Want to stand up for myself but I'll just be the bad guy

[witchcraft]

I don't know where to begin.

My father has been running my life for the past month, telling me when and where I need to be. All in order to help him move across the country now that he decided to suddenly retire.

I show up today to help him with packing all of the stuff he has in the basement. For the first hour and a half, unsurprisingly, he's just projecting all of his frustrations onto me, complaining about his neighbors for the 100th time. So and so is a bitch, so and so is a douche, whatever. Literally the same ol stories about his neighbors I have heard a dozen times; I'm sure he's the problem in at least half of these stories, but I say nothing, I would gain nothing and it would just turn into an argument.

In addition to this, the other hour was him off loading all of his Facebook marketplace decision making onto me. See, he has to sell this and this and this before the move, because he doesn't need these things and they won't fit anyway.

Why am I just volunteered to be secretary? AND therapist? When was I ever asked? Why does he think I know a fucking thing about selling $8000 worth of furniture when I don't even have $800 to my name? Just because I'm under the age of 30 doesn't mean I know the ins and fucking outs of Boomer Marketplace.

When I have ever tried talking to my mom about these things, it's the same useless responses. You're his only son, you know. Welllll he appreciates the help, you know. You know, our parents were the same way.

Am I crazy? Is this how every normal, healthy, well adjusted parent treats their child? With this profound sense of entitlement to their time, and zero respect or consideration for any boundaries?

After helping them (and they did not make it sound like helping them was ever an option), do they say passive aggressive bullshit like "I know how you are, you're late all the time. I need you to be here tomorrow at this time-"

I hate my parents. I don't care anymore; I said it. I hate them. I feel physically ill right now.

I'm 28 years old and I'm a NEET. Naturally since I have nothing better to do, nothing else going on, I have been volunteered to drive 10 hours across the country with my father. I will be stuck with him for ten days until I have to fly back on the 9th of July.

I can't sleep I am so angry and sick to my stomach.

I am tempted to disappear and completely fuck him over and his whole plan. My mind is torn between that and just committing suicide and leaving this all in a note.

Instead, I will show up tomorrow at 2pm. I told him 1pm, and just to spite him I will show up at 2. I will just force myself to dissociate and laugh at how much it bothers him when it literally doesn't matter, all we are doing tomorrow is packing up more of his bullshit and it absolutely DOES NOT MATTER whether I show up at 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 or fucking 5.

In fact, I don't even know why I need to be there to help him pack up his shit at all. It's like I'm just there to entertain him, or to give him somebody to vent all his dumbass frustrations to, to serve as an emotional punching bag.

Telling me he has been losing sleep for days because he had to make sure he called the post office and got his mail forwarded to his new address, and that the water / electric would be shut off on the day he moved out, etc.

I'm a NEET who hates working, hates being alive, is actively contemplating suicide, has $15k of student loan debt, trying to figure out if my life is salvageable, if it's worth living, what my options are, This is the shit I lose sleep over. And he is venting to me about how he is losing sleep over selling his snowblower on Facebook Marketplace.

He's all butthurt about having to sell these things for less than what they're worth, and the stress of moving out of his $300,000 house, meanwhile I have literally no fucking future whatsoever.

Holy. Shit. I just can't anymore. I can't.

I hate my fucking life so much. I fucking hate my parents. I hate 90% of my family. I hate myself. I hate being here period. With a bit of self awareness of my own melodrama, I must say, it feels like I will suffer immensely and die before this little father-son saga is over.

Again. I am seriously, seriously considering running away and/or committing suicide in the next 5 days. An entire lifetime of this bullshit, and I've had enough now.

 

[Passenger4224]

This sounds like the most toxic BS. If I was in this position I'd stand up for myself. I wasn't created to be a slave to some arrogant old man.

But ofc it's your decision, you do what you think is best whatever that may be

 

[witchcraft]

This sounds like the most toxic BS. If I was in this position I'd stand up for myself. I wasn't created to be a slave to some arrogant old man.

But ofc it's your decision, you do what you think is best whatever that may be

Thank you.

It's very emotionally confusing because it isn't always... like this? I don't know how to describe it, I'm also tired. Maybe that just further reveals the toxicity lol.

Right now I'm at what I can only call the Sun Tzu stage: trying to decide what battle is worth fighting. If I simply don't fight for two weeks, maybe I actually win.

I would say this war is won when I move out, but my parents are 65ish years old. I am going to be roped into more shit over the coming years, and now one of them will live on the other side of the country. Great. Do I need to fly down there now when he inevitably becomes senile? Take weeks off of work or fly down there and back every god damn weekend? Pay to have him put into a home?

Ultimately his problems become my problems but he conveniently skips and leaves out that step. It was his decision to retire suddenly. It was his decision to then suddenly sell his house. It was his decision to move across the country now, and not later.

The reason why there is all this time crunch stressing him out is because HE decided to do things this way. The reason why there is all this stress about selling this or that before the move this weekend is because HE is the quintessential boomer who recoils at the thought of paying for a u-haul. One reason (albeit not the only, I'm a NEET) why this is all my problem is because HE adamantly refuses to hire a moving company or spend literally any fucking money for any service at all, ever.

HE decided to do all of this on the most ridiculous time scale possible, coupled with the fact that he did not plan this out in advance and do all of the legwork to make this manageable. This basement full of bullshit should've been sorted weeks ago. So much of this should have been sorted weeks ago, but it's like some sort of mysterious crisis occurred, a demon suddenly possessed him and he's just arbitrarily decided to do all of this in the most rushed way possible. He's been divorced from my mom for nearly 10 years, he hasn't killed anybody or gotten in trouble with the law afaik, so I am just completely baffled.

And again, why do I have to be there to pack his stuff? I couldn't tell you. Because everything, just like it's been since the day I was born, has to be done his way. Exactly his way.

I can be like this too, sometimes. But if it were me: I would do all my own packing. I would know where everything is. It would all be organized precisely how I like. So all I would need is to ask someone to help me load the trailer with my pre-packed things.

I "helped" him for a few hours today and this is all I did. He hands me an item, tells me what it is, tells me to put it in the box, rinse and repeat. It's not like I am working autonomously on some other designated corner of the house, packing things. No, I'm just there for literally no reason, wasting my fucking time and listening to his interspersed rants.

 

[EmptyBottle]

If he's not doing the work as well, you can always choose to say you're busy at work/college/etc, true or false.

Or choose to say "I'll be unavailable"... choosing to be late would only annoy him without much relief to you, compared to saying "I got [whatever else]" over text and being away for some time.

 

[witchcraft]

If he's not doing the work as well, you can always choose to say you're busy at work/college/etc, true or false.

Or choose to say "I'll be unavailable"... choosing to be late would only annoy him without much relief to you, compared to saying "I got [whatever else]" over text and being away for some time.

Yeah, idk, none of that works with my dad unfortunately. I appreciate the suggestion but any of that would annoy him. Suggesting or asserting my own boundary to any tiny degree annoys him, and half the time it turns into an argument.

The problem isn't so much that he isn't doing the work, but how he is doing the work and how little consideration he has for me.

More than half the shit he has commanded me to be here to help with, is shit he *easily* could have done himself.

And like I said. He created this whole mess. This was all his decision: when he retired, when he sold his current house, all of it.

So the fact that he didn't go through his tons of bullshit in the basement, or all of his clothes, etc etc etc, and then basically just figured "ah well, fuck it, I'll just demand witchcraft be here and I will vent all of my frustration about my own decisions on him" just pisses me off.

That's how it's been my whole life. No consideration and no awareness of how all of the stress is the direct result of his own decisions.

 

[Redacted24]

Man...I hear you.
I had to do that with an elderly near-relative a couple of years ago when she decided to move into an assisted living situation.
I don't live close - it's a five hour drive - but I was up there periodically while she was selling the house, to try and help her empty it after 40 years living there.

She doesn't have anyone young in her life so it was on me.

It was awful.

But you're doing something really good, and I'm sending you lots of support and encouragement. You can only do what you can, and don't feel like you need to do more. Keep up the fight!

 

[witchcraft]

Man...I hear you.
I had to do that with an elderly near-relative a couple of years ago when she decided to move into an assisted living situation.
I don't live close - it's a five hour drive - but I was up there periodically while she was selling the house, to try and help her empty it after 40 years living there.

She doesn't have anyone young in her life so it was on me.

It was awful.

But you're doing something really good, and I'm sending you lots of support and encouragement. You can only do what you can, and don't feel like you need to do more. Keep up the fight!

I really appreciate the kind words, thanks. It was good on you to do that for her.

Your situation is actually a future concern of mine as well; my high-strung, Type A personality, Chernobyl blood pressure boomer father is in his mid sixties. There will come a day where somebody needs to care for him just like your older relative. Unless I'm still a NEET in ~10 years, I can't just up-root my entire life, or put my entire life on hold, get 90 days of vacation from my employer (just try getting 90 hours of annual vacation from an employer). Don't know what the hell I'd do. Guess I'd have to pay for a moving company, storage units, and possibly a caretaker or for assisted living. All with money I don't have.

His family in that part of the country are generally his age or even older. I know how retirement goes. My mid-seventies great-uncle who also lives near where my father is moving worked in the legal system (leaving this intentionally vague), retired just a couple years ago, and is now in very ill health. My dad's dad retired from a major manufacturer and within just a few years began exhibiting very bad body dementia. My father is retiring younger than either of them, but I know how this tends to go—the job is a big part of what's keeping their older brain and body sharp as it realistically can be. Without substituting for that, the decline can be rapid.

My father has had two back surgeries, nearly cut his fucking finger off last year working on the house he just sold (which entailed another two months of being dictator over my life). Outside of work and doing some basic miscellaneous stuff around the house (the typical kind of shit), he isn't super active. He can't play baseball like he used to, he stopped that ~15 years ago after his first back surgery. He's afraid to golf or even to go bowling. I have a very strained relationship with him yet I know when he's gone I'll miss the little fleeting bits of good, I admit somewhat begrudgingly. I don't want to talk to him on the phone for 3 hours every day, since it's more like him talking at me, assaulting me with a neverending stream of words and his opinions and directives about my life, only asking questions like a crime investigator would ask when it comes to taking any interest in my personal life. I won't be there to see him like I can be when he lives just 30mins away. When his older family pass, it'll just be him unless Hell freezes over and he makes any friends.

I get my anti-social tendencies from him. He's moving to a house that's in a decent size town but kind of secluded from neighbors. The point is, I just don't see how he's going to get the necessary stimulus to delay decline. His penny pinching skills would put any crab or lobster to shame. I fear he'd rather die in a big pile of his own poop and rant about how he's not going to pay for any kind of intervention service. And maybe that's for the best, because the caretaker better pray Jesus is at their side to supply the necessary holy patience for dealing with him.

If you're wondering what my father sounds like, it's quite a bit like me right now, I freely admit. Like a "negative Nancy" or "Debbie downer" because he seeks to avoid or prepare for every single possible bad thing that might occur, with above-average intelligence that makes it difficult to argue why he shouldn't have those concerns, because all of his concerns are technically realistic. I don't think he really has the self-awareness, however, or just simply doesn't give a fuck about the energy that exudes nor how taxing it is to be around him. The way I see it, people are free to read this or not, respond to it or not, nobody is a captive audience here and I don't really have any expectation. I just figure somebody will respond or acknowledge with an emoji reaction and that's fine. I also manage to keep these rants to maybe once a week or two, unless life is really raping me in every orifice like it is right now.

Idk, don't want to jinx anything but I get a bad feeling of where this is heading. In the best case scenario, Father Time is still inevitable. Thanks for reading, I hope you have a good day.

 

[Redhand5]

That sounds like a lot of stress on you that you are struggling to maintain control of, which is completely understandable since it was thrown on you without planning it out. You've got your own life and worries and debt to handle on top of this now, your feelings are justified and reasonable. Don't feel bad for feeling bad, it's a lot.
I've been in a similar position before and hated it as well. If I could make a suggestion, if you have a friend that you can rope into it with you, I'd tell my dad to get out of the way and I'll deal with it. That's what I had to do. My wife and I packed up my aunts things despite her wanting to stop and get in the way. It went much smoother by telling her to step aside and let us handle it. And having a companion to share the misery with lol, helps a lot. I'm not sure if there are any in your area, but here there are companies that specialize in estate sales and things like that. They would save you from the brunt of it I think.

 

[witchcraft]

Well, I have gone nuclear.

I don't want to write another big block of text here. I will save that for another day / thread when I have more time to think.

Just wanted to give a kind of conclusion to this thread by saying that I have decided to go no contact with my dad. I will not be going 12 hours down south with him to be his personal servant and free moving company.

Thank you again everyone for all of the suggestions and overall support. You are what makes this site a nice place, pretty much the only place of its kind on the internet in my experience.