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So, the holiday was pretty stressful, although I did successfully orchestrate the actual Day. Not sure how many years that took off my life, though. Fallout, of course, continues.
Things that occurred during the week long period of family togetherness, in no particular order:
- My brother had a little rage attack at me. Of course, at me and not the person actually causing the anger. During dinner. At least nobody tried to say it was ok for once.
- My SIL sent my mother a book on cognitive behavioral therapy as part of her xmas present. #helping This is not the first time my SIL has done this sort of thing. So much passive aggressive crap in this family.
- My brother and SIL brought all the holiday presents now because just sending them in the mail wouldn't be as fun as getting to give them to us. And arranged for the theater of giving play with my mother, who loves this garbage of performing family. Let's pretend!
- Upon which my mother promptly decided that even though she had been allowed to orchestrate their little performance, she had to give out her xmas presents, too! Meta pathologies ftw.
- My brother and SIL insist on giving my parents these techie presents because they are going to modernize them! even though both of my parents have said would you not do that please? This time it was an Apple TV. Which my brother finally figured out might not have been a great idea but my SIL kept pushing trying to get them to let her hook it up to something. Oh, good. A control fight with my mom. My mom won. Meanwhile, my SIL opened everything up and god knows where the packaging went and if everything that came in the box is still there. Turns out, my SIL wanted it hooked up so she could watch it. I guess the TV at the hotel wasn't cutting it. Or watching on her phone, or just watching the Fios TV. I'm confused, this was a present for my parents?
- Nobody paid any attention to the fact that they were not actually making plans so my dad could spend time with and enjoy people visiting while still respecting his illness and exhaustion. In fact, they were making him more tired and ill but he felt he couldn't say anything. So guess who went around and had a quiet word with everyone individually because my mother straight up said she didn't give a damn. She arranged all of this for my dad and she was being so great to have arranged all this just so he could enjoy himself he was damn well going to enjoy himself. I know, it was none of my business.
- Which leads to the bit where my mom blew up at me for reasons that are pathologic and irrational, triggering my niece and my dad, whereupon I carefully and quietly told her that was not ok and we all know that went well. She started with throwing groceries on the counter. I let my niece and dad take care of themselves and dealt with confronting my mother, which kept her away from them, who then pouted for days, decided I was a horrible human being, and was just generally her on steroids.
- Then, hospice failed to notify us that the doctor was coming to recertify my dad. My mom is completely incapable of dealing with anyone coming near the house that she didn't know about and approve of ahead of time. Panic, anxiety, paranoia, control issues, whatever. Anyway, apparently she lost it at them and the doctor left.
Somehow, she realized she had done something wrong and called the hospice team social worker. The same one she had refused to talk to or have anything to do with until now. And got her to help do something about the situation. So they are coming tomorrow, and I will be there, and we will see what happens. Nope, not stressed at all. Why do you ask?
What else? Oh, right.
My brother and nephew will be back tomorrow. My mother has continued to push and push and push about them staying in the house, but since we have this tiny 1 and 1/2 story house that she has kept arranged in the least hospitable fashion, aside from her trying to stick it to me about how I can't tell her not to have her children in her house, etc. I didn't, but I did point out a few other issues like the ones around my dad needing to not have people in the house when he needs to rest because the noise and energy and chaos affects him even if he's not in the same room. She basically said he could suck it up, which, just, yeah.
Also, the 4 year old already got into the fire safe where some of my parents' important papers are. She doesn't know this because my niece and I addressed and took care of it, but he can't be unsupervised in this house. It is the opposite of child safe and there will not accidentally be adults all over just in case this time. In fact, it will be her and my brother, because not my job.
So I contacted my brother directly and he had the good sense to agree that a hotel would be the best thing for many reasons. That wasn't confirmed until yesterday, though, which finally forced my mom to stop with the garbage about how she was going to make this staying in the house thing happen. I don't know what fantasy this is, but one of the things I reminded her of was that the rescheduled hospice visit is tomorrow and does she really want to risk messing that up again by having my brother and nephew here? Subtext: because she can't handle it. She blames me and my presence.
Um, oh, and this morning my mother once again managed to remind my father that he should be grateful she hasn't left him. While threatening to leave him. Because that was how she provided support for his depressed mood. Telling him she hadn't left him was something that should make him feel good. The mind reels, truly, from this sort of miserable behavior. I spent a lot of time helping him deal with that choice tidbit after she left. Did I mention? She threw that at him as she was leaving the house. She's also wrong except in the literal sense because she abandoned my dad (and us) mentally and emotionally to be involved with her brother.
Little things like this afternoon when she tried some pointless retcon sine context of why people ate the chicken up and not much of the turkey breast last week was because they wanted dark meat. Which, I mean, is totally irrational on the face of it for a number of reasons, but also who cares? There's leftover turkey and you enjoyed eating it today. Yay? Why the retcon? When I pointed out that we had the same thing last year and people ate it she got more weird. There was also some weird thing about getting a turkey breast that was dark meat and I was all what? That's not how that works. It just got weird, is what I'm saying.
So, uh, that's a lot of it, I guess.
How was your holiday?
So, the holiday was pretty stressful, although I did successfully orchestrate the actual Day. Not sure how many years that took off my life, though. Fallout, of course, continues.
Things that occurred during the week long period of family togetherness, in no particular order:
- My brother had a little rage attack at me. Of course, at me and not the person actually causing the anger. During dinner. At least nobody tried to say it was ok for once.
- My SIL sent my mother a book on cognitive behavioral therapy as part of her xmas present. #helping This is not the first time my SIL has done this sort of thing. So much passive aggressive crap in this family.
- My brother and SIL brought all the holiday presents now because just sending them in the mail wouldn't be as fun as getting to give them to us. And arranged for the theater of giving play with my mother, who loves this garbage of performing family. Let's pretend!
- Upon which my mother promptly decided that even though she had been allowed to orchestrate their little performance, she had to give out her xmas presents, too! Meta pathologies ftw.
- My brother and SIL insist on giving my parents these techie presents because they are going to modernize them! even though both of my parents have said would you not do that please? This time it was an Apple TV. Which my brother finally figured out might not have been a great idea but my SIL kept pushing trying to get them to let her hook it up to something. Oh, good. A control fight with my mom. My mom won. Meanwhile, my SIL opened everything up and god knows where the packaging went and if everything that came in the box is still there. Turns out, my SIL wanted it hooked up so she could watch it. I guess the TV at the hotel wasn't cutting it. Or watching on her phone, or just watching the Fios TV. I'm confused, this was a present for my parents?
- Nobody paid any attention to the fact that they were not actually making plans so my dad could spend time with and enjoy people visiting while still respecting his illness and exhaustion. In fact, they were making him more tired and ill but he felt he couldn't say anything. So guess who went around and had a quiet word with everyone individually because my mother straight up said she didn't give a damn. She arranged all of this for my dad and she was being so great to have arranged all this just so he could enjoy himself he was damn well going to enjoy himself. I know, it was none of my business.
- Which leads to the bit where my mom blew up at me for reasons that are pathologic and irrational, triggering my niece and my dad, whereupon I carefully and quietly told her that was not ok and we all know that went well. She started with throwing groceries on the counter. I let my niece and dad take care of themselves and dealt with confronting my mother, which kept her away from them, who then pouted for days, decided I was a horrible human being, and was just generally her on steroids.
- Then, hospice failed to notify us that the doctor was coming to recertify my dad. My mom is completely incapable of dealing with anyone coming near the house that she didn't know about and approve of ahead of time. Panic, anxiety, paranoia, control issues, whatever. Anyway, apparently she lost it at them and the doctor left.
Somehow, she realized she had done something wrong and called the hospice team social worker. The same one she had refused to talk to or have anything to do with until now. And got her to help do something about the situation. So they are coming tomorrow, and I will be there, and we will see what happens. Nope, not stressed at all. Why do you ask?
What else? Oh, right.
My brother and nephew will be back tomorrow. My mother has continued to push and push and push about them staying in the house, but since we have this tiny 1 and 1/2 story house that she has kept arranged in the least hospitable fashion, aside from her trying to stick it to me about how I can't tell her not to have her children in her house, etc. I didn't, but I did point out a few other issues like the ones around my dad needing to not have people in the house when he needs to rest because the noise and energy and chaos affects him even if he's not in the same room. She basically said he could suck it up, which, just, yeah.
Also, the 4 year old already got into the fire safe where some of my parents' important papers are. She doesn't know this because my niece and I addressed and took care of it, but he can't be unsupervised in this house. It is the opposite of child safe and there will not accidentally be adults all over just in case this time. In fact, it will be her and my brother, because not my job.
So I contacted my brother directly and he had the good sense to agree that a hotel would be the best thing for many reasons. That wasn't confirmed until yesterday, though, which finally forced my mom to stop with the garbage about how she was going to make this staying in the house thing happen. I don't know what fantasy this is, but one of the things I reminded her of was that the rescheduled hospice visit is tomorrow and does she really want to risk messing that up again by having my brother and nephew here? Subtext: because she can't handle it. She blames me and my presence.
Um, oh, and this morning my mother once again managed to remind my father that he should be grateful she hasn't left him. While threatening to leave him. Because that was how she provided support for his depressed mood. Telling him she hadn't left him was something that should make him feel good. The mind reels, truly, from this sort of miserable behavior. I spent a lot of time helping him deal with that choice tidbit after she left. Did I mention? She threw that at him as she was leaving the house. She's also wrong except in the literal sense because she abandoned my dad (and us) mentally and emotionally to be involved with her brother.
Little things like this afternoon when she tried some pointless retcon sine context of why people ate the chicken up and not much of the turkey breast last week was because they wanted dark meat. Which, I mean, is totally irrational on the face of it for a number of reasons, but also who cares? There's leftover turkey and you enjoyed eating it today. Yay? Why the retcon? When I pointed out that we had the same thing last year and people ate it she got more weird. There was also some weird thing about getting a turkey breast that was dark meat and I was all what? That's not how that works. It just got weird, is what I'm saying.
So, uh, that's a lot of it, I guess.
How was your holiday?
Friendsgiving left me with a cold, but so much happy that I don't care.
ReplyDeleteAnd your mother, ugh.
morning my mother once again managed to remind my father that he should be grateful she hasn't left him
ReplyDelete...this is where I would likely have been unable to resist inviting her to choose whether or not she wanted the door to hit her in the ass, so long as she was on the far side of it at the time. Which snippiness would certainly not help matters at all, and yet.