I can say my path to my breaking point was a little bit more different, similar in some sense but different in another.
As BOTH my parents worked when I was a child, I was left to be raised by my grandmother and the media. Of course, I brought the whole ' find your soulmate ' idea and ended up becoming an AFC, this is where the similarity to many here stops.
When I was 10, was my sister was born into the household and at this point, the family thought they'd ' help ' by taking away my two sources of escape at the time; Video Games and me drawing comics based around them. Now, taking away the video game was the easy bit but what happened next is something I still find hard to justify.
I was literally told by EVERYONE in the house ' Stop drawing childish crap, you must grow up, be a man, repress everything! ' Naive me, thinking I was doing the ' right ' thing for myself brought into the idea and that summer, of 97, when I was 11, I saw the Matrix of my family.... painfully, very painfully.
What I saw was my parents developing a full blown alcohol problem and i got caught in the middle of it, with no way to escape it, I was forced to face it full on, to listen to all the arguments, the macho BS that my father spat at my face and being blamed for letting him go out, when trying to stop resulting in him pulling my hair.... HARD and I mean HARD.
What it ment was I develop this idea that somehow, it was MY fault and that my ideals don't matter ' Do as you say or ELSE ' ' IT IS YOUR FAULT WE DRINK! ' and other dieas that should have never gotten into my head and such but then again, I lived as an almost total hermit outside school at the time, so they had me by the balls.
Of course, this caused me to become very depressed and even more AFCish than before, following girls around in silence town and such ( one incident I got ice thrown at me! ) I totally brought the ideal about that being nice is the way to go while when I saw thier boyfriends I used a phrase to sum them up ' Hi, I'm the local neighbourhood Jerk! ' I had a couple of cases of oneitis as well to boot and you know where that went!
The final breaking point occurred when I developed my worst EVER case of oneitis on a girl in my old class at school. Poor girl, she was simply too nice to me for her own good at a time I was very stupid and naive. Then, the falling out happened, lets just say I took a joke wrongly ( I had ZERO tolerance for alcoholics and smokers at the time, for obvious reasons ) and we had a falling out.
Naturally I was gutted and to make things worse, I saw the parents drinking got EVEN WORSE. My brother was one of them now. That didn't help at all, I felt as if I had no friends and that everyone, even teachers, were out to get me. Oh, yeah, did I mention the oneitis with siad girl got even worse to the point I could barely funtion without her in my presense?
I became suicidal to where I was talking to a guy about it openly. At that point, I knew, I had two choices, to either stay as I am and probably end up committing suicide or to take my arms and finally do something I never thought of doing before; Stand My Ground.
Then one fateful night in October 2002, it happened. I let it out, verbally but I still let it out. I told my drunken father how I felt, how his drinking had virtually destroyed me amd he laughed it off, of course and went to bed. After that, I actually felt emotionless, a weight had finally being lifted from me but now I didn't know how to feel, it had being so long since I had smiled or laughed sincerly I thought I'd forgotten how to.
Of course, he came to his senses and realised his errors and even told me he try and get help. I still felt emotionless until that Friday, where I went to the city and purchased a single that unknon to me, when I would listen to it a few hours later, would be the thing that would change my life forever.
The single was a techno track ' Nessaja ' by Scooter.
Always lived my life alone,
Been searching for the place called home.
I know that I've been cold as ice,
Ignored the dreams, too many lies.
Somewhere deep inside, Somewhere deep inside me,
I found ... the child I used to be
And I know that it's not too late
Never too late...
Trust me, that chorus and the rest of the lyrics of the song. Just ' did it ' it give me my drive back, a drive to succed over what had being put in front in me. I actually felt happy for the first time in a very long time.
That was the start of my spritual journey. My school grades improved, everything improved. I gave up the whole zero tolerance against people who drink / smoke idea, as it was stupid and limiting and no longer needed. For aw hile, I didn't a F*** anymore. At first, the reason I was doing was because of my case of oneitis but over time, it became for me and me alone.
Then, early 2003, I first found here, through a google search when I was bored one night. The article struck a chord with me and I bookmarked it and over time, I started to check out the rest of the site. I read the stuff a lot but it didn't really sink, as I stil lhad oneitis. I even joined the fourms, as a bit of wannabe great before my time. ( ahem )
Then, for some strange reason, I left. I thought I didn't need the stuff here. I was wrong. I didn't return until 2005. When I was in college and my old oneitis had moved far away. I was more ready to accept the information now and started to read it all again. I started posting again as well.
So where am I today? On my way to becoming a DJ, even iwth the added obstable of alcoholic parents, I'm still determined to make it. I am on my way there, I can tell you. Now, I can say, in all honestly, I don't care about the fact I'm still single and never had a G/F, it does get to me at times but its rare.
The journey is far from complete and I say its a lifelong thing as well, once a DJ, I you have to keep on reminding yourselves of what you've learned, its bit like AA, one slip and your F***ed, back to square 1! Hopefully, with the knowledge I've gained, I'm better off than like 99% of guys in my howntown!
Phew! That took me over an hour to type!
