Hey guys.
So, it's been nearly exactly a year since I finally got my ex out of my life completely. I'd say "since we broke up", but he dragged the break-up out for a full month, and I wasn't free until around this time last year. Interpreting "free" loosely, that is. You would think I'd be feeling better a whole year after I leave my abusive ex and have been with my new, more caring partner. Yet here I am, still haunted and scared.
Now, add to this the fact that I am studying abroad in Japan. As the crisis here worsens in the wake of the earthquake, my home university is apparently freaking out about its students here, and some have emailed the school saying they want to go home. Well, from what I have read, the rest of our year here might actually be canceled, and we could be pulled out of Japan. The spring semester at home has already begun, so it's too late for us to enroll in classes there. Instead, I'll be stuck at home until next year.
Home. Home, where my parents threaten me with therapy, constant supervision, and keeping me out of things I enjoy to prevent me from cutting and killing myself. Where my ex lives just down the street, and accidentally running into him is a real risk. Where I don't have the level of independence that I have here, that at least makes me feel like I'm in charge of my own life for once. Where I am judged every day. Where I'll be halfway around the world from my boyfriend in China.
I don't think I can do that. I don't think I can stand to live in that house with my parents again, to see the way they look at me when I have a panic attack and my mom somehow thinks it will help for her to come sit on the side of my bed when I'm trying to cry it out. Where the best help they can give me is "think of all the people with worse problems than you". Where I have been pushed and judged and demeaned and guilted and made to feel like a child every day since I can remember. I may be screwed in the head, I may want to kill myself, but in Japan I at least have a modicum of happiness. I am genuinely scared for myself if I have to go home. I don't know what to do.
So, it's been nearly exactly a year since I finally got my ex out of my life completely. I'd say "since we broke up", but he dragged the break-up out for a full month, and I wasn't free until around this time last year. Interpreting "free" loosely, that is. You would think I'd be feeling better a whole year after I leave my abusive ex and have been with my new, more caring partner. Yet here I am, still haunted and scared.
Now, add to this the fact that I am studying abroad in Japan. As the crisis here worsens in the wake of the earthquake, my home university is apparently freaking out about its students here, and some have emailed the school saying they want to go home. Well, from what I have read, the rest of our year here might actually be canceled, and we could be pulled out of Japan. The spring semester at home has already begun, so it's too late for us to enroll in classes there. Instead, I'll be stuck at home until next year.
Home. Home, where my parents threaten me with therapy, constant supervision, and keeping me out of things I enjoy to prevent me from cutting and killing myself. Where my ex lives just down the street, and accidentally running into him is a real risk. Where I don't have the level of independence that I have here, that at least makes me feel like I'm in charge of my own life for once. Where I am judged every day. Where I'll be halfway around the world from my boyfriend in China.
I don't think I can do that. I don't think I can stand to live in that house with my parents again, to see the way they look at me when I have a panic attack and my mom somehow thinks it will help for her to come sit on the side of my bed when I'm trying to cry it out. Where the best help they can give me is "think of all the people with worse problems than you". Where I have been pushed and judged and demeaned and guilted and made to feel like a child every day since I can remember. I may be screwed in the head, I may want to kill myself, but in Japan I at least have a modicum of happiness. I am genuinely scared for myself if I have to go home. I don't know what to do.
