Hello and thank you advance if you decide to read through any of this.

I am as the title may suggest trying to find happyness... go on a journey to find myself, what i lost along the way and to live a better life. I wish to be able to live free of the memories and doubts that plague me every day and I do need help with that. While money isn't something that will cause all of the bad to disappear, itll go a long way to help me find therapy and to find something to help me cope with my feelings.

Any help would go towards treatment for me , helping me and my other half move to a better place and to find enjoyment in the little things in life again.

This is gonna be a long story, but i want to explain as best I can what i went through and how I got here and became the person that I am now.

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My name is Nicolas and im currently 27 years old. I was born and raised in germany and was lucky to have a loving family as I grew up.

My parents treated me like an adult from an early age and I have probably skipped out on what it meant to be a kid. It is something that I had to struggle with since I was young and I suppose this is where my trouble and story started.

As I was put into catholic elementary school in germany I quickly had to learn that due to me interacting with adults more than with kids my age I quickly alienated myself. Being so young you often don't understand the consequences or weight of your actions, and while I was treated like a 'gifted' individual by some, I was outright hated and bullied by others.

I had to spend most of my days off the schoolground due to being chased and physically abused even though we were forbidden to go outside but I felt like I had no other options left as there weren't enough teachers to look after everyone and I never received any help in the end regardless.

I endured it for the 4 years I spent there and despite the trouble I went through my grades were still solid. Solid enough in fact that the teacher assigned to our class suggested to my parents to put me on a school to match my abilities.

The german school system is split up between a total of 5 school types ranging from more elite schools to schools for children with learning difficulties. Following the suggestion my parents put me into the nearest 'best' school they could find and picked up a dog to help me focus they mentioned I'd get distracted easily.

My troubles continued and while I still didn't get along with kids my age very well and had to endure more physical as well as mental beatdowns I wasn't anything special there and the teachers also payed little to no attention to my cries for help.

As my grades worsened under the burden that I began to get used to my parents decided after several talks with teachers and a psychiatrist to pull me off the school after 2 years (5th and 6th grade) and I started my 7th grade in another school nearby which was classed one lower.

During my transition period, I was about 12 years old. My mother had a mobile hairdressing service at the time and often took me with her as my dad spent most of the day at work, working long shifts at a bank about an hours worth of driving away and they didn't want me to be alone home.

One of the families she often visited to do the hair for had a son who was roughly 4 years older than me. I stayed over at theirs a couple times and we got along pretty well. What I didnt know however was that he had something more in mind and 12 year old me didnt really understand any of the hints that i mightve been getting. One night when i stayed over at theirs for weekend led to him physically overpowering me and raping me while his parents were out. Without speaking a word i grabbed the phone after that and called me parents to just pick me up as soon as possible and after i got home i never saw him again... I was traumatized that the only real friend I thought i had at the time took advantage of me like that.

My 7th to 10th Grade at the other school meanwhile went a little better. My grades recovered and while my everyday life in school wasnt a lot more pleasant it was the time when i discovered videogames and eventually the internet and found other ways to cope. Playing games I was able to finally connect to people and even got recognition for being good at what I did.

When was 16 I had made several friends online and was gradually introduced to the furry fandom. A Large group of people that like art of anthropomorphic characters, write , compose and more.

It was easy to meet more people as you knew everyone shared a common interest in something.

Through that I met my first boyfriend. I never really questioned as to why I was attracted to the same gender but it felt comforting to know you have a close friend and getting closer still felt like a natural progression for me at the time if the feeling was mutual, unlike my first experience that i had made. He was from poland and i visited him during the winter, spending christmas and new years eve at his parents home which were quite welcoming and friendly.

Sadly it wasnt meant to be and after asking me to be intimate with him, which I agreed to he ended up claiming that it was non consentual and he blackmailed me soon for as long as 4 years trying to get me to pay up to help him 'forget about what happened' according to him.

During my final year in school the relationship between my parents worsened and they decided to break up and the relatively calm household that I had gotten used to turned upside down and I was dragged into arguments and several attempts to win me over for either side as I was left with the choice with whom i wanted to stay.

I decided to stay with my father as it was my mother moving away and i did not want to have to start over somewhere else. While i may have not had friends I at least had a sense of familiarity that was comforting my troubled mind.

For a year they lived in different appartments in the same town before my mother found someone through online dating and moved quite far away. The contact with her has since gotten worse but I'll explain that a bit later.

Due to the financial struggle that the divorce caused all funds my family had saved for me to eventually study had also been taken without me getting any say in it , or even being told till way later.

Following that my father decided to put me into college while i had made up my plans to do my military service which at the time was still mandatory. I backed down and did as told as i had enough problems to deal with as it was. An new school brought some new opportunities and while overall I felt i was getting along a bit better and had some people i could talk to during break times a couple new issues came up.

Given enough time had passed and me having had enough time to think it over, I came out as being gay.

Noone that talked to me showed any sign of support. My father talked to me several times trying to talk me down that it 'would hopefully just be a phase' and that I shouldnt be serious about it, and the few people i thought i could talk to at school started teasing and bullying me about it.

At the start of my final college year i had fallen ill for a while and spent a week at home to recover from a severe fever. That wednesday morning something happened that has caused me more sleepless nights than I can count.

My father received a short call this morning, being ordered to stand down. Just a few moments after the door to our appartment and then the door to my room were forcefully opened and I was woken up facing fully armed police forces that were ready for the worst case scenario.

I was taken back to the police station and spent the rest of the day till nearly midnight there being questioned and then later talking to the police psychiatrist as it has left me emotionally wrecked.

It turned out that 3 of my classmates scribbled a date on the table that I was assigned to. Upon reporting it to the teacher the police was called and those students claimed that i was mentally ill and would have threatened blow everything up on the day that they wrote down.

I was framed for something I hadn't done, I was traumatized, angry ... and most of all afraid cause I never imagined that anyone would go that far to hurt someone else in my life.

The police didnt press any charges , the people that framed me were let go without even so much as a warning due to lack of evidence as i was told and I was now forced to repeat my schoolyear while the whole school thought that i was some crazy kid when all i ever wanted was just to find some peace and if not making friends then at least be left alone. Needless to say my grades suffered under all the pressure , the depression and everything else i had now bottled up inside me and stuck in my head and in the end I failed college after 3 years there without any consideration in the slightest for any of the trouble i had to go through.

After college my initial plan to go to the military to get away from things and maybe be put on a path that helped me to learn how to help myself wasnt available anymore. The mandatory service had been abandoned and due to budget and manpower cuts i was told that I wasn't needed anymore when I tried to volunteer.

I peddled between smaller jobs for a couple years after , my dog died reaching a proud age of 16 and with him my only real friend I had passed away.

My father eventually picked up dating himself again , my mother married a second time and when he and his new girlfriend decided to move in together i was told that i had to find somewhere else as there wouldn't be any room for me.

I respected their privacy and at the time i had found someone i had spoken to for a bit over a year and we got pretty close.

I thought to myself that I needed a fresh coat of paint in my life and should be bold and do something while I was still able to.

So for a lack of a better place to go and not wanting to be alone I decided to move to England. I stayed with another friend of mine for a short while but the living situation was fairly volatile as his father had passed not to long ago and his mother became addicted to alcohol.

It didn't take more than a month before i was forced out of that home as well.

My boyfriend at the time offered to move in with him , his brother and parents. I accepted and am now still living here. While being close to someone you care about has made me a happier person there are still problems all around me,

The household here isnt exactly peaceful. Verbal to even physical confrontation is fairly frequent, I am unable to express any of my feelings due to a fairly anti-gay stance of my other halfs parents and have to live hiding most of who I am.

My other half whom I have now lived with for 4 years has recently come out as trans and is having difficulties adjusting especially considering the non acceptance of her parents. I care about her greatly and try to support her as best as I can but I'm not exactly a role model myself.

The demons of my own past still hunt me from time to time but i try to deal with them in my own way.

I have started seeking some help a year ago and through talking about it learned to accept that for better or worse it has made me who I am today. I carry a great lot of love and compassion in my heart regardless of what I went through, or maybe because of what I experienced and this is where I am now.

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If you've made it this far... thank you for letting me share my story here and taking your time reading it.

It means a lot to me even being able to just write about it openly like this.

I know there are a lot of people struggling out there , some of you might have experienced similar things than I did but I urge you to stay strong.

Accepting something bad has happened and showing vulnerability isn't a weakness, its strength in itself to have the courage to speak up and work past it.

I would like to thank everyone from the bottom of my heart for any help you might be able to offer and it means a great lot to me to know that people care about me, even if they might not know me. Through showing compassion or an act of generosity you touch someone elses life deeply and can make a great difference. Even so much as a single smile is something that can bring a lot of joy to people.

So thank you.... thank you in all honesty for believing in me and allowing me to be who I am.

Nicolas K.