Advice on moving out of my homophobic religious Asian father’s home.

I’m a 20 year old guy in Australia and I’m gay. My parents split when I was a kid and I’ve lived with my dad since I was about 8. He’s been married three times, and both of his previous wives (my mum and my little sister’s mum) had the same problems with him being abusive and manipulative. He plays the victim constantly and twists everything so everyone else looks like the problem.

Growing up with him has honestly been hell.

When I was younger he would get extremely angry over small things like homework. One time he threw a book straight at my face because I couldn’t solve a maths problem and my nose bled. I remember being dragged through the house and beaten when I was a kid after I got upset. He would punish me by making me sleep on the floor or locking me in the dark garage at night to scare me.

I’ve also been told by family members that when I was around 4 or 5 he threatened to cut my fingers off with a meat cleaver.

As I got older the abuse didn’t stop, it just changed.

When I was 15 and they found out I was gay, my stepmum told me not to come home. My dad ignored me for days and then tried to basically “exorcise” me to get rid of “gay demons” and pushed conversion type stuff on me.

When I was 18 he went through my phone, saw messages between me and another guy and threw my phone into a wall. In high school when I was working on a costume project with my little sister, my stepmum got angry over something small and my dad escalated it by punching a door and saying “that will be your head.” I told him I’d call the police if he touched me. Later, I went to my mum’s place and she called the police even though I told her not to. He now blames me for that and believes I was the one who called them.

I’ve also seen him be physically abusive towards my stepmum. One time he pulled her down the stairs and I had to step in and tell him to stop.

Now I’m seeing the same patterns happening with my little sister and her mum. He argues with her mum, blocks her, sends religious messages instead of communicating, and then acts like he doesn’t care if he doesn’t see his own child. He manipulates the situation and makes himself out to be the victim, just like he did with my mum when I was younger. I’m really worried about how this is going to affect my little sister growing up.

Right now I still live here and it’s a really toxic environment. He constantly threatens to kick me out, uses religion against me because I’m gay, and controls things like food, transport and housing. I’ve been paying rent since I started uni, even when I was only working one day a week. Now I’m working two jobs and my stepmum is trying to make me pay even more, even though their combined income is well over 200k a year. It makes me feel trapped and taken advantage of.

I can’t live with my mum either because she’s mentally unstable, so I feel stuck between two bad options.

I’m constantly stressed and on edge in this house and I don’t feel safe or supported here at all. I don’t see him as a father anymore. I just want to leave and have a stable, safe place to live.

Has anyone been in a situation like this and managed to get out?

Any advice would really mean a lot. I’m exhausted and I just want out.