Your parents are not doing this to you. Your siblings aren't doing this to you. You are doing this to yourself. You know that. I know you know it because the only reason I know it is that you just laid the truth out there.

You are clinging to your parents out of fear of venturing forth. Get honest with yourself. Yes, there are risks with striking out on your own. Some things will go wrong, if you do. But you'll survive those setbacks and get stronger and smarter. You know where this current arrangement is taking you - nowhere. So make a move. Age 24 is a good age to do it. Wait a couple more years and you'll never do it.

You can spend your life being bitter at everyone else . . . or not. You make the call. And don't wait for someone - like some guy - to pull you out of this. Women who do that end up back where they started - with some man taking the place of their parents.

You basically are an honest person. That's why you revealed as much of the truth as you did. I was an introvert . . . still am. I clung to my parents like they were my only real friends . . . . . because they were. Though I was the eldest, I was the last to leave the nest. I'm so glad I did. My first apartment was a tiny place with only one window in a poor neighborhood. My car battery got stolen twice from in front of where I lived. I washed my clothes in the kitchen sink to save money by not going to the laundromat. But there was a joy in my heart from having my own "domain." At times, I cried from loneliness, but it was no worse than the loneliness of being cooped up with my parents. And I found strength I didn't know I had. Nothing beats being mistress of your own fate. That's what I learned.

If you vanished from the earth tomorrow, your parents would adapt to your absence. Let them be responsible for themselves. That way you can learn to really love them again, instead of resenting them, as you do now.

Good luck.