31. My wealthy cousin gave up his first kid for adoption because he had Down syndrome
“My older cousin is very wealthy, lives in the nice part of town, has a beautiful wife, healthy kids, and a luxurious life style. Apparently, the first kid his wife and he had had Down syndrome and they gave her up for adoption because of it, instead of the lifestyle. No one talks about it and I don’t know if the kids he has now know about it.”
32. My brother was convicted of possession of child pornography
“My brother was convicted of possession of child pornography.”
33. My half-brother raped me
“My half-brother raped me and would play ‘wrestle’ with me and take my clothes off. Would walk around naked and sneak in to the bathroom when I was there to ‘talk’ while naked. (I was 8-10 and he was 13-15). My other half-sibling either knew or didn’t care and would leave to go sleep with her boyfriend and leave us to ‘play.’”
34. My father killed himself two months ago
“Two months ago today my father, 52, killed himself. The day before he ended his life I had seen him and even though he wasn’t in the best spot in life we were working on making things better for the future for him, my 4 younger siblings, and myself (19). When I got the news of his death I immediately went and visited his home where my stepmother, and two younger half siblings lived with him. While there I found out that my stepmother had “accidentally” wiped his cell phone after his death while trying to get in to it. While leaving I took his computer to look through to see if I could find anything that would give a lead as to why he ended his life. He had his phone syncing with Google Voice, so I could see all his text messages and whereabouts as they were all backed up with Google. During my investigation I found exactly what caused him to kill himself. It was a text from my stepmother that wasn’t meant to be sent to him. She doesn’t know that I know why she wiped his phone or that she was the one that caused him to kill himself. I have yet to go after her legally, but I am in preparation of doing so….The message read “He has not been served yet…I don’t know what to do. He’s in the office with J*** (my youngest brother of 13) fixing his office chair.” That was the last message he received. The being “served” part was in reference to a divorce and restraining order she filed on him. He knew she filed but had been told that it was going to be pushed back and potentially thrown out. He did nothing wrong to have her initiate a divorce or a restraining order from his two kids. I believe it ultimately devastated him after going through a very nasty divorce with my mother because of what my stepmother did many years ago and caused him to act in the way he did. He lost all hope and I believe it was because she ruined his first marriage, tried to take his kids away, and broke his heart.”
35. My father raped me for seven years
“It’s hard to choose just one thing because my family is the definition of a clusterfuck. I think the worst thing worth mentioning is that I was molested and eventually repeatedly raped for a period of 7 years as a child by my father. It was quite violent at times, and occasionally, a loaded gun was involved. I’m now 24. In short, this has ruined my life. I’ve suffered an incredible amount of mental health problems as a result that are not yet totally resolved and have cost thousands upon thousands of dollars and hours to treat. I’ve been on probably 20 different psychotropic drugs, none of which have made much of a difference. I’ve tried to kill myself more times than I can count on both hands. I’ve been institutionalized nine times—sometimes voluntarily, sometimes not. I don’t mean to toot my own horn, but I am objectively quite bright. Everyone expected me to go places with my life, but I have absolutely nothing to show for my intelligence. I couldn’t finish my college degree both because I have been in and out of hospitals and treatment centers since I was a teenager, and because my college fund consists of money my father controls; dealing with him in any form renders me unable to function for days or sometimes weeks. I’ve had many jobs, but I can’t hold one down because my mental health has made me too unreliable for anyone to want to keep around. It was only fairly recently that I became remotely capable of having healthy or functional close relationships. I met my SO two years ago, and as of December, we are happily engaged. This is the first person who has ever made me feel safe, and the first person who I felt has ever accepted me as I am. He might be the first really good thing that has ever happened to me in my entire life. My fiancé and my therapist know what went down, but no one else does. I think the rest of my family thinks I’m just plain crazy. My father has never been punished for what he did in any way. He is moderately famous in a field I will not divulge for fear that he sees this. He lives in a mansion with a trophy wife, and I live in a studio in the ghetto. My parents are divorced, and my mother and I are close; however, my father is an extremely vindictive, vengeful person, and I don’t even want to know what would happen if he knew I had outed him. He is getting old, though; he’ll be 65 next month, and as far as I know, he’s in fairly poor health. I have resolved to tell my mother what happened once he finally kicks the bucket.”