Relationships are way too difficult

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I think that may be part of the problem. I'm assuming that if her own children ignored her, they also ignored your father. However, you gave a gift to your father and not to her; you weren't ignoring the family specifically, you were just ignoring her. And she feels disrespected because you do give her a bit of affection, but you don't extend it as far as what she may feel to be "necessary" activities, such as presents on Christmas. (People are weird.)

I don't think you were being disrespectful. I think it was rude of her to force your father to return the gifts; if she really had that much of a problem with it, she could speak to you in a polite, civilized fashion with no name calling or accusations. Some people just cannot seem to work like that though. If it's been thirty years, chances are she's not going to change, which sucks.

If there's any possible way, could you ignore her beyond the scope of being polite? I'm guessing you'll still have to see her at times, but don't go out of your way to interact with her, and more or less just ignore her comments. It's not the ideal solution, but it might be better than nothing.

Sorry if this is unpopular, but I agree that it would have appeared disrespectful to get one member of a married couple in your family a present without addressing it to the other person as well. It was also bad manners for your father to send it back though, so hey, you're even.

I agree with gwenevyn on this one. As I said, it wasn't too disrespectful, but it was a little disrepectful regardless of whether it was intentional or otherwise.

It's part of the me-too mentality - and one of the reasons I have problems eating snacky food for lunch at work. Eg: If I go out and buy chips, people assume that I should have bought enough for them too - not realizing that it's my lunch - arrgh.

Anyway - They're a couple - live with it. If you want their help/friendship, apologize. If not, walk away.

It was sucky and your dad is an idiot! It was very kind and thoughtful of you to give your dad the DVDs for Christmas. I think that it highly sucks when anyone places expectations of Christmas gifts on other people. Giving should be from the heart and should never have to be done due to feeling obligated or feeling that there will be hell to pay if you don't give or give well enough. Giving should always be appreciated, but never expected.

I feel that I did a pretty good job with Christmas gifts this year. It was super difficult for me to pull it all off having to deal with all of the Christmas gifts and cards for my family and my husband's on top of all of my regular life challenges and being quite broke even without buying gifts and paying to shipping them all. I get that Christmas gifts can be a challenge for other people too, and it is totally fine with me if people choose not to send me anything for whatever reason or no particular reason at all. It just so happens that I did send my dad a very nice Christmas gift, and I sent a gift for my step mom too. I received nothing at all from them except a phone call from my dad. I am completely fine with that, and I would hope not to be put down if the situation were reversed and they sent me something nice without me be being able to send one or both of them a gift.

Anyway, my point is this:

1) It sucks that your Dad returned the DVDs to you.
2) His attitude and point of view sucks.
3) Please don't let it bother you. You did nothing wrong. You should not feel the slightest shred of guilt or feel that you 'should' have acted differently. If your step mom isn't pleased that you didn't give her a gift, that is HER PROBLEM, NOT YOURS! Please don't waste any of your valuable time or energy feeling bad about it. Okay?

What sort of cave do you have? Hope you have decorated it well. I'll come visit sometime as I understand the whole relationships are just too hard thing.

Oh, you know just a hovel. There's a Monty Python Hermit sketch in here somewhere. Something about waddling? Speedy has the complete scripts, perhaps he can fill in the blanks.

I just am really having a hard time. Normally, when people hurt me after I've bothered to get close to them, I withdraw from all humanity, but I don't know if this is a good coping skill or not. I just have that instinct to run and hide and put on a huge suit of armor so maybe it will start to feel better. Or at least make some kind of nice broth.

I guess my problem here is that I opened my life back up and let my parents back in when my son was born and now I just wonder what the hell I was thinking.

I can totally relate...I often just feel like jumping in the car and driving and driving and pulling up in a new town and starting all over again and to hell with everyone.