Some personal things - need advice, please
Assalamu alaykum. I will delete this in one month. I’m a 17-year-old girl and I’m honestly overwhelmed. Talking to my close friends helps a bit, but I need perspectives from older, more experienced people about what I’m going through. My family isn’t bad and I love them, but there are times they make me feel really hurt. I try to understand them because they’ve been through so much. My mother seems unhappy and I don’t think she truly loves my father. My paternal grandfather was violent and caused a lot of pain for my dad and his siblings. My dad takes medication to deal with anger and to try not to pass that trauma on. My mother is Chechen and has seen war and loss; her family suffered raids and killings, and her father left them. Because of all this I’m grateful we at least have food, clothes, and a home, and I try to be a good daughter. May Allah reward my parents for what they’ve done. Still, my mother doesn’t take me and my siblings seriously and won’t respect our choices. She controls everything from how we dress (not about hijab-she even wants flashy clothes), to how we walk, talk, laugh, do our hair, eat, and who we befriend. She tries to reshape our personalities into what she wants, even in things that aren’t sinful. People don’t just change overnight-how is that fair? All of us are quite anxious and not very social. I think my mother’s behavior contributed to that, though some of it may be genetic too. When we try to speak back, she immediately says, “Don’t talk back.” I’ve mostly avoided arguing, but when I did respond once, I ended up crying and then she mocked me for how I cried. Because of that, it’s hard for us to stand up for ourselves or communicate with others. I only have one or two close friends, two of whom I met online. Most social platforms are forbidden at home except YouTube and Pinterest. Once my mother saw me texting one friend and overreacted, saying things like, “Then why am I even protecting you?” and forbidding me from speaking to them. I warned my friends about this, but I’ll keep talking to them anyway. We already find it hard to make friends-why interfere with the little support we have? I know risks exist for girls my age, but I know my boundaries. Why does she not trust me at all? It feels like control. She also won’t let me make film edits online because she believes music is haram. Is she right about that? Am I just being a typical teenager and overreacting? If I told them everything I feel, I fear being shouted at, disowned, or cut off, and that frightens me because I love them. Despite these problems, they are good people in many ways and sometimes show affection. From an Islamic point of view, does a parent have the right to interfere this much in matters that aren’t sinful? Also, my mother is very stubborn about how she raises us, compares and humiliates us against other children, dismisses psychology as unimportant, and has obsessive cleanliness habits among other issues. I used GPT to translate this, so sorry if there are mistakes. JazakAllah khair for any advice. Salam.