Coping with anxiety from verbally abusive alcoholic father

[Iconoclast]

Hi. First post.

Before we begin, I've tried about 30+ medications for depression, anxiety, mood stabilisation, as well as various atypicals usually used for things like schizophrenia, etc. I've been to a therapy session, apparently the only therapy my insurance convers. All there was was behavioral shaming, and arrest threats from a rent-a-cop with a justice boner because I was caught getting lost in their labyrinthine hospital looking for the therapy room.

I'm a 27 year old who, as a result of severe anxiety which prevents me for doing things like trying to find a job that fits my graduate degree in stats, etc., as well as the ability to piss people off (e.g., therapists, everyone) merely by existing, is forced to live with his parents.

This wouldn't be as horrible as a lot of people make it out to be if not for "The Moof." a.k.a., my dad. Despite raising me quite well in the years that it's considering acceptable by society for a child to still live with parents, over the past few years as a result of rather unjustly losing his job of 25+ years, has taken to the bottle pretty fiercely.

He's a pretty reasonable, albeit somewhat difficult to connect with person when sober. When drunk, which is to say, practically always nowadays, he becomes an insane bully. His M.O. in this state is to obsessively do yardwork/cleaning around the house to an absolutely unreasonable extent, and basically stalk me while looking for ridiculous reasons to throw a screaming fit at me. Such reasons have included:

Eating
Eating the wrong thing (multiple times)
Not replacing the ice in the freezer (multiple times)
Replacing the ice in the freezer at the wrong time
taking a plate out of the cabinet like a "WORTHLESS IDIOT" (read: completely normally, but slowed down as a direct result of anxiety from knowing he's watching me)
Using the bathroom (period, multiple times)
Using the bathroom upstairs when it's obvious that I should use the bathroom downstairs
Using the bathroom downstairs when it's obvious that I should use the bathroom upstairs
Showering (multiple times)
Shaving (multiple times)
dropping objects on accident
taking the wrong one of two equally full bottles of ketchup out of the fridge (note, he admitted he'd have made the same shouty snide comment at me had I taken the other one when confronted)
Seeing a black person on TV, since this is apparently my fault somehow (NOTE: He's an absolutely unabashed racist. Not at all religious, though, if that helps)
I can probably spend a solid half hour filling this list with similarly minor shit

Then there's the cliches. He likes to bust these out as auto-win attempts (which work in his own mind) for any conversation we have at complete random, from my point of view. It's gotten bad enough to where him uttering any one of these trite phrases can trigger an instant severe panic attack:

"You're too negative." (Note: I'm grossly underemployed, my girlfriend of 6+ years dumped me on Facebook for someone better endowed in the salary department after years of "the only thing I'll dump you for is if you become comatose" and "I'd only ever dump you in person," have literally no friends or support network, and worst of all of this, YOU, DRUNKY. But yea, I'll get right onto plugging my ears and pretending everything is sunshine and unicorns.)
"________ sounds like a big word." (Note: "Big words" are simply words he doesn't know the meaning to. As a direct result of the insane screaming fit he gave me because I called him "lucid," which is a "big word," I had an extreme night terror. It's like playing Taboo, but you don't get to know the Taboo words, and instead of a buzzer, it's 1+ hour of YOU'VE NEVER DONE ANYTHING RIGHT IN YOUR LIFE YOU PEECHSA SHIT LUCID LUCID LUSHHID HE CALLED ME LUCID PEEEESHA SHIT ALWAYS WITH THE BIG WORDS I'M DONE DONE DONE

HE CALLED ME LUSSSHHHHID WHAT DID I DO TO DESHERVE THIS)
"You don't lisshen." (Note: He says this all the time for no reason I can tell. At all.)
"DON'T RUN AWAY FROM ME" (Note: This can translate to "you are walking in the direction opposite of me, regardless of the fact I just told you to do something that requires this.")
"Take the inishiatve." (Translation: Learn telepathy.)
Probably a few I've forgotten. If only I could forget them forever...

This is also a man with no idea of boundaries, at all. He'll wake me at 8 AM, somehow already drunk, to show me his new stereo (and tell me I don't listen). He'll fucking spit in my face because he fucked with my razor, a few hairs came out, and after an hour of shit fits threatens to "knock my teeth out." (note: he has never actually assaulted me physically. Somehow.)

My mom? She'll give him a verbal drubbing for being drunk and making me feel like the worst thing that's ever existed because a black person getting a shave and haircut was on TV, he'll accuse us of ganging up on him, do a bit of unintentional gaslighting, nothing will get through to him, she'll cope by just pretending nothing happened, and justify her "Libra nature" by trying to make us both look equally bad "yea, he's an abusive alcoholic and nothing gets through to him, but why do you speak so loudly sometimes?"

Lather, rinse, pencil in tomorrow's 2 PM screaming fit over a stuck cabinet or whatever.

What's my plan here? I've, at least, figured out the source of my anxiety, but when it's reached actual nightmare point, and I really have nowhere to turn for help, how do I stop living in fear of the inevitable?

[Kuma]

So your dad is allowing you, at age 27, to live in his house -- but you are not happy about the way he acts toward you, or just generally?

It seems to me the optimal answer is move out. Live on own. You are an adult.

If you are not able to live on your own -- for mental health reasons or economic reasons, or any other reasons -- then maybe you should appreciate the fact that your father is allowing you to continue to live in his home, far beyond the time that he is obligated to do so. I did not sense much appreciation in your post.

I am not excusing his conduct which, at least as you have described it, sounds pretty unappealing. But I doubt you are going to change him. He is who he is. Alcoholism is an illness (as is anxiety). And to some extent I guess one might say "his house, his rules."

So it seems to me your choice is probably to make the best of the current situation -- perhaps trying to make some peace with your father, and to understand his human frailties, just as you would like him to understand yours, or to move out of his house and live on your own.

Maybe this is not the "you are good and right and your dad is bad and wrong" answer you were hoping for. But you know, when you post something on the internet and ask for responses and feedback, you get what you get.

[Iconoclast]

Good point. I've told my parents I've wanted to move out. My mom responded by taking all the money I had in savings and withdrawing it into an account I can't access, and taking my car keys as a result of her grossly overestimating how sick I was when I made this ultimatum. Since then I've put my savings into my own account but due to a pretty severe panic-based reaction to this I wound up investing a lot of it in long-term investments. I mean, if I'm going to have my car taken from me, it's pretty much implied that I'm not allowed to leave, and money saved for leaving the house is better used elsewhere, is it not?

I have also gotten the car back.

But yea, grateful for the help they give. Absolutely not at all grateful for the "my way, NO highway" attitude they've given me, as I'd have taken the highway months ago if I had that option.

EDIT: Wow, your response is giving me a genuine panic attack. No, seriously. Not trolling at all. Shit. You don't think I've tried literally dozens of times to make peace with him, and gotten YOU'VE NEVER DONE ANYTHING RIGHT IN YOUR LIFE PICEEESHA SHIT in response? Wow, ok.

[trinidiva]

You are being mentally abused in my opinion. That will cause your anxiety symptoms to elevate. .....if you can't move out yet...I would stay in my room as much as possible.....and try to remove yourself from his line of fire as much as possible. When he does start to get on you, do not provoke the situation. Dismiss it and keep on moving. Make a plan to get out of there and that should be your primary plan of action. Since your mom doesnt seem supportive of that, I probably wouldn't share that plan with her.