thinking about the root cause of my anxiety

Hey everyone, Iv been having counselling for a few months now and iv made some really good progress. When I first started I was at a really low point and found it really hard to go out of the house. However, now I'm much more active and I haven't missed a day of college for a month (really good for me!)
Although iv started to face my day to day anxiety and have learnt how to challenge the feelings I used to get, iv now started to concentrate more on other emotions that I'd completely forgotten about cos of the anxiety. I live at home with my dad and my twin brother, and ever since I can remember my brother has mentally abused me. He constantly belittles me calling me lazy and useless, as well as saying that I'm ****ed. My dad witnesses this behaviour but shrugs it off because he doesn't want the hassle of arguing with my brother. Whenever I try to stick up for myself my brother becomes very aggressive and threatening which scares me.
My brother also uses all of my things (moisturiser, shampoo, even razors!) that I have paid for as a way of reinforcing his power. I used to tell my dad and he'd tell me to stop whining. Because I had no way to vent my feelings in a calm way I began to bottle them up, causing me to have aggressive outbursts and smash my room up. Obviously this would create resentment between me and my dad driving us further apart-to my brothers delight.
Even though my anxiety is slowly starting to improve I still have dreams that my brother does something really bad and my friends and family do nothing causing me to shout and swear making them all hate me! I can't help feeling that as long as I'm in this house with my passive aggressive dad and abusive brother il never fully be able to recover! I go to uni in September but until then I just Feel trapped and I have so much pent up emotion that no one will listen too.
I believe that it is years of emotional torment that has finally worn me down and ruined my self esteem causing me to develop anxiety.
What do I do about this situation? Has anyone experienced similar abuse/bullying that has caused them to develop anxiety or depression?
Thanks for taking the time to read this :)

---------- Post added at 14:57 ---------- Previous post was at 14:51 ----------

Don't know why there's a winky face next to this! Haha

What a horrible situation :(

Do they realise the damage they are doing? Have you tried explaining how their actions are making you feel?

If you don't feel you can talk to them, how about writing them a letter? If thhat still doesn't work then writing a letter to them, but not actually giving it to them if you think that will make it worse can help. It's a way to get all that pent up anger out of your head and onto paper. When you're done you can rip it up, shred it, burn it or whatever you want!

Awful situation to be in though, so sorry to hear this...

Thanks its nice to hear that someone understands, everyone else including my friends brushes it off as sibling rivalry. Iv tried to calmly explain to my dad so many times, he just says "ahh I can't be doing with this" and makes me Feel like I'm the one causing the tension. My family don't talk about there feelings. I told my dad that id been getting wierd flashes of light in my eye and I thought something was wrong, he shrugged it off as he does so I went to the doctors and it turned out I had a detached retina. I was scared about the surgery and tried to talk about it but again he shrugged it off!
I just can't wait to get out of the bad atmosphere in this house that's always dragging me down. Until then I don't think any amount of counselling is going to fully help me!

Your brother uses your razors? That's just weird. Sounds like an complete idiot.

You poor thing, it sounds like you're in a bad situation. Typical unsympathetic male behaviour to shrug something off so they don't have to deal with it. Sorry, I know that may be a generalisation but some men have a knack of following the path of least resistance when they ought to be dealing with a situation. Anyway...
Is there any possibility that you could move out to your university town sooner? When you leave college, you could try to get a job to support you for the few months prior to university? Not as easy as it sounds though, I know.
To me it sounds like you can't win with either your brother or, unless he seeks advise just like you are doing he won't ever change.
I’d maybe try to distance yourself from your brother as much as you can, spend more time with friends or take up a new hobby; just something to get you out of the house and away from the situation and out of your mind. If you’re not around your brother, he can’t pick on you.
I’d also maybe try moving your things that he uses to somewhere he won’t find them, it might sound a little extreme but if they aren’t there, he can’t use them.
Good on you for going to college everyday. I’ve suffered with anxiety for a long time, and when I was at college it became a problem for me, but back then I didn’t even know that I had it, nor that it was the reason that was stopping me from going.
Hope you continue to make progress with counselling – even that takes a lot of courage so be proud of yourself.
What do you plan to study at uni? Just curious :)

I think what happened when I was younger set me well on the way to what I have become today.

I couldn't have been much older than 9 or 10 when I remember my mother sitting me down on my bed and telling me that her and my Dad were going to split up, I was distraught and although they decided to stay together, my parents not being together became like my worst nightmare.

In 2004 when I was 12 it almost happened again, they spent 9 months at each others throats constantly arguing, it would terrify me. I was really depressed for a long period which shouldn't be the case in one so young, eventually more for my sake I think, they patched things up once again.

Another few years down the line and they did seperate and divorce in horrible circumstances, whereas before I would cry my eyes out this time I just decided to bottle it all up. I avoided talking about it completely.

After 6 months of that I ended up flat on my arse having a panic attack at school.

I'm now 20 and after briefly recovering from anxiety a few years ago, its back worse than ever.

Thanks for you're replies :) I haven't been on here in ages so sorry it took so long to get back to you! Really good advise crumble, its wierd I don't Feel anywhere near as bad as I did when I wrote this, although I know that's me just bottling my feelings up! Iv realised recovery is such a long proceeds one minute il feel fine the next I feel really low.
Rhys, its true experinces like that really can affect you later in life, when your as young as that you don't know how to express you're feelings so you just end up bottling it up. This makes recovery even more long and complicated. The fact that we are aware of what triggered the anxiety is a positive thing though. Wish you both the best with you're recovery :)
We will get there!