I'm not crying I swear!

I'm 40 years old and I'm not going to cry, not going to cry, not going to cry!!

okay... I'm not going to cry where anyone can see me because no one understands anyway, not even my husband.

Dear Daughter I promise I will never abandon you. Never ever. I will never leave you and then make you feel like it's your fault that I am going. I promise.

No one can make you feel guilty unless you let them. I know. I know. It's her choice that she's going.

This would all be better if it was June and work was slower instead of April when I am so busy. Right? It's her fault for the lousy timing. She doesn't want my help anyway. If she did then she would do it my way. She'd listen to my needs. Why does everything always have to be about her anyway. Now I'm getting angry.

Dammitt!!! Why does it have to hurt so much? Every time she leaves me I take it personally. I know it's not personal. She is just living her own life. I just don't like it. I thought I was doing a good job of detaching but not today. Today everything is all twisted up. My husband wants to know when he'll get his wife back. Hopefully by next Saturday.

How do I explain leaving to my 5 year old?

I'm not going to cry. I'm not going to cry. I'm not going to cry. I'm just going to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Dammit!

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It's all about the boundaries folks

I haven't posted lately in part because I don't have anything good to say. My mother has been pushing, pushing hard to keep me away. She is selling off her stuff because she needs money to move at the end of April. A week or so ago she told me NOT to come to her tag sale. She started a huge fight with me on the phone while I was at work (I had called her to see if she needed more boxes). Then she called my house and left a NASTY message on my answering machine. So glad my daughter didn't hear that one! Sheesh.. I wanted to call her back so badly, I literally stood looking at the phone holding my hands behind my back. I just stared at that phone and let the voices in my head sound off. But I didn't pick up the phone. I kept my Al-Anon going and I knew that making that phone call would not be NICE. It would not improve anything and it was not necessary. I left the phone alone. She hasn't called me since. Now our birthdays are here. She sent me a card and some cash. Hmm... an expensive card for someone claiming to be broke, and why did she send cash?? I plan to deliver her card on Saturday (her birthday is Sunday). I will return the cash she gave me in her card and I'm also going to give her some girl scout cookies. Nothing fancy. No taking her out for a meal or for ice cream. Just going to drop off the card. She may or may not be having her indoor tag sale again this weekend. If she is then she'll be home and dropping off the stuff will be easy. If she's out then I'll just leave it in the mailbox.

However I'm not using the birthdays as a "all is better now" thing. Just because she sent me a card and a gift does not mean all is forgiven for her rotten behavior on the phone concerning the tag sale. I understand that she is probably selling stuff I don't want her to sell and she doesn't want me to see her doing that. It's her stuff she can do what she wants. I am being respectful by not going to the tag sale. I am respecting her boundaries there. However it's too bad that she has chosen to be this way, and it's too bad she was so mean and nasty to me on the phone.

I feel badly for my daughter. She is getting cheated out of good grandmothers. My father's girlfriend helps sometimes but she has 5 other grandchildren of her own. She doesn't really need a step-grandchild very much. Oh well.. now I'm rambling.

Boundaries... and the serenity prayer are keeping me going these days and I'm still working that stuff every day.

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Calling all Adult Children of Alcoholics! Help me here please!

I feel like I'm really done. I mean it. I'm tired of empty threats from the alcoholic parent. I'm tired of empty threats from myself. I want to be DONE with the drama. She's been bothering me for weeks. I keep stepping back, hoping she's calmed down, and then I pick up the phone and try to reach out to her only to have her go nuts again. She's not that far away right now, less than 20 miles, but I haven't seen her in a while. So at the beginning of the week she left some crazy messages on the answering machine. I waited until tonight to call her back because I didn't want to feed into the insanity. She started right up though. 20 minutes later she's in tears slamming down the phone for the 3rd time and I'm angry that I got sucked into another fight that I wasn't looking for. I want this to END. I know my daughter deserves to have grandparents in her life, but this grandparent doesn't possess the qualities I want her to see. This grandparent is untrustworthy and mean and a huge blackmailer.
So what do I do? How do I make it end? Do I confront her and let her know that I am cutting her off? Do I tell her why (not sure I can explain it anyway, and she's so irrational she won't understand etc)? Or do I just stop returning phone calls and let it "slip away"? My father has been divorced from her since I was less than 2 years old (he says she cheated on him). He says that if I cut her out of my life completely I will regret it later. I don't know. She's been gone from my life before for months at a time (her choice). The difference now is that she is older and not in good health. Well she's never been in good health. That's always been one of her ways of getting at me with her blackmail.. but anyway... I keep asking myself "How much more do I have to take before I am allowed to walk away?" and if I am allowed to choose when to walk away then I want to do it soon and get it done with. There is a CHANCE that she will move away in April or June next year, but it's not a guarantee. So I could wait until then and just let her go but that seems like a long time to wait, especially with the holidays on the horizon.
So if you've got any advice or experience on this, please...!!! I'd love to hear it. I'm exhausted from this roller coaster ride that I've been living on for the last nearly 40 years and I think it's time to get off.






thank you.

I think I can set my calendar now

It seems from looking at this blog that every month around the 24th or 25th my mother and I have an argument. Not necessarily a real argument but she goes off on me and I end up wanting to cry, trying to detach, and asking myself if I have to continue this relationship with her.

On October 24th  my grandmother was being buried. My mom was on the edges then, complaining about me not spending enough time with her. When she realized she'd been outranked by my father's family she backed off.  After the burial my mother went to the cemetery to visit her parents' grave (same cemetery as my fathers' parents) and then she made some crack to me on the phone about how my father's family hadn't put enough flowers on my grandmother's grave. I was speechless at her lack of tact, but I didn't feel guilty because I knew that I had put flowers there even if no one else did. I guess this was her way at striking back at me for not spending time with her.

Then we had my father's birthday and Halloween. Well really, my father's birthday was November 1st, and she couldn't wait. She called me during the day yesterday and left a message. It angered me. I called her back and left a short but simple message that was direct and detached. Today she called again with 2 more messages, plus she managed to run into my father during the day and tried to get him on her side as well. Much to my amusement I heard about the encounter from my father's point of view and was glad to hear he had supported me (even though he didn't know about last night's game of message tag).

SO here we are again. The Holidays are coming. My husband and I have agreed on boundaries for Thanksgiving (we will not have her in our house, and we will not visit hers, we can meet in a public place). My mother is trying to change that, but I have my husband's support and I am strong.

Of course Thanksgiving and Christmas both fall in that window of 24th-25th when she seems to come after me. Should make for another eventful holiday season if I don't figure out something out soon.

I've been invited to another fight it seems

I came home from work today and found a package on my steps. Inside the bag were small photo albums that I had made and given to my mother over the past 4 years. There were also some in frames. Most are photos of my daughter, and a few are of me, my brother, my (late) grandmother, and my mom. The letter explains that some of these are duplicates, but I know I only gave her one "Christmas 2008" album.

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The letter also says things like she wishes we could be friends in spite of our differences but she doesn't want to get too involved either. She says something negative about her own mother which of course I disagree with. She says she misses her granddaughter.

Really??? Then why did she come over to the house and return all these pictures that we sent her as gifts?
I think she expected me to call her, and part of me thinks that I am "supposed to" call her. That's the polite thing, right? I am too angry though. I can't think of anything nice to say. It wasn't nice of her to give back the gifts we gave her. I don't feel like saying "thank you" for that. So I haven't called her. I don't want to fight. The package seems to have a dual message to me. It feels like she is saying "I hate you" and "I miss you" at the same time, and I don't know what to do with that.

I have to remind myself that we aren't speaking for a reason. She lies to me, she called me bad names, she is dishonest and mean. I can't trust her and I know she will hurt me. Even though she seems to be reaching out to me I have to protect myself, and my family. So the phone stays silent and I feel guilty about it.

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Still breathing...

Things did not go well. I started getting the updates right away on Friday. The biggest problem with the home repair project is that the previous owners didn't remove the old flooring, they simply built on top of it. Their laziness has caused my husband many, many hours of extra work. Losing power due to a thunderstorm didn't help things either. Whatever the reasons are, they don't really matter. The reasons, or excuses as some may say, are out of my control. I have to accept what IS. I have to remind myself that it doesn't matter how we got here, what matters is dealing with where we are now. Anger will not help. I am allowing myself to feel disappointment. I think that is acceptable. I am disappointed, very disappointed, but I am not angry. What I am doing now is working that Serenity Prayer and pulling at it. What can I change and what can't I change. What do I do next?

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On Monday morning we checked out of the hotel, got the kid a special lunch from Panera to bring to school, and returned the rental truck (sad to see that go). Then we went home together, just the two of us.

I had been warned. I knew in words what I was going home to see, but seeing it was still hard. Before I even got out of the car I was holding back the tears. After surveying the situation, and having the power go out while we were there in the house, we left. I brought my husband to work and found a place to do laundry. At the laundromat I used the internet to find another hotel. I booked it without checking with my husband first, and I booked it through until Friday morning. I don't know if that will be enough time. We might still need it Friday night, but we can extend the reservation if we need to I think. It's not the best hotel, and I'm afraid of the swimming pool because I know that at least one person has died in it. However it does have wireless internet and a microwave and refrigerator in the room (which our weekend hotel did not have). Really, I want to go home. I'm tired of eating out, I miss my yard, and I'm tired of entertaining a child. Thank goodness she's in school during the day at least.

Home repairs are never easy. Being married isn't always easy. Being a parent isn't easy. Trying to do all 3, plus work full-time.. not easy. We will get through this. We will survive. It could be worse. Soon this will all be a memory. I am still breathing.

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