Hi, I'm new here. I was and maybe still am, emotionally abused. This is all fairly new to me. I was at a church retreat at the end of December and one of the speakers was discussing abuse and how many victims of it live in denial for a long time and that's when it hit me that he was describing me.

Growing up, my sister and I used to fight- a lot. I actually have a few scars on my arms from her nails. She typically started the fights because she just wanted my attention and I wouldn't give it to her unless she was bothering me. I really tried not to hurt her physically except out of self-defense. My parents would always get mad but ultimately tell me to just ignore her and she'll stop. Now that we're older (I'm 19 and away at college and she's 17) we're ok and have made amends but things with my parents are a bit more complicated though they don't know it.

My Mom has always been tough on me. She's a perfectionist who expects the very best from me always from school to sports to appearance to attitude. She is constantly comparing me to my sister or to her friends daughters and sometimes to other family members. This happened especially back in high school. If I gave her the typical teenage attitude she'd say stuff about how she doesn't wasn't me to turn out like her uncle who is a very terrible person. For over two years in high school she tried to force me to lose weight even though I was perfectly healthy while also trying to lose weight herself even though she's quite thin. She alluded to my size being the reason I was single although occasionally it was also due to my mean and judgement all personality too. She threatened to not let me go on a youth group trip if I didn't lose 2 pounds by the end of the week. She made me weigh myself in front of her. She would sometimes punch my stomach. She would cry and say she doesn't want me to become a fat slob with type 2 diabetes like my aunt (who inconveniently shares my name). I once came back from cheer camp to find a scale in my bathroom. Sometimes she'd force me to go on walks with her and make me run. If I refused or wasn't going fast enough she'd swat the back of my head. It didn't hurt but it made me feel like I was a horse. She even bribed me with a thousand dollars in new clothing if I would just drop the weight.  My Dad does the grocery shopping and my Mom had him stop buying certain foods so I began secretly buying and hoarding junk food. I don't know if my Dad knew what was really happening. He's really busy with work and not confrontational so he either was too absent to notice or just wanted to ignore what was happening.Finally she told her friends she thought I needed to lose weight and they said I was fine so she apologized and stopped. But even so whenever I come home from college she asks about if I work out and if I've lost any weight. The weight was obviously the main thing but I've always been put under so much pressure to be a success. In a few weeks I'm going back home for the summer and I'm dreading it. It's much harder now to be there now that I think it's abuse. But sometimes I still think I'm overreacting. I know you're not supposed to compare but I can't help but feel like I didn't have it that bad. Others are raped or beaten or living with addicts or straight up told their worthless and don't deserve to live. So I don't know. So yeah, if anyone's still reading and can tell me whether or not I'm overreacting or have any tips for how to survive the summer I'd appreciate it. If not, just writing it all out made me feel a bit better anyway. Also if you're a survivor of abuse or currently undergoing it, I hope you know you're amazing and I believe in you and one day you're going to do some incredible things! God Bless!