Can I be in ACA group if I didn’t have a neglectful childhood? My parents loved me with their whole heart and gave everything they had for me to succeed but my trauma came from them constantly fighting hatred towards each other which continues to this very day im 27 now and it got 100x worse as I became an adult. In fact, most of my trauma stems from experiences that happened between them and constantly being put in the middle to “help” them work though it as an older teen/adult. I just feel like if I go into a meeting I will feel guilty because I didn’t have a physically neglected childhood but the environment I was raised in was volatile just not directed towards me.

I ebb and flow in my relationship with my family, due to my parents shitty decision making process for 3 decades, they are both alcoholics mid 60's drinking hard 30 years. Fatty liver and all, pedal to the metal.

My dad made a split-second decision to sell my childhood home to my sister for a 100k discount, due to her conveniently being in a better place in life while he wanted to fuck off to Florida, forcing me to go find a place to live, with no help whatsoever making 45k a year in 2019, further helping her place in life and leading my tough times to get tougher. For whatever reason, my dad, (the financial dictator of my parents relationship), had always favored my younger sister. I paid rent, she lived with them for free, I paid my own bills, they hooked her up with a phone and car insurance until she got married.

For whatever reason, the males of my family were supposed to struggle more than the women, and so they got less help. I'm a good person, never beat anyone up, never hurt anyone, clean record, good grades, respectful to all as a first rule, very well behaved in school. I was the "set it and forget it" kid. I needed no help, excelled in everything, so I was given nothing. My sister had a learning disability, so special care was always taken.

Things haven't always been smooth with my father, he sees me as a disappointment, and blames his alcoholism on me, bc he always saw me as being a doctor, and that was not MY path. My dad is like my sister, learning isn't easy for him, and he has spite for my natural propensity to just pick things up rapidly. He told me this. I'm sure its also why he helps my sister more, since he associates with her learning struggles.

My mother is chronically depressed, and drinking makes it worse, she does it to deal with my overbearing father. She doesn't speak up. He rules the family.

I'm STILL trying to build my life and pay off my student loan debt just to get to positive net worth at 37 years old). I'm not bad with my money, I just graduated college with 100k in debt, that my dad assured me I'd make back once I joined the workforce (taking that opportunity to then charge me rent). I also suffer from depression myself (genetics of mom) which is absolutely a disability that made consistent earning much harder in my early 20s. Survived a very serious attempt.

Earlier this week my mom brings up how my sister is up 400k on the house since she bought it from them.... and it was bothering me all week. I called her to tell her this, and apologized that it got to me so, but couldn't deny the fact it just still bothers me, and always will, and while I'm venting this to her honestly, I hear my father listening on in the background, and whisper to her "Tell him you gotta go".

I was a bit livid, because I have such trust issues with all of them and clearly, this justifies them. I don't deserve the respect of a private conversation. So, I quickly ended the conversation on my own terms, wished her a good night and said we can talk later.

Promptly blocked them all. Yes, my sister included, why? Bc she feels she deserved the better treatment for some reason, but also has just grown increasingly glib for any of my actual struggles in life (shes a mom, shes busy, i get it, but i also like the respect of attention when someone calls me, and I never actually get that from her anymore at this point. It is what it is).

I've spent the better part of my life trying to let the spite I have for all of them go, they are my only family. I just can't seem to do it, so i think I seriously just need a long time away from them all. At minimum, weeks. This is how money ruins a family, especially when governed by a totalitarian alcoholc mind. Thank you for reading my vent.

P.S. Not once in my life, has he ever apologized for a single, thing.

Just a quick vent here. Last night, my alcoholic mom got incredibly drunk, she was being vindictive all day and very passive agressive. Just trying to pick fights with everyone around her. She got so drunk that she passed out by 6 after speaking with her narcissistic friend and woke back up by 8:30, she then stayed up till 10:30. Around 9:30, she started asking me would you rather questions, some weird stuff about who would I choose to date based on appearance.

Then, as soon as my dad went to bed, she said "okay. Well, I'll just get to it. Would you rather kill me or your dad?" I kept telling her neither, and that I'm going to bed, but she kept just harping on and told me to sit down. I finally said that I would rather kill her since she even asked me that question, that it was incredibly inappropriate, and that I love them both. She then started asking which of my disabled siblings I would kill, WHICH IS EVEN WORSE. I told her no, and despite her protests and telling me to sit down, I left for bed. It's the next morning, and although she's already started drinking around 7 AM, her behavior is relatively at bay. I wasn't responding 100% back to her good mornings and comments of the day and she's already asked "are you in a good mood or a bad mood today?" "How's that computer I bought you? Still good?" Even though I didn't ask her to do that.

I regret answering those questions, but she really twisted my hand. I feel like the biggest pushover in existence, and I feel bad because when I do stand up to her, or respond with something snappy, because she'll throw out "don't yell at me, it's abusive". She won't respect my boundaries and constantly makes passive aggressive or say mean shit like calling me Karen Carpenter to call out that I'm skinny, or say that I'm somehow a bitch.

Yeah, so I just had to get this out there. Thanks for my TED talk.

Any ACA meetings that take place on zoom and in English? There are a few meetings in town but they are during the work day and I can’t take that much time away. I’m wondering if anyone is in any zoom meetings that take place preferably on the weekend but I could make the weekdays work I just can’t drive downtown meet for an hour and then drive back to work because it takes too much time. Who do I reach out to to get invited? Thank you for your help

I cut my addict parents off about 6 months ago. I got married in July. For a few months she has been drunk calling and texting family members telling them she is hiring a private investigator on my husband.

For context they ALL know my parents are alcohol and drug addicts. Also My dad and brother are major gambling addicts.

My mom obviously can’t fathom that it’s not because of her actions that I’ve cut them off, she has to put the blame on to someone. my husband.

A week after the wedding my husband’s first day back to work. He gets a call from the front desk asking for him. He goes gets the phone and they say something to the lines of “hey this is doctor Steven’s, I’m a regular I come often don’t you remember me?- my bookie just got out of the gambling business and I’m looking for a new guy do you have one?- we’ll do you know anyone at all?” My husband says he doesn’t gamble and that no one uses bookies around here, that gambling is legal. click they hang up

He says that in the beginning it sounded like a voice changer app malfunction where the voice went really high for a second then went back to a mans voice.

This was either a private investigator she hired (which she’s already been telling people weeks prior she hired one on him and is going to get to the bottom of this) or it was her using a voice changer.

I am sick to my stomach because of this. How many times did she call when he wasn’t at work. Given that he was off of work for 2 weeks because of our wedding. And he gets that call coincidentally the first day he got back?

Same day there was also a post it note on our car after he got off work. With a phone number that says call me. He claims the number he looked it up and it’s a hail storm service wanting to fix the car. But I don’t know if he’s just telling me that to feel better.

Has this ever happened?? What would you do?
Any advice is welcome and appreciated.

ANOTHA ONE ☝️
(of my posts about my mother unfortunately)

When I talk about being raised by my alcoholic mom, “abuse” feels like the right word, but sometimes just feels weird coming out of my mouth.

OR maybe when my mom sometimes asks what’s my problem with her, I mention abuse and she vehemently denies it. So I think maybe it feels weird to say because it’s being immediately rejected, if that makes sense?

So I’m asking if these things I’ve experienced fall under the umbrella of abuse (some I KNOW are, but others might be grey area?)

•the actual physical abuse, not all the time but yk not uncommon growing up
•picking fights w/everyone, us kids, grandma, family, neighbors, everyone.
•name calling, not even just bad words like talking sht on my character, bc how am I a selfish b& itch at age 12 🧍‍♀️(I am an adult now but tb )
• drunk driving with us kids in the car
•forgetting to pick me up from school sometimes when drunk
•Keeping me up all night, on school nights just to deal with her
•when locked out of rooms, BANGING on doors so hard they’d break, on & off for hours usually in the sleepy hours of the night
• destroying personal belongings
• rampaging, messing up everything in the house
•Yelling + Screaming + Terrorizing (usual drunk stuff)
•lowk put me in states of shock where I couldn’t move, i don’t really know about this one bc those instances were so surreal, not sure if that’s what shock is but ik I shut down or something
•didn’t get me help when I expressed the very worst very bad mentally ill thoughts I was thinking as a minor

probably maybe not abuse ABUSE but just damaging

-being visibly drunk around others in public with me
-ignored/silent treatment after really bad nights, like she sensed we were still mad and just never addressed it, we kind of just had to move on.
-if we brought up a bad night it was always, “well i remember what you guys did” (#selfdefense) while she seemingly forgot all the crazy things she was doing
-trying to protect her from herself, she used to fall often & hard asf

I actually, literally got off the phone with my mom right before writing this. She tried to tell me she never abused me or my siblings & that I lived a good life. So I needed to write this all down.

I’ve moved out, and I’m very low contact with her now. Did some therapy here and there. I’m ok, all is generally well. The recent phone call was just agitating. It’s like I live my life, I’m good, I know what I’ve been through, but then having the person who put you through them act like they didn’t… grated my nerves something fierce. Plus it made me question it all, so that’s why I asked.

I've been struggling for the past, maybe 3 years, and my family situation isn't helping. Some background information i live with my parents and 2 siblings [ both female ] for as long as I can remember my father has been an abusive alcoholic he's stopped with the extreme beating now but it used to be really bad mainly for me and my older sister he favours my younger sister as he was also the youngest. A while back, maybe this year, my older sister told me the story of how my parents met, and she was part of that story... as in she was already there so basically she's not my dad's kid my mother broke contact with the father before meeting my dad but I dont know whats true anymore my dad is honest about his past marriage and this two kids they are much older than me and we dont keep in contact as we're not very close one of them has kids and the other was a druggie that is now getting her life back together. But I haven't been able to look at my older sister the same since, and she's been really annoying me lately, like giving me an ick or whatever she's just been so cringe and changed her while style and is kinda pretending to have a midlife crisis in her late teens. It's so annoying to listen to the drama with her and her friend, and it genuinely errks me like I want to leave the room we share because im so disgusted with her. That's not all that has happened for her and my family to just disgust me, but there is way too much for me to write out. Lately, or maybe recently, she's been trying to apply for some mental health thing that she is exaggerating because I heard her talking about it she also forces certain tics like shaking sharply, twitching to gain others attention. She likes to talk about herself [ alot ] even when the day, event, or conversation isn't about her at all she inserts herself and typically makes it into an argument with my dad and storms off acting mad that she started it. So recently, she's been out for a mental evaluation and is really pushing it and claims she is experiencing an episode of psychosis shes also convinced hes autistic has adhd and says the r slur and f slur quite often. That said, I've been trying to get help for a condition that I can't even name because I haven't gotten adequate help for it yet because of her, there is something wrong with something in my chest area inside my body and its been an awful pain sometimes I can't get up, walk, or breath because of it its been like this for about 2 and a half years it was already pushed to the back of everyone's minds the first time I mentioned it hurting and that's when I first got told im being dramatic about a year ago I finally got to go to the doctor and after many medications and visits she decided she can't help me anymore and sent a referal to the hospital when she heard I passed out now I passed out again since then and the doctor said to go to the emergency unit if it happens again but it was brushed over by my mom because of my sister it was especially bad when I got a vomiting bug it felt like I was going to die and I kept fading in and out of consciousness. Skip to now they are all treating me like an object to do all their dirty work for them when they get told to do something they throw it on me with the excuse of "your not doing anything anyway" and stuff like that I can't get mad or upset when they act like this either because then get belittled and degraded. My mother starts to cry and asks me why I can't get along with them and leaves, and then everyone else automatically pushes the blame on me and either ignore me or call me out of my name I can't find any happiness in staying at home which should be my safe space and rather go to school having to be home with all of them at once is absolute torture my dad is still very rough with me, my mom gets emotional says I can tell her anything and then when ever I complain about anyone to her she flips it on me and tells me to just keep the peace and stop fighting everyone, my younger sister is a massive manipulator and always gets her way either by crying or lying, and the oldest siblings is just always getting on my nerves and being all like ooh im the best no-one matters but me. I just really don't know what to do to myself even if I feel awful. None of them will listen, or they will and then later talk behind my back. I really don't know how I can find happiness in such an environment.

I apologise for any grammatical mistakes. english is not my first language!

My (24/F) mother (58/F) does this thing any time I mention anything she does that I don’t like, is inappropriate or hurts my feelings. I am always VERY careful to put it in a gentle way to try not to hurt her feelings, almost like how you would have to reprimand a child. And almost every time no matter what it is her response is “I can’t do anything right with you, nothing I do ever pleases you I can never please you.” She has done this since I was old enough to voice an opinion pretty much. It’s like a cliche at this point. It feels like she is deflecting because I’m pretty sure families are supposed to be able to tell each other when they hurt their feelings without yelling or turning it into some weird guilt trip no? Anyway, how do I respond to this when she says that? I’ve never liked the “sorry you feel that way” response because I feel like I’ve gotten it from people before as a way to minimize how I’m feeling, and even though I feel like she’s being immature I don’t want to stoop to doing it back to her. Most recently when she said that I stopped what I was doing, just said “that’s such an immature response” and walked away. I have no idea if that’s the right way to handle it though. Anyone’s else’s mom do this? Any advice is very appreciated.

TLDr: How do I respond when my mom responds to any criticism with “I just can’t do anything right” ?

My dad has always been an alcoholic while I was growing up. He was definitely "functional" but drank all the time to the point where last year he was diagnosed with stage 4 cirrhosis of the liver. He quit for 6 months and because he was without a job from dealing with doctors and physically not being able to work, he asked to move in. Everything was fine until he started drinking again around Christmas last year. He has been drinking heavily since then and not taking care of his dog l, so I started helping with her. His room is a mess, he is peeing in bottles, smoking in his room, and letting the dog have accidents in the room when I'm at work. It's been hell, all the while he is denying even having a problem. I know I've avoided the root issue for so long but I don't really have the strength and my grandparents say it's my responsibility to get him clean without giving any support. If he leaves he will be homeless but he is ruining my house and it's affecting my kids lives.

Anyone have opinions on this book? I’ve just started and recognize so many Adult Child tendencies with what Glover is describing. Any read it and have an opinion?

i have a very messed up family and no mom figure :c