my whole life has been terrible and im so angry about it

I'm 18 years old. When I was eleven, my parents moved onto the property where my dad grew up. We spent some time living in a tiny house without running water, sewer, or electricity. Then they bought a double-wide for 10000 dollars. They started fixing it up, and it took about two years to get electricity, probably four years to get running water, and an additional year to get hot water. They still don't have a sewer system. For the past four years, our grey water (water from the bathroom sink and shower) has been discharged through a pipe that runs away from the house. Dishes are done in a bin in the kitchen sink and dumped out the back door. Our toilet is the "humanure composting system," where you use a five-gallon bucket in a wooden box with a toilet seat on it, cover it with sawdust to keep the smell down, and dump the bucket in a compost pile when it's full. Nobody showers nearly enough, nobody ever washes their hands, it's atrocious. The whole house is chock-full of dirt and germs. They did all this because they feel god called them to. They think it's acceptable, and if anybody told them it's not, they would probably say that person is crazy and unreasonable, and what they're doing is fine and acceptable. Now for my education. I've been homeschooled all my life, which is fine if it's done well, but my parents didn't do it well. Once a week for the entirety of my childhood, I would go to a Christian homeschool co-op. I wouldn't talk to anybody ever; I had no friends, and I hated it. Once before COVID hit, I did a theatre production. It was a little community-theatre thing my sister did. I was thirteen. That is the only extracurricular I've ever done, and I didn't even do the show because COVID hit that day. For the whole two and a half months of rehearsals, I sat in the back by myself because I had no social skills, and I probably stank. A few weeks ago, the topic of summer camp came up. I said I wouldn't know anything about that because I've never been to summer camp. My dad said, "You missed out on a lot." I looked at him crazily, like, "whose fault is that?" and then left. As I was walking into my room, I heard my dad say, "Some people would say this wasn't a normal upbringing." My dad is the sole provider for this family. He probably makes 35,000 dollars a year if he's lucky. He's a self-employed handyman, which is why he makes so little. he doesn't work a regular, better-paying job because he doesn't want to work for other people. My mom has been a stay-at-home mom since my 21-year-old sister was born. My sister and I are both out of high school and have driver's licenses, but she still hasn't found a job. This is particularly asinine because my parents have ZERO retirement savings. The whole thing is just absolutely atrocious, infuriating, and insane. I leave for college tomorrow to study computer science, and I'm not ever coming back. I'm so angry at it all because it could have been different, but it's not, and now I'm an overspender, a control freak, resentful and angry, and I wish I could have had a good childhood to look back on. There's so much more, but this is long as it is.

Posted Dec 29, 2025, 8:00 PM UTC

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