To be furious about this?

OP, I don’t know if you want to be getting the hard time you are receiving on this thread. Is this a deliberate attempt to replicate the sort of responses you would have received from your abusive, gaslighting parents? Once again, I recommend you move this thread to Relationships and/or join the Stately Homes thread. Vent in a place where people might understand where you are coming from, otherwise you are just hurting yourself and wasting your time.

I am trying to help. Sometimes, indulging people in their navel gazing is counterproductive.

This isn’t a case of abuse. She is unhappy about the way she was ‘forced’ to be friends with someone she didn’t like very much (and who didn’t like her).
If you can’t get over stuff like this, 50 years on, you either aren’t trying, or you have sunk into a state of utter self-obsession/indulgence.

Does she even realise that others have REAL problems? Is there no perspective?

You may feel YOU are helping, with your compassion and understanding.
I say you’re enabling a load of old nonsense.

And you need to have some compassion and not all of us were brought up in a picture perfect world. As a child, the way you are treated can have long lasting affects on your psyche and its not always easy to unravel it without a lot of pain.

If you are not interested in trying to help...then go look at some other persons post...this is what Mumsnet is all about, somewhere to let off steam and share experiences.

She’s an adult now. She needs to get a grip.

Do you not considered that she may feel that she was being controlled and manipulated? And the person they tried to force on her was also being abusive to her from the sounds of it.

That is a relentless environment to be in. She is just trying to understand and find answers her parents clearly have not/cannot provide.

You are looking at this with an adult mind, she was a child trying to navigate her way through a traumatic upbringing.

That actually makes sense. Your parents are not around for you to have these conversations with and so here you are ruminating over things that you cannot resolve with them.

has there been a situation with your children that has triggered these issues? How old are they?

Are you actually kidding me?
Your mum was an alcoholic and abusive to you, yet you find the orchestrated friendship they set up as having robbed you of your childhood ?
FFS. Get a grip

It sounds like you had a hard situation from a very young age.
I wonder if your parents pushing you and this girl together, despite you not being suitable as friends, suggests they had an inkling they were failing you? But there actions totally missed your needs.
Lots of people have suggested therapy. The children of alcoholics need a chance to process why their primary care givers failed to give appropriate care. Often siblings process together. Do you have any family who saw the reality and how it impacted you? Can you talk to them? If not, finding appropriately qualified therapy could be really helpful.

Op, do you have children? Are your parents still alive? Do you have a support network at all? Friends? Family?

@Overlenders get yourself some therapy. You’re rightly angry about your childhood but holding onto it is only doing yourself wrong.

This has to be a wind up/troll post now.

That's the crux right there as being a child forced into toxic and doing adult caring roles and then forced into friendships would cause these feelings now which are absolutely valid. You were a child but lost a childhood which is why I got you straight away. Also I think people forget that early experiences can and does shape us as adults. We are all immature as children and with experiance we gain maturity. I can completely understand why you feel the way you do and please reach out to friends to support you. As an adult you will be grieving the child you were and also dynamics of families, people and society in general. It will get easier but work through all the emotions and dont let anyone tell you that your feelings are not valid.

I think it's been part of the change of life with being middle aged and peri menopause to be honest as traumas dealt with years ago can sneak up unexpectedly and what seems trivial to some people are far from it when in that moment as families and life can be complex. I used to hate the big family gatherings as a child as like you have experienced chaos and alcoholism with relatives.

It sounds like a very strong reaction to something which was annoying but hardly the end of the world- lots of parents try to foster friendships, especially if they are worried about their own children.

Has something happened in your life recently to remind you of this? Sometimes things will pull up memories from years ago. Or if we are feeling stressed or unhappy, our brain retrieves memories of times we felt like that before.

If it is a random thing that you are processing, fair enough. But if you think about it a lot or go over it a lot, you may need to talk to a professional about why that is happening. You mentioned attention - if you have ADHD or ADD you may also be prone to getting hung on on questions of fairness.. Most people dont like unfair behaviour, but people with ND find it particularly hard to cope with.

Maybe there was TWO reasons they wanted you to be friends?
’this doesn’t wash though’ - Christ alive. Your parents simply encouraged and fostered a friendship that you weren’t particularly invested in. End of drama.

It's alright to feel miffed that a friendship was forced on you. But to feel furious and violated is OTT especially so many years later. Maybe "Anna Taylor" was forced to befriend you by her parents, they perhaps could see your mum was an alcoholic and aggressive and wanted Anna to look out for you, get you out of the house for a bit and that was their way of trying to help.