I (NB18) can’t trust either of my divorced parents (M and F 55). TL:DR at the bottom

Other than move out, I don’t know what to do. I can’t move out yet (I don’t even have a job yet, aside from self employment stuff).

I’m gonna try to make this short.

I have a great life that I am grateful for. I’m not trying to be complaintitive, I just have no clue what to do, aside from push to get a job, and save as many months of rent as I can. Save for furniture, maybe rent a storage unit if I wanna buy, and then leave when I can stably do so.

My dad sees everything as a business. He earns 6 figures, paid for a stranger to go to Morehouse for all four years, raised all three of his step kids, invests thousands of dollars monthly into multiple stocks. But he paid child support for me for one year according to my mother, and refuses to spend a dime on my tuition. He has money set aside (more than enough) in savings, because he and his mom are thoughtful and money-smart. I didn’t earn many scholarships because I’m not eligible, because one of the parents providing for my tuition earns six figures. But he’s bitter about how I didn’t earn but a few scholarships instead of a full ride, and now he says that the money was supposed to go toward my housing. “But now we have to use it for your tuition because you didn’t earn a full ride when you could have.” I applied to at least four scholarships every two weeks this summer, but I haven’t heard back from any of them. He acts like he has no money, but then turns around and drops tens of thousands of dollars on something that wasn’t planned for. Since I turned 18 he goes silent and has my mother and I pay for everything ourselves. And he lives in a poorer part of the city to save even more money.

Unlike my mother and I. My mom gets paid a good amount of money— she’s been an educator for decades and ranked up and up. We live in an expensive neighborhood (soon to be foreclosed because she can’t actually afford it) so we don’t have much money to go around. She gaslights me and is transphobic. I am transgender so this is a problem. I got kicked out of the house when I was 14 for cutting my hair without permission, and coming out. I get it was a dick move because she provides for me, and hair-cutting was a no-no. But it was super late at night, I sat up, felt extremely dysphoric, took a pair of scissors and literally said, “fuck this shit, man.”

She and my maternal family blamed me when she turned to alcohol and mourned until I apologized and told her I was “willing to change myself.” I looked in the mirror and threw up on two occasions— I had to change so much about how I dressed, and chemically change my hair’s texture so that it looked feminine. I present androgynously and that entire experience has confirmed that what I am uncomfortable with. Silver lining.

She and my family called me ugly everyday until I stopped trying to present the way I prefer, had me pray for change, paid for behavioral therapy just so that I “get fixed,” and wouldn’t let me go to clubs after school until she bought it. The only reason I have as much freedom as I do right now, is because I’m in the closet.

On top of that conflict, I get gaslighted with every argument we have. I feel like I’m crazy the way she puts things, even if she’s in the wrong. I’m stressed to the point that my chest and head hurt and I badly want to leave. But I can’t because I’m a broke college freshman. She’s a helicopter parent, as well, and has Life360 on my phone (I agreed to it when i was 13, I didn’t think I would hate it in the future). I never snuck out in my life. I live in a dangerous city so I understand her concern, but God, I just want actual control of my life for five minutes. But I know how to get around Life360 if I wanna. She freaks out if she doesn’t know or can’t see where I am for thirty seconds. I can’t miss any of her phone calls without calling back within thirty seconds, before she takes it as a personal attack, calls me disappointing, disrespectful, ignorant, all sorts of things that make me feel guilty. It’s never on purpose, and when I explain it’s an accident she calls me a liar and keeps yelling and yelling. She’ll use things that she’s done for me as a dagger over my head. Like. My newest phone. I said that I would buy it, but she told me to save my graduation money (such a sweetheart) and bought it for me. But now it’s used as leverage for whenever she’s upset about something. I’ll call her out but then she’ll bring my phone into it. As if it’s relevant.

She’s been my cheerleader and advocate for all these years (until we reach a disagreement for whatever reason) and bless her heart. I am so grateful for her. And she eats all the food I cook for myself, when she meal preps for her fad diets. And then compares her body to mine when she isn’t losing weight. And talks badly of my LDR boyfriend of 2 years because she can’t read his mind and predict when he would leave, but doesn’t try to ask him anything she wants to know about him. So. He felt the tension and left early to stay with his mom (whose guard dog forgot who he was, which is why he doesn’t feel entirely safe staying with her.) But he says he’s alright. I just hate how that happened. She loved him until she couldn’t forsee what was happening, but then refused to communicate that, and said that “You’re basically taking your problems and putting them onto me.” When he was at her house which she opened up to him, while I was gone for a week, for professional training. I wasn’t even home to know what was going on.

They speak badly of one another and always so I don’t know who to believe anymore. I want nothing to do with it, and don’t want to be in the middle anymore (but I doubt the latter truly ends for most children of divorce, so whatever). My life is ahead of me, I don’t need to be subjected to this bullshit anymore. It’s been going on my whole life. Is there any advice anyone could offer? Other than “save enough emergency funds that you don’t have to move back in.” Lol.

TL:DR: yeah I didn’t make that short at all, sorry. Anyway. My dad is shady so I can’t fully trust him, my mom is a nurturer but borderline pathological and transphobic so I can’t fully trust her, either. They speak against one another so I don’t know who to believe but myself. But I can’t live by myself, yet. I’m just tired of being the bigger person literally every time there is discourse. And the frequency of discourse fluxes. Things have felt shaky for as long as I can remember and I just wanna leave, but am in no place to. Because if I “betray” them and move in with another family member, they very well can cut me off, before I’m ready to be cut off. Keeping my head low and tongue still only lasts for so long. Does anyone have any advice for me?

Submitted August 02, 2019 at 12:12AM

Other than move out, I don’t know what to do. I can’t move out yet (I don’t even have a job yet, aside from self employment stuff).I’m gonna try to make this short.I have a great life that I am grateful for. I’m not trying to be complaintitive, I just have no clue what to do, aside from push to get a job, and save as many months of rent as I can. Save for furniture, maybe rent a storage unit if I wanna buy, and then leave when I can stably do so.My dad sees everything as a business. He earns 6 figures, paid for a stranger to go to Morehouse for all four years, raised all three of his step kids, invests thousands of dollars monthly into multiple stocks. But he paid child support for me for one year according to my mother, and refuses to spend a dime on my tuition. He has money set aside (more than enough) in savings, because he and his mom are thoughtful and money-smart. I didn’t earn many scholarships because I’m not eligible, because one of the parents providing for my tuition earns six figures. But he’s bitter about how I didn’t earn but a few scholarships instead of a full ride, and now he says that the money was supposed to go toward my housing. “But now we have to use it for your tuition because you didn’t earn a full ride when you could have.” I applied to at least four scholarships every two weeks this summer, but I haven’t heard back from any of them. He acts like he has no money, but then turns around and drops tens of thousands of dollars on something that wasn’t planned for. Since I turned 18 he goes silent and has my mother and I pay for everything ourselves. And he lives in a poorer part of the city to save even more money.Unlike my mother and I. My mom gets paid a good amount of money— she’s been an educator for decades and ranked up and up. We live in an expensive neighborhood (soon to be foreclosed because she can’t actually afford it) so we don’t have much money to go around. She gaslights me and is transphobic. I am transgender so this is a problem. I got kicked out of the house when I was 14 for cutting my hair without permission, and coming out. I get it was a dick move because she provides for me, and hair-cutting was a no-no. But it was super late at night, I sat up, felt extremely dysphoric, took a pair of scissors and literally said, “fuck this shit, man.”She and my maternal family blamed me when she turned to alcohol and mourned until I apologized and told her I was “willing to change myself.” I looked in the mirror and threw up on two occasions— I had to change so much about how I dressed, and chemically change my hair’s texture so that it looked feminine. I present androgynously and that entire experience has confirmed that what I am uncomfortable with. Silver lining.She and my family called me ugly everyday until I stopped trying to present the way I prefer, had me pray for change, paid for behavioral therapy just so that I “get fixed,” and wouldn’t let me go to clubs after school until she bought it. The only reason I have as much freedom as I do right now, is because I’m in the closet.On top of that conflict, I get gaslighted with every argument we have. I feel like I’m crazy the way she puts things, even if she’s in the wrong. I’m stressed to the point that my chest and head hurt and I badly want to leave. But I can’t because I’m a broke college freshman. She’s a helicopter parent, as well, and has Life360 on my phone (I agreed to it when i was 13, I didn’t think I would hate it in the future). I never snuck out in my life. I live in a dangerous city so I understand her concern, but God, I just want actual control of my life for five minutes. But I know how to get around Life360 if I wanna. She freaks out if she doesn’t know or can’t see where I am for thirty seconds. I can’t miss any of her phone calls without calling back within thirty seconds, before she takes it as a personal attack, calls me disappointing, disrespectful, ignorant, all sorts of things that make me feel guilty. It’s never on purpose, and when I explain it’s an accident she calls me a liar and keeps yelling and yelling. She’ll use things that she’s done for me as a dagger over my head. Like. My newest phone. I said that I would buy it, but she told me to save my graduation money (such a sweetheart) and bought it for me. But now it’s used as leverage for whenever she’s upset about something. I’ll call her out but then she’ll bring my phone into it. As if it’s relevant.She’s been my cheerleader and advocate for all these years (until we reach a disagreement for whatever reason) and bless her heart. I am so grateful for her. And she eats all the food I cook for myself, when she meal preps for her fad diets. And then compares her body to mine when she isn’t losing weight. And talks badly of my LDR boyfriend of 2 years because she can’t read his mind and predict when he would leave, but doesn’t try to ask him anything she wants to know about him. So. He felt the tension and left early to stay with his mom (whose guard dog forgot who he was, which is why he doesn’t feel entirely safe staying with her.) But he says he’s alright. I just hate how that happened. She loved him until she couldn’t forsee what was happening, but then refused to communicate that, and said that “You’re basically taking your problems and putting them onto me.” When he was at her house which she opened up to him, while I was gone for a week, for professional training. I wasn’t even home to know what was going on.They speak badly of one another and always so I don’t know who to believe anymore. I want nothing to do with it, and don’t want to be in the middle anymore (but I doubt the latter truly ends for most children of divorce, so whatever). My life is ahead of me, I don’t need to be subjected to this bullshit anymore. It’s been going on my whole life. Is there any advice anyone could offer? Other than “save enough emergency funds that you don’t have to move back in.” Lol.TL:DR: yeah I didn’t make that short at all, sorry. Anyway. My dad is shady so I can’t fully trust him, my mom is a nurturer but borderline pathological and transphobic so I can’t fully trust her, either. They speak against one another so I don’t know who to believe but myself. But I can’t live by myself, yet. I’m just tired of being the bigger person literally every time there is discourse. And the frequency of discourse fluxes. Things have felt shaky for as long as I can remember and I just wanna leave, but am in no place to. Because if I “betray” them and move in with another family member, they very well can cut me off, before I’m ready to be cut off. Keeping my head low and tongue still only lasts for so long. Does anyone have any advice for me?