I'm done.

[Cooper]

Haha Jester, I got my medicine. My doctor put me on a giant ibuprofen pill. The dose is higher than I['ve tried before (600 mg).

I just tried it. I think it just kicked in. I feel amazing.

[Cooper]

Also Pimento, I will do that. I think I'll either do that, or leave the country as a high skill immigrant once I'm done with my education (something I've considered doing long before the 'get as far away as possible goal' I love the UK), and just put up with the small amount of time they can contact me.

[mathnerd]

I too have bat-shit crazy parents, and I too am in a position where I was forced to move back in with them, dragging two of my three kids with me. To add another layer of misery, I was forced to allow my sister to care for my middle child because, well, I'd rather not get into the details. Refer back to the bat-shit crazy parents. I don't want to hijack your thread by going into my own story, but suffice it to say I have a clue how you might be feeling.

With that in mind I have a couple of thoughts.

First, you cannot control the actions of other people. You can only control your actions, and your reactions to those other people. While I fully understand your need to have your parents understand you, the simple truth is that there is a good chance they never will. It sucks, and it took me a long time to realize that myself, but once I did so, my ability to get along with my parents improved substantially.

Second, I think you need to go back to a therapist. A good therapist doesn't stop because they've given you a few tools to feel better about yourself. As a person with chronic and severe depression and anxiety, I had to come to terms with the fact that there will be times in my life when even the tools I already have are simply not good enough. I will always need that objective third party to help me out when the going gets tough. Having somebody to bounce ideas off of, even when things are going well, helps me deal with my life in a manner which helps prevent me from backsliding, and making my life a lot happier in the process.

Third, I agree with the others. Take a deep breath, smile, do what you have to do to set yourself up for financial freedom, and when you get everything in place, get the hell out of there. The happiest years of my life were when I was away from here. Unfortunately, two of my three kids are disabled. In the last 12 months those two have been in the OR for major skeletal reconstructive surgery 7 times, and the little one is going back in to surgery in two weeks. As a single mother (my husband abandoned us years ago), I simply couldn't hold down a job being absent as much as I was when all hell broke lose. Having had that time away, and having a therapist close at hand, has allowed me to be able to handle the toxicity in this home with a far healthier frame of mind than I was able to all those years ago. You need the same thing for yourself.

This won't be easy, but you can do it.

[Jester]

Haha Jester, I got my medicine. My doctor put me on a giant ibuprofen pill. The dose is higher than I['ve tried before (600 mg).

I just tried it. I think it just kicked in. I feel amazing.

I probably should have mentioned that, while I am not on prescription-strength ibuprofen, I do generally take 4 200mg tablets, for a dose of 800mg. Partly because more than that can be dangerous, partly because I have a very high tolerance to drugs, and partly because that dosage WORKS for me.

[Cooper]

Well, the ibuprofen has good and bad news. The good news is it does work. The bad news is I suspect I'm taking a dose of about 2,400mm a day, so I am definitely going to have to go back to the doctor. I'm going to give it another week, though. At least now she can probably get my insurance to cover it, since they needed proof ibuprofen wasn't going to work.

I am the exact opposite, Jester. I have a very low tolerance for drugs. I was on vicodin for a year (jaw surgery) and half a pill would get me higher than a kite. I think the doctor was expecting someone with a lower pain tolerance, who was more of a heavy-weight, because I don't think the drugs were supposed to last as long as they did. XD