I'm thinking about running away from my parents

[Guest]

I’m 16 going on 17 in September.


I’ve been having issues with my family for a while now, starting with both my dad and brother bullying me for my weight which lead to some suicidal thoughts at the age of 8. After that I never really healed from it and I stayed in that mental state for a long time. Thankfully it hasn’t reached any physical actions yet on both my parents side and mine.I’ve never been a bad kid or a bad student. I have straight A’s in higher level classes, all of my teachers and leaders love me, I was in multiple sports for a very long time, I'm an artist, basically I'm a very good kid. Yet when I bring home all this good news I get “and?” as a response. It’s never enough, I'm never enough. I asked my dad if I ever would be and he straight up told me “no you will never be enough and you need to get rid of that weak mindset.” At the time I was doing dishes and my parents were sitting on the couch and tears started to form and all my mom did was sit there. I proceeded to break down about it for the next few weeks and had to get comfort from teachers and friends who were more like family to me than my own parents. My family considers me my dad's soft spot because I never got the physical punishments like my brother. Instead I got the constant degrading, emotional, mental, and verbal abuse. As I mentioned earlier, I'm an artist, I've always had a love for it but I didn't get good at it until I started realizing I was being hurt by my own family.


In 2020 my parents found out about me being a part of the LGBTQIA+ and my relationship as well. They decided to ground me for it and expressed that they expected my relationship to fail because I was not allowed to see her outside of school. Fortunately for me we haven't and they continue to prevent me from seeing her. This has included threats of military school, moving, and or a restraining order against my girlfriend as well as other methods. When they first found out my dad made remarks such as “It’d be easier if you were pregnant” “This is very selfish of you” and even when we were having heart to heart conversations he would explain to me that the main reason he would not accept me was because it meant he would not get grandkids from me. Mind you I have an older brother soon to be 21 which logically will be the only one to pass on the last name that is so important to them.


At my age my mom went through similar issues with her mom except instead of homophobia stopping her relationship it was racism considering my dad is black and my mom is white. I brought this up to my dad because I was confused as to how their relationship could go through that and decide to put their own daughter through it as well. My dad would claim that he didn't understand why my mom made the choice to continue to be with him even when her mom forbade it. From this conversation with him I learned that no matter the pain that he could see he was causing me, I would gain no sympathy from him.


It’s gotten to a point where I don't even want to be home anymore. I make plans as much as possible to avoid being with them. I sometimes feel bad about it because if you were to take away the homophobia and “abuse” then I would have a great family. We don't see eye to eye on religion or sexuality or politics but you don’t have to do that to be able to have a healthy or stable relationship. But then I remember the nights where I cry so hard I can't breathe and I go to school the next day running on 2 hours of sleep.


Recently things have been getting worse as they’ve realized that I have no intention of going to college after I finish highschool. Meaning constant reminders of my soon to be failure of a life and my worthlessness. I do have plans after highschool that I am extremely excited for but have little to no support from my parents. The most recent major conflict ended with multiple threats including taking away my phone in which I paid for, taking away my car in which i also paid for( my dad claims that there is no legal proof that I paid/pay for it so he can do so), taking away my money in which im hoping goes towards me moving out as soon as possible, and making me quit my job if I did not become submissive. With my current mental state I'm not sure how much longer I can be in such a toxic household. I know running away is considered a law violation and can result in law enforcement interaction. I have no family I could go to considering they would all turn me back to my parents. I dont know what to do anymore. I just want to be free from them.

[ccsmod16]

Hi,
Thank you for reaching out; we are glad that you did. It sounds like you have survived years of emotional and verbal abuse from you dad, and that your mom isn't able to give you any emotional support either. It sounds like your dad also physically abused your siblings. We are so sorry that you are being treated this way. You don't deserve it at all. He treats you this way because of who he is, NOT because of who you are. He has some pain or anger or something inside that prevents him from being any other way than to hurt others as a way to either deflect his own pain or anger away from himself, or as a way to feel better about himself. Whatever the case, he treats you this way because of himself, not because of you.
As far as how he is treating you for being part of the LGBTQ community, his remarks show again that your personal self is only about him. You don't deserve that either. Your mom may be afraid of him and is passive to protect herself.
What you do have, what you have earned by being your excellent, warm, intelligent, brave self, is the support of teachers and friends who see you and respect you as you really are.
You have been so brave and so strong to survive so much already and we hope you can feel proud of yourself for that, because you deserve to feel that way. We do our best work with people when we can have a conversation with them. We want to listen and help you discover what your options may be. We hope that you will either chat us through this website, or call our hotline at 1-800-786-2929 (1-800-RUNAWAY).
For now, you can reach out to www.thetrevorproject.org which is a mental health site for LGBTQ youth. They have a chat as well and are also available 24/7 like we are.
We truly hope to hear from you soon.
Sincerely,
NRS

[Guest]

I'm 15 turning 16 in about 6 months. my life isn't hard compared to others in fact I'm quite well off. My parents however are so off and on with me I don't know how I feel about them anymore. they treat me like I'm a failure when I have bad grades and instead of offering help they threaten to take away everything I have to communicate with my friends. I've been playing lacrosse for about my whole life and I have to admit I'm quite burnt out. They make me try out for a bunch of teams and don't give me a say in if I want to play. I hardly feel like they care about me and for the first time this summer my dad called me a failure and that my future will be terrible I will never be like him, (good income and nice house/life), and that I'm awful at school. This was after a Lacrosse game and we lost and he made me feel terrible. I cried when I got home and wanted to run away. But I never have. I would never run away or commit suicide as I feel like it doesn't make the pain go away but gives it to others. They made me play football this year which I don't really like. The only thing I enjoy about it is seeing my friends. I hate it, I don't get home till around 6:30 pm every night from school. I've been on and off with my girlfriend for a while but we finally stopped around august this year. I've missed her but I try to move on and not be a pussy because if I do, I'm scared my dad will think I'm a failure and won't love me. I've felt like ever since I and my family moved my life has just gone downhill from there. I've felt hollow as a person and I don't feel like I've felt love other than when I'm away or with my girlfriend. Sorry for all this rant, I haven't been able to talk to someone ever about my problems and I feel like if I do to anyone I know I'll be a loser and that I'm weak and a pussy. I'll go back to my main point. I feel as if my parents just are nice to me because they have to see me. they are nice to me when nothing bad is happening but when I have bad grades they see me as a failure and a nobody. I just want to feel like I belong. I just want to turn 16, drive away and live in the woods. I just want to talk to someone. I miss being wanted, As much as I hate her for what she did, The only person who made me feel like I belonged was my girlfriend. now I cry every now and then about how I'm a loser and a failure. (I'm sorry for this I just want to talk to someone. the other posts I've read have had it much worse than me and I just need to toughen up. Thank you for taking the time to read this.)

[ccsmod3]

Thank you for reaching out to NRS, we know it’s not an easy thing to do. Everyone deserves a space where they can vent and talk about what’s going on in their life. No matter how “good” you have it, your feelings and the problems you’re dealing with are just as valid as anyone else’s and deserve to be heard. I’m sorry you haven’t had the support your’ve been looking for from your parents, thats not easy for anyone to handle especially while going through other things. None of the emotions you are experiencing make you weak or less then. You mentioned just wanting to talk/or vent and we can offer that space to you further if you’d like. You can contact our our 24/7 crisis support line either by phone or chat and speak to someone more about what's going on.

Our contact information is 1-800-RUNAWAY (786-2929); www.1800runaway.org (click on the chat button).

If you are at risk of any danger or feeling unsafe, we encourage you to reach out to 911 or seek emergency assistance immediately.

We hope to hear from you soon.

[Guest]

hi im 11 and i really want to run away but i never get the guts to do it. My parents are so mean to me my mom will scream at me for no reason and she is emotionally and mentally abusive. My dad is basically the same but he is like a little nicer than her he will curse me out and he and my mom will lock me in my room and starve me but i also have a dog that a really love and want to take care of and i dont want to leave behind. I also have a older sister that already moved out but i dont know where to go if and when i run away.

[ccsmod3]

Hi, thank you for reaching out. It sounds like you are experiencing mental and emotional abuse from your parents which you never deserve to be treated this way. It’s understandable to want to get away from it. With running away, it is always important to consider your safety and making sure that you would have a safe place to go. It sounds like you have an older sister who has already moved out. It can be an option to try and talk to her about how you are feeling and see if she can help in any way. It can also be helpful to try and talk to any trusted adults in your life so they can help as well and it can also be helpful to talk about what you are experiencing. We are here to support you in any way possible. If you would like to talk more about what you are going through, please call our hotline 1-800-RUNAWAY (786-2929) or chat us online at 1800runaway.org. We hope to hear from you soon.
Be safe,
NRS