For flutherites over 50. Do you feel the older you get the more people feel they need to control your life?

I’m hopeful that it’s just you (and just a phase).

I’m sometimes astonished at the level of deference I’m accorded simply because I appear to know what I’m doing, what I want, or that I’m right where I belong. (I’ve also learned how to act those parts much better over a long life.) Sometimes it helps to have made so many mistakes, to have learned so many lessons and remembered so many awful earlier incidents that are being repeated by others now, and approaching with a level of patience, understanding, sympathy (when appropriate) and humor seems to open a lot of doors.

I don’t “accept” bad treatment even when that’s what I get; I’ve learned ways to give “a look” (even over a telephone sometimes!) that gets me to someone else with a better attitude, a better idea, another way of doing the thing that’s giving us trouble, and we ‘get er done’ some other way and walk away with better attitudes.

I’m rambling, and I’m not even drunk.

It’s not happening to me yet, although I have a daughter who thinks I will want to build a mother in law hut in her back yard when I’m older. (Never gonna happen.)
I have seen it with my MIL though. My sister in law want so badly to take over and she is a fiercely independent woman. She is now in assisted living and it hurts to see so much of her decisions taken away from her.

@Judi I am with you there. I’ve already told my children that I will not live with them when I am old.
@CWOTUS I don’t accept bad treatment either, but when it is family, it can be so annoying. It’s why I stay away from so many of them as it is. I don’t want to be told what to do. Funny thing is that they don’t get it unless I point it out. I never boss them around or try to really push something they don’t want to do. Yes, maybe the kids when they were young but they are full grown adults with minds of their own. That is the way I raised them to be and even when I don’t agree with them, I let them to their own devices and wishes. It’s not that any of my family members think I am daft but they think they know how I feel about things better than myself, and its really about trying to get their own way.

I’ve always had a simple way to live my life. I don’t tell you want to do if you don’t ask me and I don’t want people to tell me what to do if I don’t ask. This is all over a family event that I do not want to attend. It’s blowing up into a whole mess. I was close to giving in and going because I don’t actually care for the drama but I feel like I have to draw a line in the sand and stand my ground. It was simpler when I was younger. I could be stubborn and say no to people when I didn’t want to do something but I find I’m losing my desire to fight.

My husband says stick to my guns and don’t let anyone guilt me or push me into doing anything I don’t want to do. But this has made me aware that I have been letting people get away with guilting me into doing stuff I didn’t want to do for some time. I don’t know when it happened but somewhere along the way, I gave some of my power away.

So it made me wonder if this is how and when it begins for people as they age, that they end up having people try to dictate their lives.

I am not old old yet but I am over 50 and have never been more in control of my own life. I am divorced, financially independent and my kids are each 3,000 miles away. When my mother was alive and my husband was in my life, there was a lot of power that I gave away but not now. There may come a time when they try to control me but it’s nowhere near happening now.

At this point in my life I feel less controlled by others. For the most part I like that. But as time goes by, I increasingly find myself having to make decisions about finances, health, house maintenance, etc. that I sometimes wish somebody else would make for me.

My background is similar to @janbb‘s and as soon as circumstances permitted, I released myself into the wild. It was tough at first, but like my brave friend, I have never regretted it. There may be a day, if I live long enough, when I’ll need assistance with Activities of Daily Living and I will have to surrender some independence to a hopefully competent nursing staff. But we’re not there yet and god help them if they arrive at my door too early.

Only my daughter, and she has mellowed, for the most part now.
She is 27 now and after numerous reminders that I know myself well and am quite capable of making my own decisions ( at the ancient age of 55 ) she has backed off. It was especially bad a few years ago when she was in her early to mid-20’s.
” Mom, I think you should buy a new car,” ” Mom, you should join a book club ”, “Mom, I think you should do ABCXYZ!”

Gah!

One of the more recent pieces of unsolicited advice really annoyed me.
As many of you know I took a major hit in this depression situation the last few handful of years.
At one point my daughter told me that she could “teach” me to live on a particular amount of money, saying, ” you were used to living on this much but I can teach you to live on this much.”
Oooh…THAT pissed me off, I’m a big girl and can budget my money quite well thank you.

As IF I hadn’t been the poor, starving college kid once upon a time myself.
I budget my money just fine, I just need to HAVE money to budget it now. lol
While we have a great relationship and share many similar personalty traits, humor, creativity, she is much bossier and hard nosed than I am, that’s her dads DNA rearing it’s ugly head. lol
She is a very hard driving and ambitious young women and still young and hot headed enough to think she knows best.

It’s difficult to determine whether the situation is as you fear, or just that we grow more aware of this tendency to be bossy in others. The women in my life who are bossy (and that pretty much defines most of them) have always treated me this way. It doesn’t bother me, since I usually ignore the barking. When I want a little fun, I sit in a room with the 3 women who matter most to me in the world. It’s a wonderful show, as the 3 of them demand that I make tea or serve them cake, as the conversation evolves toward the listing of my many shortcomings. The best times are had when I suggest that their bullying is both useless and the primary reason that 2 of them remain unattached. The consensus among the 3 of them appears to be “who needs a man when we have you to shove around?”

^^ Jesus Christ, man, get the hell out of there before you develop a stutter or something.

I fear it’s too late, though your sympathy is heartwarming. The fact is that the 3 of them together so conform (at least verbally) to the rolling pin wielding bully wife stereotype that it cracks me up. That seems to annoy them somewhat, so I guess we all have our fun.

@stanleybmanly I’ve already pushed “9” “1” and my finger is hovering over the last “1”. Say the word and it too shall be pressed!

I don’t experience that actually. No doubt the people who know me well enough know I make up my own mind, it’s always been that way.