u/Emotional-Yak-407

I’m 27F and recently graduated from college. I also have a prestigious internship in Los Angeles that ends next month, and I’ve been applying aggressively for full-time jobs.
I live with both of my immigrant parents. Neither works due to disability, neither speaks English well, and they depend heavily on me to handle things. My mom received a lung transplant in October 2025, and I became one of her primary caregivers. Thankfully she’s doing much better now.

The biggest issue is my dad. He has significant mental health issues, attempted suicide a few years ago, and refuses to get help. He blames me for almost everything that goes wrong in the family, especially anything involving money. If I work from home, he assumes I’m doing nothing. If something goes wrong, it’s somehow my fault. He regularly tells my mom that my sister and I don’t love her and only care about her because she gives us money.
Meanwhile, I’m the one who was at the hospital at 2 a.m., helping my mom through surgeries, appointments, medications, and recovery. I’ve worked incredibly hard to build a future for myself. I’ve won scholarships, traveled, graduated, and spent years trying to create opportunities for myself despite everything going on at home.

My biggest fear right now is that my internship ends next month and I don’t have a full-time offer yet. I’m applying constantly, networking, updating my portfolio, reaching out on LinkedIn, and doing everything I can think of.

The reality is that I don’t think this living situation is healthy for me anymore. My mom can’t realistically leave my dad, and I don’t think my dad will ever seek help. So I feel like the only solution is for me to eventually move out.

For anyone who has been in a similar situation:
How did you move out when your family depended on you?
How did you deal with the guilt?
How did you survive the transition period between graduating and landing a stable job?
Is there hope for building a life outside of a dysfunctional family when you’re carrying so much responsibility?
I feel exhausted, scared, and honestly lost. Any advice would be appreciated.

I don’t even know what I’m looking for posting this. Maybe I just want to know if anyone else has experienced this kind of friendship attachment before.

Earlier this year I met two guy friends and we all became really close really fast. One of them especially became a huge emotional comfort in my life. We talk constantly, my parents know him, he’s protective over me, we buy each other little gifts, go eat together, support each other emotionally, etc. We’ve also slept together before, which I think blurred things emotionally even more.

The confusing part is I genuinely never saw him as “my future boyfriend” or someone I wanted to date seriously. But somehow he became one of the most important people in my daily life emotionally.

A few days ago we had plans. He confirmed them the night before, talked about surprising me with dessert he bought for me, and then disappeared the entire day without communicating. I ended up crying almost nonstop for two days because I felt abandoned, rejected, confused, and honestly embarrassed that it affected me that much.

The thing is, this was the FIRST time he had ever done something like that. He’s normally extremely consistent and emotionally present. And it also wasn’t just me he disappeared on apparently he kind of disconnected from everyone that day, including our other mutual friend. So logically I know it wasn’t some personal attack against me specifically, but emotionally it still hurt really badly because of how attached I realized I was to him.

Eventually he apologized sincerely and explained he was having a really emotional day because of family stuff and missing his mom (it was Mother’s Day). We ended up reconnecting, and now things are okay again. He’s been affectionate, supportive, said he misses me as well, etc.

But the whole situation shook me because I realized how deeply emotionally attached I actually am to him. And now I feel scared because I know he has the ability to hurt me emotionally.

I don’t even know if this is romantic feelings, attachment, emotional dependency, or just an unusually intense friendship. I just know that when we disconnected for those couple of days, it felt awful in a way I can’t fully explain.

Has anyone else experienced this kind of friendship where it feels deeper than friendship emotionally, but not exactly romantic either?