The earliest memory I have is my dad leaving. Then he came back. Then he left again. There was a lot of violence in my family. My dad used to hit my mum, almost killed her once and me and my two older sisters watched him. He knew we saw him kick my mum and punch her. Apparently, he used to hit my sister's too, but I don't remember seeing that. My eldest sister said that I never got hit, but I have a distant memory of my dad taking his belt off and whipping me with it (but I don't know for definite if this ever happened).

When I was about 12 and my dad was living with one of the many women he had had affairs with, he decided to disown all of us because the Child Support Agency had asked for more money for me. He didn't speak to us for about a year, then one day he saw one of my sister's and told her that we could now call him. I phoned him up and told him how much pain he had caused me, that I had been crying every night, in so much pain because I wanted my dad but he didn't want me. And he laughed. And he said that all the things I could remember hadn't really happened, that I had imagined them.

I can't remember how old I was but once, my dad was looking after me on a Saturday, as usual but when he came to drop me off back home, my mum wasn't in. It turned out that she had decided to go out for the day and was stuck in traffic on the way home. So my dad waited with me and when my mum returned, he said nothing and left. The next morning, there was a knock at the door. It was my dad and I was excited to see him as I thought he was missing me. But when I opened the door, he pushed me out of the way and my hamster that I had in my hand flew across the room and couldn't breathe properly. My dad went into the kitchen where my mum was and pushed her to the floor. He kicked her over and over again in the stomach. I was crying and tried to make him stop but I couldn't. I can't remember any more about that day. My dad would just change. My sister says you can see it in his eyes. Home was very unsafe. Everyone was always trying to hide information about what had happened from me.

My mum used to go out a lot when I was little and she used to leave me on my own quite often. I used to see ghosts when she was out and used to panic that she would never come home, so I would put the kettle on and have to jump over the carpet a certain amount of times so I could convince myself she would be ok and would not leave me.

My mum was upset most of the time, so I would have to comfort her and look after her as my sister's had left home. I was always making cards for her and writing letters to her to try to make her feel better.

Once, I fell over and needed to go to the hospital for an x-ray and a tetanus injection. I had to have the injection in my bum and when any of the nurses came near me, I freaked out and ended up kicking them away. They were concerned about my behaviour and sent a social worker round to my house. I heard my mum and my sister talking to the social worker about me, but no-one got me any help. I so needed help as I was hurting so much, my school work was suffering, I was crying all the time and I was constantly making up illnesses, everyday there was something else wrong with me. But nobody helped me. No-one could see what was happening to me. I was always trying to break my leg, I don't know why. At school, I was always trying to cut myself with the end of a pair of compasses.

We had two dogs but I used to hurt them. How horrible is that? How evil am I for doing that? I used to stop my friends from leaving my room. By the age of 14, I'd already started having sexual relationships, very carelessly.

When I got to college, I still couldn't stop crying so I went to see the college counsellor, but that seemed to make everything worse.

When I was at Uni, I buried myself in my work, not allowing myself to socialize, working 12 hours a day every day and I wasn't going to be satisfied until I got a first-class degree. Even when I got a first I wasn't happy. I wanted to be the best, to do everything perfectly. I saw the counsellor at Uni too, but I couldn't really talk to her as I was too angry.

When Uni finished, I had nothing to hide behind anymore and that's when everything fell apart. I began working in a fancy dress shop but was so horrible to people, this is when I started to notice my moods swinging and first went to my doctor about these problems. I saw more counsellors but none of them could handle my emotions and passed me on to other people.

Since then, I have been in and out of hospital, diagnosed with BPD last year. I am now in psychotherapy and attend a day hospital twice a week. I am married now after having many doubts about my sexuality. I met my husband in hospital as he has also been a patient there. We were married 3 months later. Six months after getting married, I got pregnant after contraception failed. We both decided the 'best' thing was for me to have an abortion as there was no way that either of us were well enough to have children. I was also told by my gp that if I were to go ahead with the pregnancy, he would have to get social services involved and I would probably have to have my child fostered. I think about the 'baby' all the time and still find the experience extremely traumatic.

There is so much more to tell, but I'd be here all day and I'm sure that if you've read this far you'll be very bored by now. I just felt like writing this here. Thanks for reading.

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