#anyways there are really no legal protections for that lol but at least physical disabilities have some pretty good protections

[officialbabayaga]

philip glass should be sending me christmas cards. i'm so attached to the OST for the Illusionist that even though it's less than an hour long i've been listening to it on loop for 4 hours now, with 6 hours to go until this goddamn paper is due 💀

[exrayspex]

oh also lol all legal preparations for my mom to finally divorce my dad have been done for months and months. she just has to tell him. but time kept passing and she kept not doing it. and i was like you've gotta pick a date or you never will, and she "didn't wanna ruin the holidays" (lmao. him being there ruined them.) so she decided to pick i think it was the first weekend after new years.

(damn this got long huh. cw for talking about domestic abuse under the cut)

surprise surprise she doesn't do it then either. she thought about it and started having a panic attack. and so i keep trying to talk to her about it to like, figure out how to work to make it more manageable but she won't talk to me about it. just refuses

every time i try she's just like i think about it every day! every day i try but i get too scared! and then just shuts me down before i can try to work with her to make it more manageable. and with my weird hours and us living with him it's v hard to get those chances to talk, so each shutdown blocks any convo off for a good while

like i want to talk about how she seems to think we'll all just live together while the actual divorce process happens, because i think fear of living with him while he's trying to make life as hellish as possible for her bc of anger about it is uh, probably contributing to her fear a bit. but every time i try to discuss like, planning to separate after the announcement and figuring out the housing situation for that, again she shuts me down.

i keep trying to get her to plan a day and time for us to do it together too, but she just says the thing about trying every day again and won't make concrete plans with me. i think bc she doesn't actually want to do it with me there, bc she knows that if he gets nasty and screams or is violent that i'll do whatever he does right back to him.

and she hates hates hates when i retaliate in any way to him, hates that i'm not a doormat in the face of abuse so much, hates it more than anything else about me. i think she still, in the scared animal part of her brain, considers me retaliating the same as him abusing in the first place.

anyway. so she doesn't wanna do it with me there. but she also knows what he's like, and doesn't wanna do it when it's just her and him either bc she knows he might try to kill her. so she is trying to find a way to do it in a place with other people around, like at a bar or restaurant. but shockingly, that's not the best way to build up her courage for it.

she also doesn't wanna talk about any of it with me at least partly bc like every time i get upset about something she says or does something that sets off my deep, deep anger and resentment about it all. that she never left when i was a kid and he was hurting me, that she never was willing to physically protect me, that she says she defended me with words but also never ever let me hear them, that she's so proud of herself for threatening to call cps on him if he didn't stop that one time and thinks that was her protecting me, even though the very next time he hurt me and she did nothing she was showing him her threats were totally empty, the fact that i am almost fucking 30 and haven't been able to escape him bc i'm too fucking disabled to be on my own, the fact that i am forced to be dependent on her to escape him, the fact that i would be brave and step in and protect her all the fucking time as a kid, that i still do now, and she either doesn't realize it or hates it depending on the day, the way i would deliberately get him pissed off at me when i thought he looked like he might get violent with her so that he'd get violent with me instead, to protect her, and she doesn't think i was capable of that, thinks that oh he was just mad at her, he was just taking it out on me bc i "happened" to be there and it was really only about them, like i was just an object and not a real child choosing to sacrifice my childhood to protect her, like i haven't made a difference, even though he doesn't verbally abuse her in front of me hardly ever anymore bc he knows i'll immediately defend her and return fucking fire.

just. all my life i've been being brave for her, and tried to protect her from him and all my life i've been waiting for her to FINALLY do the same for me. and after years and years she finally gives me hope that she will, and it comes time to do it, and she's too shit fucking scared. like i wasn't? like i'm not? like if he does try to get homicidal (again lol) over the divorce announcement it won't be me who steps up and physically protects her and is the one hurt yet again? like i'm not screaming on the inside all the time bc i know at any moment she could come and say it's time and i'd have to be ready to potentially die or kill him to stop him killing one or both of us? and i would! i would be ready and i would do whatever was needed! i will! but all that. ALL THAT. and she won't even fucking be brave for ten fucking minutes and tell him? ALL THAT and she still won't be brave for me for once?

anyway. yeah i'm angry about it lol. and every time she's poked at *gestures to this entire mess* when i've been upset i've gotten mad and yelled at her. which has of course made her even more reluctant to talk through it with me and plan it and finally fucking DO IT.

so. yeah. 2022, a lovely year so far. oh also i had a horrible dream where she told him without me and he got violent and she came shuffling into my room in the dark all bloody and horribly injured and making those quiet crying hurt sounds like when she broke her leg and when the dog dragged her over and down a hill. (when her leg was broken it was in 3 places from falling and she had insurance and he still didn't wanna call an ambulance. i had to fight him--very nearly physically but not quite--while i was on the phone w 911) i dreamed this more than once but it's finally stopped. can't stop thinking about it though.

i just want it to be over, i just want us to be free, i just want to finally get to live a different life. she's terrified it'll be worse somehow. terrified of poverty mostly. but like, ugh. she's been poor with him, too. and she'd be able to get alimony easily. she has the legal stuff all set up for that too. but she's still worried bc he generally works making quite a bit of money for a few months to a few years, then is unemployed for a few months to a few years making nothing, that's been his pattern for over a decade now. and that would effect alimony. but like. it effects us now too!!! and i might actually be able to get SSI if we were finally free of him and also finally had a household income that maybe didn't fluctuate wildly.

it will only be better without him. but i'm starting to doubt that she will ever leave. starting to think she'd rather live in a familiar hell than face an objectively better life just because there'd be a lot of new, unfamiliar things and it wouldn't be perfect. i've asked and she seems annoyed and shrugs it off like yes of course she's going to, it's just a matter of time, like it's ridiculous i could doubt her, but. well. and then i do feel bad doubting her too, bc that's probably not going to help give her the courage to do it, and also bc i do know her. and i know that it takes her an absolute age to do most things. like, years sometimes. but she does usually do it eventually. so it's not surprising that this is taking years. but augh...i genuinely cannot wait much longer.

and i hate how she'll still criticize the way i react to his abuse, do her old playing the impartial referee bullshit. and like, i cannot help it. i cannot help the way i react to his abuse, the ptsd is driving when that happens, the only solution is for me to not be around him. yet she'll lecture me for it while also forcing me to still be around him bc she won't fucking leave.

god, fuck. i hate that i can't live independently. i hate that i need a caregiver. i hate that i don't and won't ever qualify for SSDI (the better disability, basically. it's still not great, but SSI is the other kind, and that's meant to be temporary, is even less money, and can be and very frequently is stopped for all kinds of ridiculous reasons at any time. it's the only kind i'll ever be able to get). i just wanna be free from him. it's all i've ever really wanted. why can't i have this one thing