I am 52 years old.   Single, never been married, no children.  I have lived outside of my home town for over 20 years.   I have been employed, bought a home, a car and basically managed my life without any assistance from my parents.    That is fine.  They raised me well enough that I was able to get along very independently.

But now, since they have retired ( they are divorced and retired at separate times ) they now feel they need to manage my life.

They separated when I was 12 and when that happened, my sister and myself were basically left to take care of ourselves.   My mother had to find work and my father was the one to leave the home and except for occational weekend visits, he wasn't much part of our lives.    When I needed their parenting, they weren't there.  

Now, I can't get rid of them.    They hate that I live 2 hours away from them.   They think I cannot manage my life because I am not married.   Because I don't share every detail of my life with them, they are insistant that I have no friends.

I used to go home often to visit, but each year it gets worse and worse.   They complain about my living too far away and that they worry about me being alone.    I am not alone, I have friends and people who support me, but because they don't see it, it must not exist.

Now, when I go home its just a huge guilt trip.   

These are people I love, but I don't like.  

They aren't bad people, but if we met today, we would be polite to each other, but we wouldn't be friends.   We have nothing in common, from interests to values.    So, if we weren't family, we would never socialize together.

Again, I love them and while I have been up front and honest with them, that I love them but they need to back off, they refuse to hear it.

I only hear from them when they are bored.    They do things for me that I don't ask for and don't want and expect me to be greatful.

Each year this gets worse and I am attributing this to age, but it makes me never to want to go home and see them.

Example -  I told my mother not to get me anything for Christmas.   This is not me being self depricating.   I truly do not want her to get me anything.    Even when I come out and tell her exactly what I want, she ignores it and get what she wants.   Usually it is something I can't or won't use.  She wastes money on it and she is on an extremely limited income.     I gave her money this year so she can Christmas shop.    So, when I say I don't want anything, I mean it.   But she is hurt by it - like I am doing it to deliberately to hurt her.    Since I was a child, even telling her what I wanted, she never paid any attention and just got what she wanted.  

I don't want to have to pretend I like something I can't use and that has wasted her money.   Its a relief not to get anything.

Same thing with my father.   I ask him for nothing, but he doesn't listen.  He likes to buy christmas themed things.   While they are nice things, I have a closet full of junk I don't use.    Last year he bought me a cell phone I didn't ask for.    Every time I talk to him on it ( as its my only phone now - because I couldn't not use it ) he asks me "how's the phone"   expecting me to all of the sudden rapsodize about this phone - which I didn't want and is much fancier than I will ever use - and sounds disappointed when I just say fine and don't expound on it.

Now - I know in the grand scheme of things, these are not huge problems, but they make me feel so guilty and terrible that I cry about it.

I know I just need to get over it, but I don't know how or why I can't just push it aside.

They make me feel a failure for not being the kind of child they wanted.   Married with children and a husband that lives next to them and likes all the things they like.   

They don't and never accepted me for the person I am.  

It hurts