TL;DR: Going back to uni for a career change in 2021, and I gotta un-learn some shit.When I was 17, it was uni application time, and ND decided I was going to be a lawyer. He decided I was gonna defend corporations and make the big bucks, and as he worked for a mining company he had me meet their lawyers, show me their flashy cars, etc and tried to get me to fall for the money. I wanted to study law sure, but I wanted to work with post-release juvenile offenders to reintegrate into the community and help them transition into as normal a life as possible. Anyway, that year was also ND's worst year for physical violence as well as his usual narc bs; I was working five nights a week after school at a butcher shop (we were not broke, ND was controlling my account and skimming my wages), and was in a violent relationship of my own. Surprise surprise I didn't get good enough grades for law. I was also volunteering with a few kids programs, and decided to put in for primary teaching, social work, human services, etc. I figured that way I could still work with kids and make a difference. Anyway, ND logged into the application thingy, saw this and flew into a rage. He towered over me and screamed at me that those who couldn't do teach, social workers are just nosey pricks who stick themselves into your life bc they have none of their own, etc etc. All the stereotypes about human service professions and then some. He then logged into my application portal and put in for five law-related courses, and made it clear I wasn't to change them. He had my first uni offer sent to his email so he could see it and approve it before telling me I'd been offered a place.Fast forward to now. About 6/7 years later. I have a Bachelor of Criminology, selected by Dad, and like I said am doing child protection social work. I specialised in mental health and developmental trauma (yes I am aware of the irony). But child protection is exhausting and intense, and I love every day of it and I love my kids but I got my own chronic mental and physical illnesses and as a result the intensity is something I can't take. But through working in child protection, I maintained my love of education. Making schools put education plans into place for difficult kids, re-engaging teenagers in alternative schools, all that stuff. So I've decided in 2021 to go back to Uni to be a primary school teacher.Mum is out from under ND now, they split in 2016. I left home in 2014 so this didn't make much of a difference to me. Mum is now a full champion for me being a primary teacher bc as much as my teens are fun, my soft spot is for ages 4 to 10. She's going on about how it'd be great with my personality, love of reading and literature, how I tutored kids for extra cash in uni, and my 'way' with kids - she knows a bit about what I did when I was in investigations and what I could get kids to tell me. I told her I feel as though I've wasted six years in social work when this whole time I could've been a teacher, and I'm even more mad that I ended up with the student debt from a criminology degree I ultimately didn't end up using - I took an alternative pathway into social work using crim, when ND's plan was for me to transfer directly into law after a semester of crim but as I left home he lost control of that pretty quick. I didn't transfer into social work or education though because I still had a bit of ND's negative and false rhetoric in my head about teachers etc. Child protection is a branch of statutory law enforcement, so I guess in doing that I was still pleasing him in a roundabout way? I've been NC all 2020 so only now am I saying fuck it.Anyway, now I'm actually doing it, it feels like "those who can't do teach" as I've acknowledged that I can't take CPS, and I know he'll be livid if/when he finds out I'm doing this. I told Mum I needed her support when I was a 17 year old kid under an abusive parent, not so much now as an independent adult, but she was just as under his control as I was so I can't really resent her for it. It's a career change that I want to make but there's a little part of me which is relentlessly mocking me for this decision, and I told Mum "I have a lot of unlearning to do..." referencing ND's ideas and the damage done which I've been undoing since the day I left home, but she took it to mean unlearning crim/social work and relearning education, so we couldn't discuss further. She gets into a lot of self-blame when I talk about ND's damage so I don't like to with her.Anyway, thank you for reading my debrief. If you have any similar experiences and/or have ideas on how to survive or dismantle harmful opinions you've learned I'd love to know. Love to all of you. via /r/raisedbynarcissists https://ift.tt/32WARhp
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