So sad about how my parents are living their lives

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I'm writing to vent really, rather than seeking advice.

I'm an only child nearing middle age. My parents are in their early 70s.

My parents are married but have an unusual setup where DM stays home (in the middle east) and DF goes off to work abroad. He's been doing this for 35 years. He works as a manager of sorts in the mining industry, and the locations he works in are usually very difficult, remote places in Africa where they pay danger money. DM doesn't work and almost never has - when I say "stays home", it's almost literally that. Home plus food shopping. No friends, and she has distanced herself from everyone in our wider family. She is miserable when he’s away and guilt trips him, but neither seems able to part from the other so this arrangement is it.

DF is visiting us at the moment, on his way home from work to my mum. He is, as always, on the phone nonstop with some work crisis, rather than spending time with his GC. Who he has met about three times in their lives. He is racist and unpleasant, and very loud, and just angry - this is not a new thing; I remember the same when I was a kid. He also really doesn’t look after his health, so I can see some sort of health crisis imploding his life / theirs. He has already had a stroke.

It’s just this shit sort of dynamic where he refuses to retire despite enough to live on comfortably, I think partly because he doesn’t really want to live with DM. (One of his preoccupations is money coming to me after their death, so I have seen bank statements etc - they have plenty of money, and I have told him repeatedly that we are ok financially and I’d rather they enjoy their lives.)

But the work he does (and he is in each job a year at most, he’s always unhappy with some aspect of it and resigns) is hard and isolated. She seems unhappy whatever he does and doesn’t take much agency in her own life. It took me until well into adulthood to start ignoring his requests to ring mum/visit her/whatever else - she makes me and everyone around her miserable. He’s now trying the same with my kids, like we need to make an effort to cheer her up.

On the one hand - it’s his/their life.

On the other hand - it’s a sad sort of life. Physical decline, straitened circumstances, social isolation. I work coordinating volunteers and the people I meet my parents’ age are volunteering, playing sport, spending time with family, going to the theatre etc.

As I said - I’m not sure there’s any advice to give here. I’m just reflecting on his visit and feeling down.

I had much the same childhood as yours - raised all over the world (with my 2 brothers), mother who never worked, father always away, my mother also never had any hobbies or real friends...

In my case however it all exploded when I had just turned 21. My father (42) left my mother for his latest other woman. Family home (we'd only lived in it for 4 years) had to be sold, nasty divorce etc

In a weird sort of way it was a relief. They'd been living a lie for a good decade beforehand. My father didn't want the 'family' life and rarely came 'home'. I had no real relationship with him and when he left my mother I went full no contact with him - that was 35 years ago. I also decided to make the UK my home 25 years ago, my mother still lives in my home country and I am very low contact with her...she's a very bitter and angry narcissist and has alienated all of her family and most of her friends.

I know the feeling of being sad and worried about a parent's future. Coming to terms with the truth that their happiness is not your responsibility and that there is little you can do is always an ongoing process.