Hi to all sun
I usually don't post and prefer to read but I'm going through a very hard time now and need some advice.
To sum up the situation, I'm a Muslim, God brought me to discover Islam about 4 years ago, THANKS GOD, and my parents are Christians.
My father sexually abused me when I was young until I left his house when I was 18. I had continued to see him and visit my parents, and act like a "normal family" but at one point I started to get very mentally ill from the side effects of the abuse because until I was about 24 years old, I really didn't fully realise what had happend to me. I had blocked out a lot of the abuse from my childhood and had not dealed with it or gotten any kind of help but at one point, you cannot block it out anymore and when the gates open, everything comes flooding out! Flashbacks, nightmares, abnormal behavior, anxiety attacks. I will not go into details or explain how abuse manifests itself but just to say that when you are abused, you feel guilty, ashamed and you can still love the abuser and seek for their approval and love. It's screwed up and dealing with these emotions almost makes you want to jump off a building instead of feeling them. My father also loves to mentally torture the rest of my family including my poor mother who has suffered this for years and doesn't even realise what she endures every day of her life since it is kind of "normal" for her now to be treated like this. My mother and brother were witnesses to little things like my father's pinching my nipples and butt while passing by me, grabbing my head and stuffing his tongue down my ear, that was the abuse that everyone saw but nobody did nothing to stop or help and that was probably because they were too scared of my father because he was a very aggressive and violent man.
5 years ago, after I consulted a psychologist because I thought that I was slowly going crazy and I had fallen into alcohol, drugs, partying, abusing my own body as a punishment (tattoos, peircings, completely shaving off my hair from my head like Britner Spears,....).
The psychologist advised me that I should cut ties with my father and start to heal myself. My mother was so sad that I suddenly cut ties with my father and refused to go to visit her at her house where they both lived. I would go to meet her at her work, we would go out to do things together but I refused to go to her house. She loves to have me over for dinner and pretend that we are the "perfect family". I love her so much and I always felt so bad that I was making her very sad to not go over to see her on holidays. She loves Christmas, and I could see her suffer when she would ask me every year to go over and I would say no. She would ask me to go over on every Christian holiday and I would refuse. The day I decided to cut ties with my father, I felt an enormous amount of weight released from my chest. Every year, I would feel better. No more anxiety attacks, no more suffering of the side effects. In that time, I was brought by God to discover Islam, which helped me so much.
Early this year, I left my country and went to accept a business proposition to open a new business in another country. Once there, I had a bad experience and one partner of my new business in this new country decided that I was no longer needed and wanted me out of the company. He acused me of stealing, which was not true, and I was jailed for 3 months 10 days in a 3rd world country....it was very bad. In this time, my mother did her best to help me, send me money and just be supportive. I got out, acquited of all charges, THANK GOD, and left the country the moment that I got out of jail. I returned to my country but I didn't have a place of my own to come back to because when I left my country, I gave up my apartment. Obvioulsly, I was not in the best of shape after enduring a trial that the outcome was 15 years of jail but then the decision was reversed at the court of appeal, I was malnourished and mentally not all there. My mother came to the airport to pick me up. I had asked her to contact my ex-husband so that he could take me in for a while until I get back on my feet. He had accepted (we are still on good terms and help each other when needed). But when she was driving back from the airport, she decided that she was bringing me to her house....where my father also lives. When I was in jail, I had 104 days to think about my life, where I was heading, what I was doing. When you are in a situation like this, you realise many things that you should change to become a better person and I thought alot about my mother and my father. I thought that maybe I should just give my father another chance since my mother kept on telling me all the time during the 5 years that since I cut ties with him, that he had changed, that he cried for me, that he missed me. In jail, I had nothing. One pair of pants, one sweater and the only thing I was dying for was a Quran but I had nobody to bring me one. I was dying to read the words of the Quran to help me, guide me. In the country that I was jailed, it is an ultra Christian country and many people, even in this day and age, have no idea what Islam is and nobody had a Quran nor could they get one in because the guards revise everything that is brought into the jail and they would not let it in. I did remeber passages that talked about respecting and obeying your parents and that this was maybe the time to turn to God and accept to forgive and move on, to love and respect my parents and this would be a good chance for me to change. I love my mother so dearly and she suffers because I have split the family in 2. I thought that maybe I had to stop being like this, that I had to be the better person and be a good Muslim and obey God and his teachings. So after all this thinking and nowhere to go, I thought that going to my parents house would be a way to reconsiliate and I know that it would make my mother very happy after everything she endured of having her only daughter almost jailed for 15 year. My mother just wanted to be a "normal family". When I arrived, my father told me that he was the one who sent me money when I was in jail, then he gave me more money right then and there to help me out, he was trying to act like the hero and save the day, like trying to repair what he did or something like that. I spent a few days there, trying to avoid my father. I could see the pain in his eyes, like as if he regretted something. But he never said nothing to me. The few first days, he was as nice as he could be. Then slowly, he came back as he always is, insults and agressivity. I started to have panic attacks, anxiety attacks, crying for no reason. I knew that it was because of the abuse feelings coming back again but I told my mother that it was for what I endured in jail but little did she know that jail was nothing compared to the abuse!!! I would of given anything to get back into the dirty, disgusting jail, starving for days and sleep on the frozen floor instead of experiencing the feelings again and again of the abuse.
Then after a few days, I left, got an apartment, and I was putting my life back together again. But my mother is now happy that I am in contact again with my father and she thinks that things are back like they were before eventhough she saw some of the abuse I endured its like as if she doesn't realise it. I had tried to talk to her about it various times and she tells me that it wasn't that bad and that I should not exagerate, she pushes the subject away and gets into a bad mood.
I went to eat Christmas dinner on the 25th. My father was acting bad again, insults and agressivity, putting down my mother, bad mood,.....I started to feel bad again. I was trying to hold back on my tears and try to eat my dinner, I just wanted to throw my dish on the wall, flip the table over and tell him to shut up and stop....but I didn't. I just eat calmly and left. When I left, my mother had tears in her eyes, happy that I had finally assisted her Christmas dinner after 5 years of absence.
I have spent the past 2 days going crazy. Reliving the abuse again, reliving the pain, the suffering. I feel his hands on me, his eyes on me. Its hard to deal with.
I have decided that I will cut the ties on him again and moreso, I will tell my mother that I will not accept for her to make me feel guilty with her tears because I have decided this. I always felt sorry for her but now I realise that things will never be good, what I endured will never go away and my mother who keps on living with him, protecting him and acting like as if nothing ever happened is really starting to upset me alot. My mental health is at stake here and I don't understand why she is trying to play the guilt game on me in getting me back to where she knows that I don't like to be. Is it selfish of her part or am I bad for not obeying and respecting her wishes?
I have suffered damage that has affected my life, I cannot have a normal sexual life, I was married my poor husband went through some bad times with me when I was having the occasional anxiety attack, I do not want get married again because I have issues with sex, I am a complete mental mess, I cannot have children and it is probably linked to the sexual abuse, I have suffered too much to just love and respect parents that do not take responsibility of their actions and try to drag me back into the abuse!
All I have to say is that I tried, after 5 years, I gave time to my father to fix his problem, he has not admitted of having done anything wrong nor does he take responsibility of any wrong doing and still acts like he always did except he doesn't touch me now. When I was in jail, I spoke to God alot, I told God that I have forgiven and will try to forget, I asked for forgiveness for being so selfish and not giving my father another chance and to make my mother unhappy all these years, that I will try again and give a chance but after this, nothing has changed. I tried to make my mother happy but how can I do so when to make her happy is destructive to me? or can I just void them from my life to try to salvage my own sanity?
I have not encountered any mention on how to deal with abusive parents in the Quran. I'm looking and looking but maybe one of you can help me with this. I need to know what to do. If it was just for my decision, I would block out my family and only allow my mother into my life if she stops trying to make me feel bad for breaking up her "family"....because I am sick of thinking that this is all my fault when I am the victime here. But maybe this is not what I should do, maybe God instructed something else. Please let me know if you have any clues!
And thanks for you all that has taken time to read me.
