She did try to contact me through a couple of text messages and voice messages during the first two months I cut her off. She sounded sober on the last message she left for me, but it also seemed like she was just trying to blame her behavior on her illness. I don’t have a problem with the fact that only she only goes crazy when under the influence, but it felt like another manipulative attempt to bring me back into her life. I need her to understand that despite her illness and situation she needs to start taking responsibility for her own life. It’s not her fault that she grew up neglected and abused, but at our age she can’t keep going with that narrative. It may not feel fair or just, but picking ourselves up is often the only way to move forward as we get older. I can’t see any other way. She’s also friends with my past employers too. I introduced them to each other a while ago. I dunno if they’re still close friends after I ran from them. She did tell me she follows them on social media or something. I didn’t ask her any questions since it’s none of my business. But it still makes me feel weird.

I can’t really share in detail the reasons for my anger without outing myself. This is why I chose to post here rather than reddit. One thing I can share is the constant isolation when I was growing up. Outside of school I had to stay home. Rarely had friends over or went over to their house. Parents told me everything is dangerous and that I’m too naive or incapable of handling real life like they could at the same age. When I got older I would talk about this to friends. I guess I was treating them like a free therapist cos they would find way to shut the subject down. They’ll tell me that they had struggles too because they were raised this way or that. That I’m not the only one who struggled. But they didn’t have the kind of lockdown restrictions I had growing up. They even said that my parents were extremely controlling.

Then covid happened and many struggled with being isolated and quarantined. Especially children. Everyone can acknowledge this had a very negative impact of kids and it will affect their development for years to come. Maybe everyone that dismissed me can see it now? I’m not gloating. I don’t want kids to grow up like I did. It hurts a lot. I’m terrified on what kind of effect this will have on them. It really messed me up.

I’m hoping people will understand better on how bad it was to grow up like this. But things have changed. I don’t really want to talk about this to anyone in real life anymore. Just on the internet when I need to vent. I’m older now so I have start picking myself up instead of whining about the past. It’s the only way to move forward. It’s just really hard doing that alone at an older age.