Venting I hate my mom for traumatizing me over my grades

[mob]

This is going to be pretty long, and I'm sorry.

Grades have pretty much always controlled my life. I always tried to force myself to be academically smart, get good grades - but it just never worked. I'm bad at math, I'm good at languages, my German is perfect, and I speak English pretty well. But I struggle with everything that has anything to do with calculating and logical thinking when it comes to numbers. And my struggles were all that mattered to my mom.

It started when I entered elementary school, when my mother would hit me whenever I had anything worse than a B (a 2 here), and it's caused me panic attacks when I was just as young as ten. At some point, I remember thinking, as an elementary schooler, that I'd rather stay at school than go home. I've thought that mamy times since then. Home was a warzone, I always felt like I was walking on eggshells. My sister was always smarter than me, writing straight A's, being praised - something I never had, or experienced.

One thing I remember very clearly was when my mother came into my sister's and I's shared bedroom, she sat down and calmly asked me why I'd failed my test. I remember the look in her eyes. I couldn't find an answer, and just like that it felt like suddenly a switch flipped inside of her, and she hit me over and over again. I was fucking terrified - and I was twelve.

I got depressed and tried to ctb when I was fourteen because I was so scared of showing my grades to my mother. But my mother never saw, she never realized. She thought that fourteen year old me was a whore, and I was throwing up uncontrollably not from the ibuprofen overdose in my system (I was young and stupid, yes), but because she thought I was pregnant. That's how low she thought of me because of my bad grades - because if I have bad grades, it must mean I'm whoring around, no?

I got severely depressed and suicidal, and almost every time I'd go to school I'd get an anxiety attack, so I did the most logical and smartest thing in my eyes at that time - skip school. My grades dropped so bad, and I'd try and try, but I just couldn't fix it anymore.

At some point the abuse stopped, but the trauma stayed with me since then. I moved out from home. I'm 19 now and doing an apprenticeship which requires 2-3 months of school once a year. I'm in my second year and close to failing a class, and I'm so terrified of it. I missed school a lot due to mental health reasons, and I'm behind in a lot of classes. I'm scared. Somehow my brain still fully expects me to get beaten and ridiculed, although I know it won't happen. At some point my mom said that as long as I pass, it's fine - and I wonder, how can you say that now after traumatizing me so bad I tried to kill myself? How does that fix my trauma, my countless panic attacks, my self harm and pill abuse caused from all this? HOW do you expect me to be like "oh, okay" NOW? I feel so pressured, I feel like I have to prove myself, but it's all in vain. Nothing stays in my brain, I can't remember anything and will most probably fail my important exam tomorrow. I literally want to kill myself right now, more than ever.

So yeah, I'm back to square one. This mindset I tried to get out of so badly, this hole I spent years trying to crawl out of - just to slip and fall back in again.

 

[Kit1]

I am so sorry - your experience at the hands of a very abusive mum sounds very painful and hurtful. Child abuse is never okay. Your continued reaction and cycle of self expectation and disappointment is understandable - that level of abuse that you had undergone will leave its mark on life.

Not everyone is going to be a A grade student - we all have different skill sets and honestly an exam result does not have to determine your life. You can actually do lots of things without the necessary grades - though I admit that this could be harder. But please do not let this define you.

Have you ever tried to work through the trauma that had been inflicted upon you?

 

[mob]

I am so sorry - your experience at the hands of a very abusive mum sounds very painful and hurtful. Child abuse is never okay. Your continued reaction and cycle of self expectation and disappointment is understandable - that level of abuse that you had undergone will leave its mark on life.

Not everyone is going to be a A grade student - we all have different skill sets and honestly an exam result does not have to determine your life. You can actually do lots of things without the necessary grades - though I admit that this could be harder. But please do not let this define you.

Have you ever tried to work through the trauma that had been inflicted upon you?

Thank you. Gotta admit my thoughts were all over the place in my post, I do feel a bit embarrassed haha.

I've been going to therapy for about two years now, trying to work through the trauma, but nothing's gotten better.

 

[sad_rock]

anything grades related also give me intense anxiety that it could trigger a manic episode for me. i used to enjoy academics until my parent became abusive over grades as well. i was "intelligent" but with suspected learning disabilities from autism/add so they didnt know what to do with me but beat me up and berate me. i remembered getting dragged on the floor by my hair and pummeled a lot. a lot of my pride was tied to my intelligence and seeing it go downhill because of abuse and neglect dwindled it away. i got yelled at for being too distracted and unfocused. rather than seeing a child specialist, i got beat up a lot. worst part my dad was a narcissist so the abuse was unbearable and trigger my meltdowns.

I'm bad at math, I'm good at languages, my German is perfect, and I speak English pretty well. But I struggle with everything that has anything to do with calculating and logical thinking when it comes to numbers.

oh my god i have the exact issues with math. i loved math, but when it involved word problems or became multiple steps, i sucked. i remember having all a's except for a c- in math. my brain struggles to look at the bigger picture of problems, because it gets distracted/overwhelmed by the smaller nuances.
im abnormally good at biology/memorization/sciences, but it was not enough for them. worst part, i questioned my parent's unreasonable authority (as expected for gifted people) but that worsen the abuse. my dad's abuse grew more worse and it no longer became about grades but just my abnormalities as a human being.