Thebaddestdaughter

  • When no contact doesn’t work

    When I initially asked for space by my family, it was respected. The problem occurred when they couldn’t respect my wishes long term. What happened after a certain amount of time was a drip feed of contact from lots of different sources, all with the same narrative; I was selfish and needed to get back…

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  • Sibling Stings

    My brother is 4 years older than me. I’ve always felt like a pain to him, a thorn in his side. Someone to ignore whenever possible. I accepted that, I didn’t think that I had much to offer. We were very different in our interests, he was a football fanatic, whilst I loved books and…

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  • Body Image

    I suppose ideas about your body and how you fit into the world start very early. Relationships with food are formed as soon as you wean. The joy of an ice cream on a sunny day or a hot chocolate in Winter. I almost never remember having a guilt free and happy relationship with food.…

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  • The Smear Campaign

    I asked my mum for space. I asked for time to think about how I wanted our relationship to move forward. I didn’t have any intention of cutting my mum and dad off completely, but I knew that I would need space in order to work through some issues. I was still seeing my therapist,…

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  • An Explosive Marriage

    Currently, my parents have been married for over 50 years. On the surface that seems like an amazing feat. It a long time to be together, to go through life’s good and bad times. They were very young when they met and got married. My mum was 19 and my dad 24. I suspect my…

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  • Love Hurts

    Love is about drama Love is about fights, and break ups and make ups Love is about slamming doors and banging down phones Love is about loud snotty crying and ringing your best friend Love is about reacting, not thinking Love is about making a scene, raising your voice The bigger the scene, the deeper…

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  • From Bad to Worse

    After the initial drama passed, the simmering tension started mounting. The usual chats with my mum were awkward and didn’t contain our usual ease. Every few chats, she would bring up how things didn’t seem normal, how she was sad that the regular closeness we had seemed to have disappeared. I turned this on myself…

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  • My Introduction to Estrangement

    I didn’t choose estrangement, it chose me. I am not a writer, or a journalist, but I felt the need to share what I have experienced over the past two years because it has been life shifting. It’s like the tectonic plates of my life have changed, and many other things have changed in my…

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