I am 30M , married, and honestly feeling pretty lost right now.
I grew up in a financially comfortable family, but the home environment was always chaotic. My father has a terrible temper, drinks heavily, has cheated on my mother multiple times over the years, and somehow manages to blame everyone around him for every problem. Growing up, there was constant shouting, emotional abuse, intimidation, and occasionally physical violence.
For most of my life, I thought this was just normal family dysfunction and that I needed to be tougher.
In 2018, I moved to the US for my MBA. Looking back, that was probably the happiest and most confident period of my life. I built a career, made friends, felt independent, and generally felt like a functioning adult.
Earlier this year, my wife and I moved back to India. We had been together for years, recently got married, and genuinely believed things would be different now that everyone was older. I left a good-paying job because I thought I was coming back for family and to help build something meaningful together.
Instead, everything seems worse.
The fighting at home never stopped. My father openly admits that the conflict between him and my mother has been going on for 30+ years and says it will continue. He has taken away my mother's phone before, monitors the house with cameras, and reacts aggressively whenever anyone challenges him.
When I told him I was struggling mentally, hadn't slept properly for days, and asked him for guidance, his response was basically that this is how things are and that I should learn to ignore it.
The weird part is that I don't think he's a cartoon villain. I genuinely think he believes he wants the best for his family. But he also needs to control everything. If we make plans without involving him, he gets angry. If we suggest living separately, he reacts with shouting, verbal abuse, and banging things around the house.
The biggest thing I'm struggling with is my own mental state.
I feel like I've lost confidence in myself. I have severe brain fog. I overthink every decision. I used to be outgoing and social, and now even simple conversations feel exhausting. Part of me wonders whether I've always been like this and just didn't realize it. Another part of me wonders if decades of living in this environment have finally caught up with me.
My wife is a real gem of a person. She has grown in a "normal" household and never seen something like this. We have known each other for 10+ years and got married 1 year back. She has been incredibly supportive through all of this, but I feel guilty that she's now stuck dealing with a situation she never created.
I guess I'm posting because I want to know if anyone else grew up in a household like this and what happened when you finally left. Did your mental health actually improve? Did the brain fog and constant anxiety get better? Did you ever stop feeling responsible for keeping the family together?
I feel like I'm standing at a crossroads and can't tell whether I'm seeing the situation clearly or whether years of family conditioning have completely messed with my ability to judge what's normal anymore.