I feel like a shell of myself

I am 30 years old now. I feel nothing like my old ambitious self now. Just live life day by day. Don’t enjoy much while it may seem I am enjoying life when I’m mainly with friends deep down I’m always dreading life. I don’t know if others feel this way. The past 10+ years of my life have been full of nothing. On the outside I’m semi successful. I have a wife that loves me, two kids and a business owner. But every day I wake up and despise the person I am now. I look in the mirror and don’t see me anymore. It feels like I’m looking at a pathetic excuse of a man.

My life story is different than many others because my family has culture from where they’re from and I am born in America so I grew up in a different culture. My parents split at a young age my mom was very irresponsible and dumped me and my siblings on my dad’s porch one day and ran away to another country before coming back after a year or so. I didn’t know where she went at the time and was very confused until my cousins told me she went to Australia. She came back eventually and I used to see her every weekend until I turned about 14. I started working at a very young age (8 or 9 yo) delivering newspaper any day I had no school. Weekends, summer break, winter break. That interfered with time with my mom since I used to see her weekends only. When I was 14 my older sister ran away from home to get away from my father. And I cut all connection with my mom at that time because I was so done with the constant stress and anxiety from my parents arguing and putting me in the middle. There was also lots of pressure from my dad to stop talking to her and I lived with my dad so I made the horrible decision to stop communicating with my mother.

Now my father is the epitome of a strict over controlling dad. Still to this day I don’t make my own decisions. My dad has made every big life decision for me. I wanted to move out and go to college and get away from my family’s bullshit. I was a really good student got accepted to many colleges even some giving me full ride or partial scholarships. When I told my dad the school I wanted to go to he said if you leave my house you can never come back. This was the biggest regret in my life when I let him guilt trip me. He is a heart patient with diabetes and his reasoning was he wants me to be there for my family (including him) if something happens to him. Not that I’m older I don’t see how that is not possible if I’m going to college. This was a huge turning point in my life. I started working at the family business and going to community college taking classes I was way over qualified for so my motivation left me. I had already given up on my dreams the minute I decided to stay home. Since that day I have been just trying to get through life day by day and just do everything my father says. Eventually I quit school because my dad was hospitalized for over a month and I just full timed the family shop. I worked 6 days a week 12 hours a day minimum since then. On my off day I get inventory or run errands for the shop. I am the sole source of income for a big family. Almost 10 people. And I never made a single dollar because every penny goes to my dad. I have to ask him to this day for money and have to answer questions like why do you need this.

My dad is the source of the man I am today. He taught me everything I know but also never let me grow as a person. Like I said before he has made every major life decision not only for me but also my wife now. He chose my wife for me, when I should have kids, what I need to be doing, what I can eat and even when to shit or if I should wipe my ass it feels like. I do love my wife but being this way she has wants and needs and I can never fulfill them as long as I don’t stand up for myself. But I can’t find the gall in me to do so. So it’s constant nagging and it’s got so bad that she even shit talks me like you’re not a man which I feel like I deserve. I do not do right by her, I should be giving her the world but in reality I don’t give her anything besides my love. And when you don’t feel like yourself I can understand why she doesn’t feel loved because when I come home I’m exhausted from being overworked and stressed and I can’t find the power in me to do anything besides play with the kids (which is very hard some days) or lay down in bed. I even eat my dinner in bed most days now.

I’m all over the place but essentially you can see I am getting shit on from every direction. There is no happiness in my life besides my kids. My first born has autism but a very mild case which I think is lowkey bullshit cuz she is just like every other kid she just likes things a certain way, but I do see repetitive behaviors from her which is a trait in autism. I’ve gotten her all the help that’s available regardless of my dad’s thoughts and she recently “graduated” from behavioral and speech therapy. My son had skull surgery at 6 months old he is now 10 months and healing good but has to wear a helmet 23 hours of the day.

I can’t keep living like this. I want to be the superhero dad that my kids look up to. Working so much I already missed out on their lives, every day I come home to my kids crying because they miss me. I just don’t know what to do I’ve been depressed for so long. I know I need therapy but I can’t find the time to go and honestly I am skeptical although I wholeheartedly believe it will help. I also already know what they are going to tell me. I need to be open and honest with my dad. And I have tried at times but somehow I’m always the bad guy. I wish I could just up and leave with my family but I am all my dad has although he treats me like this I still love him same as my mother who I recently started to talk to again. I can’t be that superhero to my kids when I just feel like an empty shell myself. The only reason I haven’t killed myself is because of my kids. I’m their only support financially so I’m not suicidal like I once was. I just need help of any kind. Has anyone else gone through this and I know I’m all over the place but it’s hard to explain everything that has happened to me in the last 30 years in a Reddit post.

If you read all of this, thank you.