CW: terminally ill family member, child abuse, CSA, suicide

Hey friends,

I’ve really found myself between a rock and a hard place this time, and would definitely appreciate hearing your perspectives and advice on what I should do!

Long story short, my grandfather is terminally ill. His doctors estimate he has a few months left to live. He and my grandmother have significant mobility issues and cannot leave my home state.

My home state is the place where I lived and was abused my entire life (including a CSA incident). My incredibly abusive older brother is still living there, in my parents’ house (my parents continue to enable him to this day and have basically left me to suffer alone, despite the fact that he abused me for years and sexually assaulted me).

So basically, my family is incredibly fucked up and abusive. They are also super transphobic, homophobic, etc.

My grandparents and cousins and aunt and uncle (who all live together in the same house) never abused me. But they also are pretty conservative, transphobic, homophobic, etc. I am trans and queer, so going back means I’d have to get misgendered and shove myself back in the closet for the duration of the visit.

The best thing I ever did for myself was escape that fucking hellhole I lived in. I did all sorts of things to avoid going home for the past few years of college. I promised myself I would never, ever go back there. I moved to another state for college and everything. Last time I was stuck in my home state (covid pandemic quarantine for 7 months) I nearly killed my self. The only reason I didn’t kill myself is because I swore I would leave that place and never go back.

If I even interact with my parents briefly (i.e. for a day), my dissociation level reaches 100. My dad had to come over to help me move things to my new apartment today and by the end I was staring blankly at nothing and became entirely unresponsive.

For the next month, my mom and (extremely abusive brother) will be out of the country. This is the only chance I’ll have to go to my home state (I can’t risk seeing my older brother after everything he did to me. If he was there my answer would be 100% be a “no”, but now that he’s not here, this is my one opportunity to go. But I’m not sure I feel ready to go back there right now. It might be incredibly damaging for me to go back to the place where I was abused and forced to stay closeted for 18 years. But if my grandpa dies and I never got to see him again, would I regret it more? Maybe the guilt of not going would eat me alive. My parents are trying to force me to return, but I know this is a decision I have to be very careful about given my cptsd. I haven’t been there in years and even the thought of it has been giving me nightmares.

A friend from high school has offered to make the trip with me. We used to be really close, but honestly nowadays she’s a trigger, too. She’s made a lot of mistakes in our relationship. I’m not sure if it would help to have her there just so I wouldn’t be alone in that hellhole, or if it wouldn’t make a difference.

My parents refused therapy for years, have antagonized, gaslit and blamed me, etc. I feel like they should have done more to try and make things right if they expect me to return home.