Less of a rant, more of a slow, pathetic, agonizing burn.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

You probably need to read lots of books and practice enforcing your boundaries. A good therapist can help loads, if you can afford one. A support group might help even more, as well as being a place to potentially meet people who will be healthier for you to be around than the people you've likely surrounded yourself with until now.

The thing about being dysfunctional is that we tend to attract and be attracted to dysfunctional people, and when we try to get better they are often totally unsupportive or even angry. So, we have to find new people.

[navkat]

The nice thing about the VA is they'll pay for all the nut-house treatment you need, free of charge no matter what your disability. Broke your spine in a HALO jump? NO PROBLEM. Here's some 800 mg Advil and all the Paxil you can eat!

[BadBeast]

Fucking hell girl, that was such a guts full of hurt I can feel it from here. And even though there isn't one thing in that post that should inspire hope, somehow it does. It's clear no-one ever gave you any chance at all, but rather than buckle under the weight of it all, you've decided to give yourself the chance of a chance, and that's exactly what you need to do. No-one is going to fix your life for you, even if they wanted to. So you are taking steps to fix it yourself.

That is brave, desperate and vital. One day, (and soon I hope) all those things you need are going to come together. I know that it is easy for me to say, and not much help to you in any practical way, but I wouldn't say it if I didn't believe it. I don't really know you from a hole in the ground, and vice versa, but that doesn't mean shit. I know that one day, you're going to click into sync with the rest of the world, and all that shit is just going to fall away. The only other option, is that the rest of the world is going to click into sync with you. Either way, you're going to be so full of win, you'll be farting through your ears. There really is no other way.

I'm constantly aghast at the things parents do to their children, whether by design, or indifference. That's how the world is. Sad, but true. But the really humbling thing, that balances it out into a bearable world for me, is the way those kids who survive bad childhoods, can rise above the whole sorry mess, draw a line under it, and leave it behind them. Not spend their lives trying to pretend it didn't happen, or that it doesn't matter, (it really does) But find a way to just put it down, and stop carrying it around.  It may well shape the way they are, but it doesn't have to be something they need to relive, in order to have an identity.

What I'm trying to say is that while it *is* something that happened, and it will have an effect on how you interact with others, it doesn't have to define you. That's what you have realised, where so many would sooner just let it colour every fucking thing they ever do. You've given yourself the chance to shake it into the past, where it belongs. Not spend all that effort denying it, like your Mother did / does. She found another way to get through what she obviously can't sublimate, it's not for me to judge how anyone staggers through the shit. But you have found the shining path that will take you somewhere else, and you need to trust yourself to stay on it. And you will. I'm sure of it.