18 and confused

[Guest]

I turned 18 five months ago. I've been suffering from this kind of thing way before my 18th birthday, but I never really said anything about it. Today was the last straw. I live with my mom and sister. My dad is abusive and we left him when I was 5. My sister is 14 years older than I am. We're below the poverty line, and kind of dysfunctional. My mom takes frequent naps and sleeps until 5 PM sometimes. Most of the time she wakes up in a bad mood and starts yelling about the first thing that upsets her. My sister and I are kind of lazy, I'll admit. Today my mom blew up over our broken kitchen sink. She threw something in it and screamed at me. Then my sister and I got into an argument and my mom came out of her room to say she'd beat us if we didn't stop arguing. Is this verbal abuse?

[ccsmod0]

You mentioned experiencing emotional abuse which may be reportable against your mom.  Please keep in mind you by no means deserve any type of abuse, emotional or otherwise.  Unfortunately, emotional abuse is often harder to provide evidence for compared to physical abuse which is often what CPS relies on when conducting an abuse investigation.  That said, we can’t be 100% sure what the outcome will be if your local CPS decides to open a case based on what you share.  Sometimes CPS decides to remove minors from the home and other times they offer services such as family counseling or mediation instead.  The only way to know the outcome might be to reach out to them directly and if you’re ready to do that we are here to help you through that process. Reaching out to Child Help USA at 1-800-422-4453 or www.childhelp.org may help to get a better understanding of what may happen before and after a report is made. Because you are 18, this would no longer apply to you as an adult, but it would still apply to your younger sister.

We hope this helps. Please reach out if we can offer any further support.

Be safe,

NRS