan.

[Kalden]

Thanks very much for all the responses. Apologies for not replying for so long. Thanks Ivann for the job offer, but recently I've had some realizations, chiefly, that I didn't really have a choice of what I wanted to study at uni, or even if I wanted to go to uni or not. I was kind of forced into it because its what my brother was already doing (he is a year older than me). I'm not sure yet if IT is what I want to spend my life doing, but I have only one year left until I get my golden-ticket-open-sesame-for-any-job (that's what people tell me anyway) degree, and apparently now is the worst time to quit. Basically I'd like to finish getting my golden ticket before I decide what to do next with my life, but thanks very much anyway - I appreciate the offer (I joined the FB group btw, but I probably wont be able to make it to any meetups as Sydney is a few hours away).

Anyway, I have been reflecting on self-knowledge a lot over the last weeks, and Kevin and Ivann I think you were absolutely spot-on when you say that I need to get right away from my family and make my own way in life.  I may have neglected to mention in my post that as I went straight from high school to uni, I am currently a Centrelink (welfare) leech.  At the time I started getting welfare I was straight out of high school (AKA low-IQ-propaganda-camp-for-statists)  I had not thought about fundamental philosophical concepts like taxation being theft, or the deferral of gratification. I was a little bothered that the same hard-earned tax dollars being handed to me were being handed out to illegal immigrants, but not enough to say no to free stuff! The way I saw it, the people were paying me to get an education so that I could provide value to them later on, which I now realize is a complete nonsense theory because its like forcing some one to pay for something twice.

 

I think my primary problem now is that welfare is a lot easier to get on than off.  Its not as simple as just getting a job. I currently have no marketable skills, because as I said before I didn't really want to do IT and hence am not very good at it (better than the average person but not competent enough to have a job in it). The only reason I want to finish getting my degree is because it might help me to get a job in a different area. I also have very poor communication skills which I think comes from all the physical and emotional abuse I suffered at school and at home for the first 17 years of my life.  I could do what you did Kevin and take any low-paying work I could find, but I had a minimum-wage job in high school and because I am cursed with an IQ a couple of standard deviations above the norm, it was utter purgatory (as I'm sure you're all aware, people who have minimum wage jobs well into their 30s, 40s or 50s tend not to be the sharpest tools in the shed). I quit that job after a while because I literally (no, not figuratively) couldn't take it anymore, even though the money was great (my parents didn't make me pay board and they still paid all my expenses). I would come home completely mentally drained (for the average person, imagine being forced to read children's nursery rhymes for 3.5 hours straight, it felt a little bit like that). I am also morbidly obese, which rules out most physical-labor-intensive jobs because even if they did hire me, I wouldn't be nearly as efficient as a normal-sized person, and there could be health risks. So I am at a cross-road. On the one hand I want to get away from my family and make a living for myself, but on the other hand I feel like I need this degree to be able to get a proper job first, even though I find living off of other peoples' stolen money morally wrong. 

[Drew.]

Hey man, I can definitely relate to what you're going through. In my own attempt to break from my parents, I had to borrow money from friends as I could not rely on my parents nor my extended family for support. Tragically, this was a factor that destroyed one of my friendships. Even after a few years, I had to rely on my grandparents for some support at times. It's really difficult for a young adult to get some solid ground beneath his feet in this day and age. I have some other friends and people that I know that are struggling with this as well. Tough choices to make.

 

It seems to me like you're experiencing shame about being on welfare. I don't know much about you, but I think that if you're the kind of person who feels bad about being on welfare, you're not the kind of person who would be a leach. Welfare is argued to help people who will eventually support themselves. I think that this is the case for you, that you're not going to be taking welfare for the rest of your life and that you actually have something to contribute to society. My first couple of years breaking from my parents were all about finding a holding pattern that I could maintain while going to therapy and journaling. I don't think that being on welfare is something that deserves shame, as the reason why you are so ill-prepared for the real world is not your fault but due to the abuse that you suffered from your parents. It's like being forced to pay for something twice (or more).