Sorry for the late reply but here it goes.
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Try to remember that people are rarely upset about what they think/claim they're upset about. Your dad gives you this line about being entitled to take things from you, about how they take care of you, etc., because it is literally INTOLERABLE to him to admit even to himself, consciously, how low he has sunk and how dependent he is on you, when he KNOWS that he should be taking care of you and not the other way around.
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That really hit me because I DON'T think he stole the money from me but according to him he was just kidding. To be honest it was and still is very hard for me to believe he would steal from me. I don't know to be honest and I just can't get myself to believe that he would do that because that would defy logic. He doesn't need money according to what I know but the reality of it is that he DOES expect for me to provide for them when they get at a certain age BUT at the same time I have nothing to offer them but to help them around the house and not depending on them so much or asking them for anything. The last part is soo true about him depending on me, because growing up I always looked up and depended on him but for a big portion of my life he was never their. Even after he never gave me advice on anything when I needed it but, eventually I just took care of myself and learned from my many mistakes that I have made and I have made alot of mistakes.
So when he said that how all he is trying to do is help me and give me advice I snapped and told him that I don't even need advice from him anymore because he wasn't their when I needed it the most. I think that really hurt him because he realized how selfish he has been his life.
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I'm SO not defending his actions, and I know from experience the kind of weight that descends on you when your parents are acting like children and you just want to curl up in a ball and roll away somewhere they can't find you rather than have to suck it up and be the adult. It's not okay for him to steal from you - and that's what it is - and it's not okay for him to coerce you into ruining your financial situation. But unless you want to just cut ties and leave them to their own devices, you're going to have to take control of the situation and set it up so you can help them ON YOUR OWN TERMS.
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Honest to god, I didn't think anybody would know how I felt because that is how I felt, I just wanted to get away and go some place faar faar away from them. BUT I can't cut ties they are the only people I have, my other family back home I don't talk to because they are all greedy, lying and manipulative bastards. I think the situation is kinda good right now, my parents don't bug me as much and my dad has realized how I feel and is careful as to what he says and does around me.
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Your family doesn't happen to be Asian, do they? I ask because my mother is Thai and she (and many other Asian friends' parents of mine) has acted in similar ways at times. That is, the total denigration of the child to the point where the child is expected to kiss the parents' ass and wait on them hand-and-foot until the parent dies. Yeah, I've had my fill.
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I am not Thai but I am Asian and yes that is how they have acted pretty much my whole life until now.
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But even if they're not (or are!) Asian or "traditional" by any means, it's still WRONG. I firmly believe in equality of treatment between parents and children; I've never believed that my mother had any more right to tell me what to do than anyone else did, and have enforced that belief in our relationship since I was about 5 years old. It has strained our relationship, but the only alternative would have been to surrender and lose myself entirely and become completely incompetent, co-dependent, and lacking all self-esteem. That's actually what she wanted me to be like... never moving from home, never questioning her, never becoming my own person. Due to her own insecurity, she had hoped to use me as an emotional feed lot for her entire life. I've consistently rejected her attempts to do so. I don't know if it's the same for your family, but it does sound like both financial and emotional manipulation... and that's enough to fuck up any family.
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I understand you completly but my relationship with my mom never even took off. I found out that the only reason she married my dad was if I wasn't included in the family. My grandmother and grandfather pretty much raised me so obviously I couldn't be thrown away like yesterdays trash. Eventually she started accepting me. Keep in mind that we live in the same house with my grandmother as well. So afcourse I loved her from the start since I was about 8 years old. I would save up money to buy her candy, chocolates things like that. One day she was teaching me math and I couldn't grasp the concept of rounding numbers and I still remember it to this day and she slapped me across the face very hard, afcourse that made me mess up even more and eventually she just continued to slap me harder and harder each time. I started crying and asked her to stop and I guess my grandmother heard me crying and she came in told my mom to stop and took me away.
I asked my grandmother why she hit me and she told me because that is your mom. As time progressed the physical abuse got more and more severe to the point where I had gotten bruises. I would always ended up going back to my grandmother and she always had this ability to put me to sleep. My grandmother would tell my dad who was in the states as to what my mother was doing but apparently it was falling on deaf ears. Eventually my grandmother stopped caring for me as well because it was too much for her to bear because she would end up crying as well whenever I showed her my bruises.
My aunts would come over during summer and stay in the house BUT they would talk crap about my mom IN FRONT OF ME, which was true to what they had seen but instead it had a negative reaction on me and I started hating her aswell because I started believing what they were saying hence my atitude started changing for the worse as well where it would lead me to back-talking and acting out. Keep in mind that I am about 9 or 10 years old and had not even fully "awakened" or realized to the extent what my aunts had actually done or were doing because they are very manipulative women.
Eventually this continued for another 2 - 3 years and we moved to the states with my uncle and aunt, our only REAL family in the states. My aunt hated me also for some apparent reason also and my mom and her would sometimes gang up on me and verbally attack me while my mom would do it physically. Eventually they kicked us out of the their house we were staying in because my aunt was getting jealous of my mom. The irony LOL .
Nevertheless, time continued and things are pretty smooth now but still I guess their is a lingering feeling and I ask myself sometimes why me...?
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Have you considered counseling, by the way? The way you are writing about what's going on inside... it's obvious (to me) that there is a LOT of pain and anger down there, and you're only beginning to touch it. Seriously, give it a try if you haven't already. The fact that you "swore that you would not cry" is a huge signal in itself... why did you do that?
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I thought about it but I don't think I do anymore because I've gotten past alot of my problems or I think I have. Maybe one day I might. As for the crying because it would just make me feel weak, I hate to feel weak and know that I have become to vunerable. I guess it happens eventually.
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Everyone here is giving you great advice, and I am glad that you are taking it, and being the bigger man in this situation. That being said, I have one concern, that you have only tipped at, but should be also considered in this situation: You say that you and your parents are having a difficult time, and are arguing, how is this affecting your little sister? I have a 14 year old daughter, and I KNOW that she takes in everything that is going on in the house. You are an adult(you said you were 21) so now you have a younger sister to worry about as well. I remember you said that she gets the brunt of things sometimes. You definately need to make sure she is safe. In my opinion SHE should be number one priority. but thats just my opinion, probably because I have kids!...lol.
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I've been explaining her things more from a positive aspect instead of telling her the reality of it. I just calmly told her that our parents are a little frustrated and stressed out and that is their way of taking it out because its normal. (Yeaa I know not the best idea) but I told her that they are our parents and they do love us and things will get better. She actually wants to be a doctor and Im always saying positive things to her because she is ridiculously smart and has a good work ethic. My parents don't seem to encourage her too much so I took the task to tell her what to do academic wise and people wise. She does take alot of the sh*t from my parents too sometimes but eventually it blows over and I tell her its going to be ok. My real goal is to get her to be smarter then me when I was her age so eventually she can figure things out on her own and doesn't have to depend on anyone.
