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saraha

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Everything posted by saraha

  1. Oh! The Hardy boys and Nancy drew series from the seventies! 70s Parker Stevenson was my girls first crush 😆 Murdoch Mysteries
  2. My kids love ordering old Alfred Hitchcock movies. We watched “strangers in a train” last night we also like watching Columbo
  3. Mashed potato casserole: casserole dish full of your favorite mashed potatoes, topped with cooked sausage and shredded cheese. Bake to warm everything and melt cheese. My kids love this.
  4. That’s not to say I do t still have visceral knee jerk reactions to her, I almost think even more than I used to. I still have trouble discerning which behaviors are which and how to handle them. I still have a fear reaction to her displeasure (although it is getting better all the time) and I am learning sympathy. But my patience is also at an all time low with her, dh says she has used up her life time allotment of my patience, and it definitely feels like that. The hardest part is that the anxiety behaviors are mixed in with pure jealousness and meanness. Or she goes about expressing her anxiety in an inappropriate way.
  5. Yeah, all of my moms behaviors can’t be traced solely back to anxiety, so I am working on teasing out which behaviors are (deserving of grace) and which are mean, jealous, spiteful behaviors (need to be dealt with directly). The last few years have been a long journey in my own mind and I have a long way to go. But I have been making progress, with how I handle her internally, how I interact with her, and now I’m getting to the point that the true anger at her treatment of me is moving past and I can start to try to figure out what to do from here. I really have run the gamut of “if she died next week I wouldn’t even go to her funeral “ to this is the mom I got. There were some good times sprinkled in, and how do I want her to live in my brain for the rest of my life. Trying to limit contact and make it as positive as possible is where I am now. And when she’s gone, I will be sad for her and the life she was dealt/chose to live, and sad for me and mine at the missed opportunity. One thing I know for sure though is that I have clawed and fought hard to be a different kind of mother. She did teach us some good things along with the bad and I do have some things to be thankful for. That’s what keeps me still trying, even when she figuratively slaps me in the face.
  6. Could be. I would have no way of knowing. I’m pretty sure she’s always been very anxious in some ways that, looking back, explains a lot of behaviors I didn’t understand at the time. Knowing that she struggles with her mental health is why I haven’t done like my brother and just cut her off completely. It feels cruel to do it knowing there is an element she can’t control. But boy is it been a hard row to hoe
  7. We did! Winners of different games got prizes, and then as the big game each person got five ping pong balls to bounce into cups full of prizes. I thought I made the cup with the $5 the hardest cup to win, but all 6 of them managed to get it!
  8. That’s neat, I’ve never heard of those. She doesn’t have a cell phone though. No cell phone and no internet
  9. I can’t! She’s still boycotting the post office! her birthday is coming up, maybe I’ll get her a nice pad and pen to leave by the phone…
  10. This is kind of what happened to me. I’ve lost all contact with extended family.
  11. I think every time she said I don’t want to bug you and your sister, I wonder if she means “ it bugs me when…”
  12. I am afraid the sigh means she’s taking time to reload. I guess she couldn’t think of anything fast enough so threw out there your aunt is dying, bye and hung up the phone. 🙄
  13. Last year we decide with tween to twenty something, we were done doing baskets and egg hunts and did minute to win it games. It was a blast and everyone wants to do it again this year
  14. Well, I called her. She’s not happy, and tried to lay the guilt on, but in the end I basically said I cannot commit to that. I can call when I’m available and you can call whenever you want. She said I don’t respond to voicemails fast enough and it drives her nuts, it drives her crazy when she can’t talk to me when she wants to, and she’s getting older now and if she can’t tell me something when she thinks of it, she’ll lose it 🙄 so I told her write it down and I promised to try to be more timely returning calls. She kept repeatedly saying I don’t want to bug you and your sister, she said it like five times, so when I could get a word in I said firmly “stop saying that, you do not bug me when you call. If I answer it means I have time to talk. If I don’t, I don’t, but you aren’t bugging me.” That stopped the talking for a hot second, then She changed tactic and started in with you and your sister this, you and your sister that and when I could I said “I have no idea what sisters schedule is like, but I know for me, you can call whenever. I will answer when I can and call you back when I can’t. My schedule right now is crazy and I can’t commit to a certain day and time. I stayed super calm and when she realized I wasn’t backing down she said fine, she will be calling me on Sunday evenings before she goes to bed. I said “Ok, and I’ll answer if I can.” She sighed heavily, paused, and told me she thinks my aunt is dying. And she’s going to do what she can for her. Tell everyone I love them, bye and hung up the phone. So. I guess that’s good. It’s ridiculous that I am a grown woman and still get sick at my stomach when I have to go against her. But, progress? I guess I’ll find out the first Sunday I can’t answer. Not sure what to do with that information about my aunt. I haven’t seen or talked to her in years and years because my mother was the gatekeeper and it’s a long story I didn’t figure out for years.
  15. I’m your mother too. 😆
  16. I love surprises. It doesn’t matter what the surprise is, I love it. Doing a chore or something I’ve been meaning to do even if it’s not perfect? I love it. I’m An acts of service girl so even poorly hung pictures would make me happy. In a year, I would rearrange the room and move the pictures where I want them. Bought me an ugly green sweater that doesn’t fit because you saw it and remembered my favorite color is green and I once bought a sweater? I will happily wear it. I love to surprise my people too, and no one seems to mind. Although I’ve never thrown a surprise party, so not sure how that would go over.
  17. You’ve got this! I hope it goes smoothly!
  18. I think this is what I’ll say when I call. It’s perfect
  19. I totally agree with this, it is not about communication at all. We haven’t had a two way conversation probably ever in my whole life. It’s all about her You are right. Her calls do annoy me sometimes/ a lot. But I try to never show it, which is why I wait to call her back if I am not in the mood. I’m insulted that she would lead off with “I promise to never call and bother you again” when I go out of my way to be nice. Yes! If she would have talked to me about her needs instead of calling trying to make a pretend deal which was really a thinly veiled demand and acting like I treat her poorly! Unfortunately she doesn’t have a cell phone or access to any internet. She has also been boycotting the post office for several years now. I absolutely agree that I didn’t handle it well, which is one of the reasons I was up all night kicking myself. You guys are amazing. Thank you so much for understanding. I haven’t gotten the nerve to call her yet. Thanks for helping me have a balanced view, I am so hopelessly left of center when it comes to anything dealing with her.
  20. Of course, when I do call and tell her I don’t like her deal, she’ll find a way to make me the bad guy. “All I asked for was one quick phone call a week and you don’t even want to do that. I’m trying to make it as easy on you as I can! Why are you so mean to me, you just want to argue about everything all the time” I think maybe short and sweet is the right way to deal with this. Just tell her my schedules are very chaotic so I want to keep our communicating the way it is. We check in with each other as we are free. If she starts in, I just need to say, having a set time doesn’t work for me and we should just keep it the same and find a way to hang up.
  21. That’s a good point. Maybe I should also suggest she talk to her doctor if she is feeling a lot of anxiety and worry…
  22. She is definitely trying to control something she lost control of a while ago. When I was much younger, she taught me to answer every time she called by calling the police on me when I didn’t answer. She did it twice. For the next 20 odd years, I answered every time she called. If she called and I wasn’t home and she left a message, I would call her back the second I got the message. The first thing she would say was she thought she was going to have to call the police on me, it’s a good thing I called back. She threatened that recently, it seems I remember writing about it on here and @Rosie_0801 was like let her, then when they show up, explain she’s crazy or something like that. That was a light bulb moment for me. I’m tempted to call her when I get a chance and say, the other day when you called, you didn’t seem to be in the mood to listen to my opinion on your deal. I don’t really like this deal. You don’t inconvenience me when you call. If I can talk, I answer, and if I can’t I don’t. My Sundays are very unpredictable. Sometimes ds24 or dd22 come home for the weekend and need driven back. Sometimes we make plans as a family. It seems like it would be more stressful to have to stick to a time than to just call each other when we are free.
  23. I have one too and I like it. I can plug it up on the deck and keep all that heat outside
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