Helicopter/controlling parents

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I'm living in a bedroom upstairs at my parents house. It gets cold up there. Really cold. If I don't leave my door open none of the heat from the wood stove will come up into my room. My dad came up one day and told me that if I wanted my room to get warm I need to leave the door open (already knew that). I finally figured out how to build a proper fire in the wood stove.

Here comes the annoying part. Every time I go downstairs to make a fire when my mom's home she tells me I'm doing it wrong. No matter how I do it (even if I do it exactly as she told me to the last time), I'm doing it wrong. Just now, I went downstairs and my mom is like, "Do you have the vent open all the way it smells a little smokey?!?!?!?!" And I'm like, "Yes." And I'm immediately annoyed because I can never f*****g build a fire without her saying something and it REALLY pisses me off because she's a control freak and has to have everything done HER WAY. Even if there's a different technique with the same outcome it needs to be HER way or it's wrong. Because her way is always better.

I never have any issues making a fire and heating my room when I'm the only one home. I'm getting to the point where I'm just not going to try anymore. And I know if I ever tell my mom about how she makes me feel (like I can't f*****g do anything right) she'll deny having done anything to make me feel that way. Like my parents always do. If they don't mean it that way, then I'm not allowed to feel that way.

But yeah, I can't make a proper fire when she's here cause she will not f*****g leave me alone. It makes me so angry and I get really short with her and become monotone because I'm trying to control my anger. I can't even empty and refill the dishwasher without her going back in and rearranging everything cause I didn't do it to her liking. I’m pretty sure she does it when my dad empties the dishwasher too.

It makes me not want to do it anymore but then if I don't empty the dishwasher I won't be contributing enough to the household.

Sometimes I just want to scream at her.

I have a couple of thoughts here.

One, yeah she does sound very controlling and it's hell living with someone like that.

I think living independently should be your goal, i.e., moving out. But that probably can't happen right away.

In the short term, ask her to make the fire, since she always criticizes the way you do it. If she doesn't want to make it, say "OK I'll build the fire, but please do not tell me what I am doing wrong."

Negotiate some other chore for your "contribution" to the living situation, since she doesn't seem to like the way you load the dishwasher. Maybe you could empty it, but someone else can fill it; but meanwhile maybe your job would be to take the trash out. Something like that.

I know exactly what kind of person your mother is, from your description, she probably cannot help herself but be that way, and you are entirely right to feel frustrated by it. Good luck to you.

Not letting you make any contribution without making a big show of how you can't do anything right and you give them more work than you save them is a pretty strong hint that you should get the hell outta there if you ask me.

Yeah, that MUST be why whenever I put all my things into boxes my dad asks why I'm doing that and that I shouldn't feel like I have to move out or like they don't want me here. They're constantly trying to reassure me of that but the way they act says otherwise. I've never been anything but confused about what it is they really want from me.

And I know that they won't like what I'm doing to make money. But I want to make money so I can move back out. But it works for me and if I tell them they'll just guilt trip the hell out of me. So much guilt I've felt for things I could have done and I could be out on my own right now. But no, I listen to them. I don't do things I want to do because I'm afraid of hurting them. It's like, if I wasn't so afraid of hurting them I would be living on my own. It's a weird cycle.

That sounds like an extra bunch of good reasons to move out; especially the reassurance-but-not-quite part and the eternal doubt it entails.

What are you doing to make money?

Something that has stigma attached to it.

Cam girl. I'm just starting anyway. I fail job personality tests, suck at interviews. So, this works. I need money now, I'm tired of waiting and doing things the way they tell me but getting f****d over every time. It's like a sign. That I have to do things in a "dysfunctional" way or whatever. I mean, that's how they'd see it. I don't know what your guys' opinion is on the subject.

cam girl is a form of sex worker?

I don't disrespect it, but that stuff can be awfully hard on the psyche. Is there any danger involved?