Fun day ahead (not)

This is a pretty spot-on description of her, but it started long before I came out to her, and it has strained our relationship from the very beginning. Her family dynamic is horrible--father was an alcoholic, mother is very self-centered and distant towards her, brothers are variations of her mother and father, all very judgmental and utterly, completely lacking in any empathy or sensitivity. She is a product of her environment, in that she is equally judgmental and insensitive, but I always felt from the very beginning that there was some wounded child at the core that I saw flashes of, and could reach and "fix" somehow. Which is my own personal neurosis, of course, and it wouldn't surprise me any if the wounded child I was trying to fix was really me, not her.

I have spent the better part of 20 years trying to convince her that I was not going to abandon her, and her first reaction when I told her was "Are you really gay, or is this just a good excuse to dump me?" A huge part of my angst in all this has been worry about what will become of her if left to her own devices--especially since I've completely worn myself out trying to bolster her self-esteem, but she continues to spiral down. Every kind thing I do to help her through something just proves to her how useless she is, and if I let her work her way through it, I'm mean and cruel. I actually was somewhat relieved when I admitted to myself I was gay, because it actually does give me an "out" (pun intended!). I alternate between anger at her temper and irrational behavior, and empathy and concern over the pain at the core of it. But I've spent 20 years burying myself to try and heal her, and she hasn't met me even a tenth of the way. She's still stuck in her hole of believing that the world is a mean place filled with people who want to hurt her, and like it or not, I'm one of them, and I think I always have been, despite my best efforts. It's pretty discouraging.