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major issues with my parents
no entiendo
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Okay, so this might sound a bit crazy, but please hear me out.
Background: I've been living with my parents for about a year now since graduating college. I don't have a very good relationship with them. I feel like they still treat me like a child, despite my being in my early 20s, and don't trust me to do anything myself. However I've never had very high self esteem, and being out of work for a year hasn't helped, so I know that these issues with my parents are at least partly my fault. We rarely talk about these problems. Mostly I just try and hide how I feel, and I don't really know how much they're aware of it.
Problem: This is where things start getting weird. My parents cook most of the meals I eat and buy pretty much all the food in the house. Lately, I've started to notice that a lot of the things I eat seem to have some kind of greyish powder in them. Especially deserts, which my mom buys/cooks a lot of, and which I'm the only one who really eats. It's suspicious, because I can't figure out what it is and I wouldn't have thought it was a natural ingredient in things like apple pie.
Last night, for example, my mom tells me there's a pie (store bought rather than home made) in the kitchen and I should have some. When I take it out, I notice that part of the crust is broken, and that there's this grey powder underneath it. I look under some of the unbroken crust, no grey powder. Then, and this is what's really got me freaked out, I look in some of the cupboards and find a small bottle of what looks very much like the same grey powder, with no label on it.
So at this point, I'm honestly kind of scared. I realize that it could be nothing, and despite our screwed-up relationship I would have a hard time believing they'd try to harm me. However, I have to face the fact that it looks like they're trying to secretly slip me some sort of drug or chemical, and I have no idea what it is. I'm not sure what's more disturbing, the fact that I'm so screwed up and paranoid that I think my parents are trying to poison me, or the fact that they actually might be.
I think I should also say that although I know this sounds crazy, I am not a troll, and this is a real request for help and advice. What do I do? I don't want to confront them about it without more evidence, but I'm not sure how much longer I can go on just pretending everything's normal.
TLDR: Are my parents trying to kill me, or am I just going batshit loco insane?
Background: I've been living with my parents for about a year now since graduating college. I don't have a very good relationship with them. I feel like they still treat me like a child, despite my being in my early 20s, and don't trust me to do anything myself. However I've never had very high self esteem, and being out of work for a year hasn't helped, so I know that these issues with my parents are at least partly my fault. We rarely talk about these problems. Mostly I just try and hide how I feel, and I don't really know how much they're aware of it.
Problem: This is where things start getting weird. My parents cook most of the meals I eat and buy pretty much all the food in the house. Lately, I've started to notice that a lot of the things I eat seem to have some kind of greyish powder in them. Especially deserts, which my mom buys/cooks a lot of, and which I'm the only one who really eats. It's suspicious, because I can't figure out what it is and I wouldn't have thought it was a natural ingredient in things like apple pie.
Last night, for example, my mom tells me there's a pie (store bought rather than home made) in the kitchen and I should have some. When I take it out, I notice that part of the crust is broken, and that there's this grey powder underneath it. I look under some of the unbroken crust, no grey powder. Then, and this is what's really got me freaked out, I look in some of the cupboards and find a small bottle of what looks very much like the same grey powder, with no label on it.
So at this point, I'm honestly kind of scared. I realize that it could be nothing, and despite our screwed-up relationship I would have a hard time believing they'd try to harm me. However, I have to face the fact that it looks like they're trying to secretly slip me some sort of drug or chemical, and I have no idea what it is. I'm not sure what's more disturbing, the fact that I'm so screwed up and paranoid that I think my parents are trying to poison me, or the fact that they actually might be.
I think I should also say that although I know this sounds crazy, I am not a troll, and this is a real request for help and advice. What do I do? I don't want to confront them about it without more evidence, but I'm not sure how much longer I can go on just pretending everything's normal.
TLDR: Are my parents trying to kill me, or am I just going batshit loco insane?
no entiendo on
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That being said, you could always pocket the bottle you found and see what happens. Or if you don't mind seeming a little crazy, confront them about it.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
I would like to advice you to help your mother with cooking starting now. That will (1) make you feel more useful (2) make your parents think you're not utterly useless (3) you'll find out what the gray powder is and (4) you'll learn how to cook, something that is very useful when you start to live on your own.
While anything is technically possible, odds are heavily fucking stacked on it being your imagination, or something harmless. If - as your OP suggests - you have too much time on your hands, not enough mental occupation, and poor to no communication with your mom, helping her with the cooking will go a long way.
Help out more around the house until you find a job (which you really should try and do as soon as possible), get your self esteem up and move into your own place.
I want to know more PA people on Twitter.
but the whole thing really doesn't make that much sense. If they actually wanted to poison you they would use something that you don't need to eat repeatedly over a long period of time. Like arsenic or something.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
We really can't advise you to do things like scrape up the powder and take it to some lab to get it checked, because if you have psychological issues then that type of behavior will just feed into the illness. However, if they actually are harming you, then a professional therapist can help you sort it all out.
Honestly, if they wanted to poison you, you'd probably be dead by now.
https://twitter.com/Hooraydiation
If it is this, it's only representative of a suffocating presence on their part. Shed them, with knives.
I'm not sure if this is the best idea but it's one I would do.
If they do want to kill you in a slow and cruel way I think then no matter how you'll find out what the gray stuff is, they will stab you to death in your sleep with a rusty kitchen knife after they realise you're on to them.
I'm having kind of a hard time believing the OP's parents are going to murder their own blood in a slow and cruel way. It sounds a bit too much like a cheesy thriller movie.
I think this whole scenario is just something you've concocted in your head because you feel like a useless freeloader taking advantage of your parents even though you don't like them that much. You imagine (probably correctly) that they resent you and wish you would leave, but I think they would rather you get a job than die.
On that note, get a job, get an apartment, get some friends and move on with your life. It's time.
Ask them straight out.
Honestly here are various ways it can play out :
"We're not poisoning you... are you crazy?!?! we should get you help" *they care
"Oh honey you are imagining things, have some more pie" *possibly poisoning you
"Yes" *quit eating pie.
Seriously, I know kids who parents have tried to poison them as little children.
you should be doing this by now anyway btw
The important and valuable advice you should be listening to is the advice of dwwatermelon. You're not going to help yourself with this situation (the real situation being extreme paranoia) unless you hoist yourself up and start taking control of your own life. It might not be a comfortable situation... you might have to take a job you don't want to take, and you might live meagerly for a while... but you'll be living under your own power and under your own terms: and that sense of knowing that you *can* actually take care of yourself will likely make many situations in your life much easier to deal with.
My advice is to find the bottle when your Mom is in the kitchen and say, "what kind of spice is this? I notice you use it a lot" or "is this salt?" or something nonchalant like that.
Did you watch Rosemary's Baby recently?
But seriously, just directly ask them and say "hey, what's this?".
Case 1. Not poison
Hey mom, what's this?
Just some flaxseed sweety!
Case 2. Poison
Hey mom, what's this?
Just some flaxseed sweety!
Yes, let's shut down all lines of communication with the parents. That will most certainly help.
Plenty of people can make it in this economy without a college education, so I can't really see what your excuse is. Go find a job. Apply everywhere and get a shitty job waiting tables or bagging groceries or working retail. Get a shitty apartment, be poor, make friends, party every weekend, eat crappy food and don't go to the doctor. Get laid, live paycheck to paycheck, stress out about everything, learn the local bus schedule, hang out with your friends, and have a good time. Welcome to your twenties.
Maybe your parents are slowly poisoning you, or maybe your dad has rough shits and now your mom is spiking all of his (and since you don't cook for yourself, this means by extension your) food with fibercon or something. Who knows, and who cares? Move out, and it won't be a problem anymore.
Maybe you majored in something obtuse like "guy who designs nozzles to maintain perfect airflow for space shuttle toilets" or something, and your chosen career path may not have a lot of openings right now. Big deal. Maybe you won't find a job in your chosen career path for another year. But, if you stay at home until that time comes, you're going to be that guy who lives with his parents in a year. If you do what I said above, you'll have friends, a job, a few bucks, and an actual life in a year.
tl;dr - Get a job, any job, right now. Move out. Spend your off time growing up and looking for a better job.
10%+ unemployment.
Seriously, telling someone to just get a job and move out is all well and good, but actually doing it is something else entirely in this economy. There's a reason the government had to extend unemployment benefits.
The first post tells us that he has confidence issues, and is being coddled by his parents. The best thing he could do is get a job and leave the house.
I know the economy is shitty, but odds are somebody in his town is hiring for something, and if he actually looks and keeps looking, sooner or later he'll find it.
He's got problems, yes. But let's not act like he's some kind of dysfunctional person just because he can't get a job right now.
i lived in NY recently and couldn't find a job for the life of me, and i applied everywhere, fast food/retail/big box stores/malls etc. living in the middle of nowhere has many more job openings thanks to less competition. hell i know people up here with multiple jobs.
please don't make assumptions on limited information
as for the poisoning thing, just ask you mom what it is silly
If he is not in school, and is not working, then his freetime activities should include a considerable amount of job hunting. If he looks he might find it, if he doesn't, he won't. It's pretty clear cut.
Right now we've got a dude who is essentially a manchild, who really needs to get out of the house even if his parent's aren't trying to poison him.
I don't care where you live, if you can't find a job after a year of looking (and looking is what he is supposed to have been doing for the past year), then the problem is with you, not with the economy.
Everyone else, stay on-topic.
Find a small rodent, feed it the powder and then gauge the shift in gayness (a second rodent might be needed for this part).
working at a fast food place will not garner anywhere near enough money to live off of, even at full time. it's great you think jobs magically go to the right person but in a highly populated low-income area the competition can be overwhelming. you shouldn't assume he's doing nothing and place the blame squarely on him, it can be any combination of circumstances
I don't know how trying to convince someone to find a job and move out of their parent's house so they can get their life started while they're in their twenties is "not helping", but have it your way, I'm out.
Would you like to list a positive effect of asking the parents what it is? You seem to have completely missed the point of the example. He can not trust whatever answer they give him, leaving him with the exact same question before he asked. Personally, I doubt it's actually poison, but regardless, a trustworthy person certainly does not hide unlabeled powders in someones food.