Living with my mother who has NPD is always a challenge.  Sometimes it gets easier.  But it's so strange, because she will get better, but then just stop, out of the blue.  People with NPD have such erratic personalities, that it feels like a roller coaster when you're around them.  

I've talked about the door issues before, how she will open my door without knocking or waiting for me to open it for her.  That's ceased again, but I know it will start up again soon.  

But twice this week she's body blocked me.  It's her thing.  I've learned to avoid it, but and she's stopped doing it for such a long time, that I kind of forgot about it.  But then this week, she's now done it twice.  When she body blocks me, its either in a doorway or a hallway and she will see me coming and either already be in her spot and refuses to move or she will move into place when she sees me and and refuse to move.  And this week she's done both.  The second time she got in my way on purpose and then acted like she didn't know she was in my way, even though I will say "Excuse me.  Excuse me.  Excuse me." over and over again until she moves (and she never does when she does this).  One time was an emergency (kind of) and I was rushing past her to get to my dog who was making really weird noises in my room (turns out, he was outside and angry nobody was letting him in LOL).  She knew this, and moved herself into the hallway that leads to my room and just stood there.  I had to reach down, grab her hips and move her myself.  She was very surprised!  

See, to my mother, body blocking a way for her to have power over you.  Back in the day, before moving here, she'd do it as a "joke" (except it was never a joke, it was the same thing and for the same reason, but she wanted you to think it was a joke).  Now she just pretends like she has no idea you want to get around her.  So when I reached down and moved her myself, she was completely weirded out, because her plan did not work.  

So the second time she did it, it was very blatant and much more aggressive, as though she was going to stand her ground this time and not let me move her.  And yet I did it again.  And again, she was surprised.   Well, if that's what I have to do move around in my own home, I will.  Granted, I also will adopt my old ways of just hiding from her when she moves herself into a hallway or doorway, so I can avoid the situation entirely if I can.  Only because apparently my mother likes to lie about me and told her BFF Christmas that I committed "elder abuse" on her because I kept her home during the pandemic (apparently a stay at home order equates to being held hostage).  So who knows what she will tell her next if I keep having to physically move her out of my way.  

Another thing she did was take all my bags I had on my couch and empty them out and put all my stuff lined up on the kitchen table.  The reason I keep bags in the living room for day or two after buying stuff is because I do not know where to put something yet, mostly because I do not want her to know I have it.  My mother has a thing for chemicals and cleaners and poison and all that fun stuff.  When my son was little, they left that shit laying around where my 2 year old son could get into it.  And one time, he did!  So I said "Could you please put this stuff up where he can't get hurt from it?"  And I was told "This is MY house, and if you don't want your son touching MY stuff?  Then don't let him out of your sight!"  Yet, my mother babysat him when I worked, so how I was supposed to not let him out of my sight if he wasn't with me?  That's her mentality on things.  She will also lay down weedkiller where her dogs and cats all walked, and said "If they die, then they know they shouldn't get into it!"  So I do not let her buy these things in our house.  So if I buy them, I need to find a place to put them she won't get into them and use them in inappropriate ways.  But alas, she emptied my shit out all over the kitchen table, as though it was her stuff to go through.  

Here's my deal: I am super, super sensitive about privacy.  If something is mine?  Don't fucking touch it unless you ask me.  And I am only speaking to my mother when I say that.  Because my kids touch my shit all the time, as does my hubby (though he's a tad more respectful LOL) and it doesn't bother me.  It's just her.  Ever since we've moved in, she's treated my stuff as though everything in this house is hers and she does whatever she likes with it.  I've battled her and battled her and battled her and asked politely, and then yelled not so politely about not touching my shit.  Once she said to me "You need to stop thinking of things as your stuff and my stuff, it's our stuff!" and I burst out laughing so hard and said "The fuck it is!" and she stomped off like a baby.  But with enough complaining, I thought she had finally relented.  But like I said before, then something like this happens.  I feel I am safe in doing something, and then she proves to me I am never safe and never have been.  Hell, she's probably been going through my bags this entire time, I just didn't know it.  

I was so angry about this, and waited for her to say "Oh, did you notice?  I cleaned out your bags!"  They were just there from the day before, so I don't get why she thought that was okay.  But she never said it.  If she had, I was going to say "And never do that again."  Now I feel weird bringing it up, so I won't.  But it still feels like an invasion of privacy.  It's none of her business what I buy.  And it's none her business where I choose to put it.  

I bought special toilet cleaner (we have SUPER hard water, it's so annoying), some weed and grass killer (for the driveway), some paint for the railings I installed in back (so she won't fall off the porch), and other misc. stuff at the hardware store.  She has a huge hard on for weed and grass killer, and I have to be careful where I put it because we have four dogs and seven cats (we used to have ten...three have died in the past year).  And they don't mess around in the driveway, thank goodness, but if it was up to my mother, she'd spray it all over the backyard, and we'd end up with more dead animals.  Because my mother doesn't give two fucks about anyone, except for what she wants.  And that's the honest truth.  She has fed people and animals things they shouldn't eat just to prove the point that she can.  She just doesn't care.  All she wants is power and for people to never tell her what to do.  (I am not joking...I told my uncle's doctor what my mother was feeding him---and the doctor yelled at her about it, and then went home and fed him more of it, even though it was something he couldn't eat, just to show that nobody could control her).  

And I told my mother she could use my nice pretty rolling cart to put a paper bag in to get weeds with.  I said "Just be careful with it, as it's my only one".  I went outside to find she had put a tiny plastic bag inside of it that didn't fit and tried to fill it up with dog poop.  Sigh.  So I took the fucking cart and put it back in my basement, where she can't get to it.  She knows I love that cart and I want to keep it clean the only reason I said she could use it was to help her out.  She has confiscated my other stuff that I've bought for myself to use in the yard, so I don't know why I thought she'd treat this any different?  It's a very pretty cart and in very good condition and should not be covered in dog shit.  But that's what she thinks of my stuff.

Mother covets everything I have.  She always has.  She had a friend in her inner circle named Valentine.  Valentine was a user and she also coveted everything that everyone had, and always asked "When you're done with that, can I have it?"  And my mother thought that was atrocious!  I always wanted to say "Well, your way is so much better.  You just take people's stuff without asking."  It's funny how much she hated her for that, yet she did it worse.  Valentine would never steal from anyone.  She always politely asked.  Granted, it was rude as fuck, but still.  So everything since we've move in, if my mother has wanted it, she will take it and not give it back.  When we moved in, I had this sofa table I loved.  And she swiped it and used it for her plants.  And I was never going to get it back.  Then one day she said "I'm going to use that for my desk in my room."  I said "No you're not.  That's mine.  You stole it from me."  She said "So?  I need a desk."  She did not need a desk, she had one, but it wasn't good enough.  So I said "Then buy one.  If you're done with that table, I want it back."  She left her plants on it and I never got it back.  Well, until she went into rehab and I put her stupid plants on the floor and put my table in the basement.  

She's still mad about that.  Oh well.  

So I recently bought a wagon off Facebook Marketplace and she was freaking out about how she's always wanted one and blah blah blah and how she was going to use it.  And I said "Well, it's mine.  And I was planning on using it."  And I haven't yet, because I get this nasty feeling of shutting down when she does that kind of stuff.  I refuse to do something if she tries to take over it.  I leave it for months and months sometimes, because I cannot bring myself to do something with it, because it stopped feeling like my item that I bought for myself, and now it's some kind of item that's in a war between a woman who's trying to take control over another woman's life and the other woman who's control is being stolen.  I just want to buy something, and use it.  That's it.  But when I do in this house, it gets stolen by another person who covets it, because she wants everything for herself.  

Not just that, I don't think it's just the fact that my mother wants it.  I think she doesn't want me to have it.  I think she cannot stand when I do something or have something that makes me happy.  Last year, she coveted my garden and then killed half of it.  When I get something cute, she will bug me until I give it to her.  She's always done that.  Ever since childhood.  To this day, she says my boyfriend and his sister (who was my best friend gave her two birds.  No, they were my friends, and they gave me the birds.  But she stole them and kept them in her room, because she didn't want me to have something of my own.  Which is also why she used to clean my room and throw everything away that I loved.  

This is why I cannot buy things for the lawn or outside.  Because if I do, she will take them down and rearrange them a thousand fucking times.  I am not allowed say so over my own things in this house.  So I just don't buy anything.  Another reason I do not like her going through my bags.

She's like a fucking selfish little tornado who wants to steal everything from me, which is partly whey she acts like my hubby is her husband.  It's gross.  But we laugh about it and make plans for our escape in the meantime.  

Thank goodness she's finally left my lawn gnomes alone.  I mean, it's only taken over a year.  But I assure you, they will be moved again soon.  Because that's what she does.  Lulls you into thinking something is over and BAM!  There she goes again. 

It's really hard sometimes to read about happy reunions between birth parents and their children.  I mean, it brings me joy to hear about it, but it also brings me great sadness, too.  But more so, when you see it on a documentary or show, it can be excruciating to watch.   Especially when the birthmother is in tears, showing she obviously loved her baby once, and still probably does.

Today I watched the seasons finale of "My Unorthodox Life" which is a show about Julia Haart, who used to be an Orthodox Jew who left her community and religion and is now the CEO of Elite World Group (a modeling agency).  I really hate reality TV, but this show is interesting because I am an atheist, and I like to see other people who were strongly religious and have also become atheists.  Her two sons are still Jewish (her youngest still orthodox) which I also think is interesting, because I came from a very strong religious background myself.  And not the one I grew up with.  No, my parents were....well, fake Lutherans.  I think we only went to church together a few times when I was little.  But eventually alcoholism became their Sunday church of choice instead.  So when I turned twelve, I started learning about paganism.  And I stayed a pagan until around, I don't know, like 2015 or so?  Maybe before that, but not much more.  I was super into my religion and I really loved it.  I still have spiritual values leftover from all of that, but I don't believe in a creator anymore, as that part never really was what spoke to me about paganism.  So I like learning about Judaism from the show, because I've found more ideas I can pull from (like practices and whatnot--not orthodox practices that undervalues women, but regular Jewish practices) that interest me.  And I've had such a horrible view of orthodox jews (and still kind of do), due to how they treat their women.  So I love that the show depicts people who have escaped it.  

Anyways, so that's not my point.  Julia works with her close friend, COO Robert Brotherton, who happens to be adopted.  And the show followed his journey to meet his birth mother.  At first, his family was dead against it, which made me super angry, because mine were too.  Except my mother went as far as lying to me and saying that my birthmother "Wanted nothing to do with you, if she saw your picture on her mother's fridge, she'd got into a rage and tear it down and throw it away."  This was a lie, confirmed both by my grandmother and my birthmother.  But I will say that my grandmother most likely did shame her for giving me up.  Which at first, I thought was so very wrong.  But then I found out something.  

I was abandoned at six months old.  Until that point, I had a mother, a grandmother, an aunt, and two uncles, all who lived with me.  And then at Christmas, my grandmother told my birthmother to leave but she had to leave me there with her.  Mostly because my birthmother was neglecting me.  So my birthmother, in a fit of defiance, said "Nope, you can't have her!  I'm going to give her away!".  They even went to court about it.  And by the time I was eighteen months old, I had lived with four families.  

When I was seventeen, I informed my mother that for my eighteenth birthday I was going to look up my birthmother, as a gift to myself for my birthday.  That's when she said that about the picture thing.  I was devastated.  She said in a nonchalant voice, as though it wasn't a big deal or anything.  Saying "She didn't even want to know you still exist."  I think I cried for a week over that one.  

Turns out, what I didn't know at the time, was that both my parents wanted me to have ZERO contact with my birthfamily.  I had no idea, as neither one ever said anything to me about it.  So when I did go to meet her when I turned 23 or so, I was so excited and thought everyone was on board.   But when I got back, both my parents laid into me and guilted me and made feel horrible, as though I had just broken their hearts and stomped all over them.  

I was so freaking confused.  

I am a very emotional person.  When I feel big feelings, I normally show it.  Not always, depending on the situation, because I am not embarrassing or rude or anything.  But I feel everything with my heart.  And in the past, I was so very big-hearted.  As I've aged, I've become more closed off in some ways.  Not getting in touch with my feelings, because I am more in touch with them than ever.  But more so, I am not as naive anymore.  Since 2013, when I started this blog, I've learned some valuable lessons about who I show my heart to.  Before, I showed it to everyone, and always got myself hurt.  But learning about narcissism has helped me to be more selective in what I share with who.  

So when I met my birthmother, I wrote her a poem.  This was before I knew about who to show my heart to.  It was my way to express how thankful I was that she gave me up because now I had a kid (though I have two now), and blah blah blah and this and that.  She read it, with zero facial expressions, and then put it down and said a cold "thanks".  And then she got up to get more food, leaving me there to wonder what the fuck just happened?

I felt as though I had been punched in the gut.  I wanted to cry.  I almost did.  I hated baring my soul to people who didn't give a shit that I was doing so.  But then again, her letter to me two to three years prior when I was 20, was just as cold and a-matter-of-factly written.  "I had a boyfriend.  He had a best friend.  I was a virgin.  I slept with his best friend for my first time.  I slept with my boyfriend a little bit later.  I ended up pregnant and didn't know which was the father."  The end.  Well, not the end, because thenshe told me about how she got thrown out and whatever else.  But there was ZERO feeling in it.  ZERO emotion.  

At first, I didn't let myself feel my feelings about it.  In fact, I didn't know what they were, really.  Rather, I just knew there was something off and I wasn't sure what.  Time went on, and she showed me just how codependent she was, yet also how non-empathetic she was.  Even after she learned of all the abuse I endured at the hands of the couple that adopted me.  Not a single "Sorry, I think I made a mistake giving you up" or "Sorry that happened to you!  I wish I could have chose your parents instead!" or something of the sort.  Nothing like that.  It was always "buck up! you're good now, right?".  Not really something you want to hear from the person who birthed you and gave you away.

My aunt once told me that my birthmother had a hard time connecting with humans.  She was better with animals.  But that's not true.  She was in love with her boyfriend, the one she thought was my birthfather.  Like, completely in love with him.  She only gave me up because he left her (because she cheated on him--something she still has no explanation for).  Otherwise, they would have raised me together.  Not a good thing, since both have/had pretty pronounced aspergers and had a hard time being normal emotionally (I have it too, obviously, but I have no issues with my emotions).  But would that have been worse than my parents?  I don't know.  I mean, I may have still been abused, but in different ways.  I am not saying she should have kept me.  I would have felt just as unloved with her as I did with my own mother.  And that's not the point.  The point here is that she abandoned me with strangers at six months old and I was adopted into an alcoholic abusive family, and she could care less and acts like she has no remorse or even sympathy for me.  And she has ZERO guilt.  I would say maybe behind closed doors she does, in her own way, but what good does that do me?  Sounds selfish, but for real.  How can I process what I don't see?  And no, I do not blame her.  But she has no sympathy for my life whatsoever.  Which really hurts.

Anyways, so on the show, Robert meets his birthmother, who is in heavy amount of tears the entire time, and I can think of is "Why wasn't my birthmother like that?  Why does she not ever speak to me unless she gets a hair up her ass to text or message me?  Not even during the pandemic?"  All the woman asked was if she had made the right decision and if he was okay.  My birthmother knows I was so very not okay and she doesn't even give a flying fuck.  

One thing I know is that my birthmother doesn't really like me because of my personality (she's basically told me that before).  She's intellectual and snobby and lives in her fantasy dream world (in real life and online) and I am intellectual yet a little more trashy than she is, and I live in reality.  I say "fuck" a lot and she likes to spend most of her time in Second Life, with other intellectual and snobby people.  We do not match.  I look like her.  I am artistic and musical and am a photographer.  She is all of those things, too.  But emotionally we are opposites.  Personality-wise, we are also very opposite.  During all of 2020, I never even heard from her.  So I messaged her one day asking if she was doing okay in late October, and she replies, just like my mother does, "I was just going to contact you!" as though it explains why she never did.  "Oh you cleaned this?  I was just going to do that!"  "Oh, you did this or that?  I was just going to do that!"  My own mother says these things as a way to a) take partial responsibility for whatever it is I did so she can feel like she did it too, and b) alleviate her own shame or guilt and responsibility for not doing whatever it was that needed to be done.  My birthmother is the exact same.  

When I was adopted, my birthmother and her mother went to court for custody of me.  And my birthmother won, with the stipulation that my grandmother has to get twice yearly updates on me, and eventually letters from when I was old enough to write.  So I've "known" my grandma my entire life.  Kind of.  But eventually, after actually knowing my birthfamily as a whole, I found out that my grandma has NPD.  And so does her other daughter, my aunt, and at least one of her sons, my uncle.  My other uncle, I assume is a scapegoat, since he's been MIA since 18 (well, MIA in his mother's life).  And my birthmother seems to be a severe codependent, yet also narcissistic.  Not a reverse narcissist, though then again, I do not know her well enough, but I can say that she's severely fucking selfish.  She will message me out of the blue, after two years of ignoring me and say "Here is my number, I am going to France.  Here is where I am staying, and blah blah blah" like I give two shits.  Another vacation she took to the Grand Canyon that I was completely unaware of was when she just messaged me pictures of herself having the time of her life, after another year of not talking to me.  I said "Um, what are these pics?"  She said "Oh, I am on vacation and I thought you'd love to see what I"m up to!"  

Eyeroll.  She forgets I exist, and then later remembers, which makes me feel so good inside.  Yay.

I get it.  She's autistic.  She has no self-awareness.  She lives inside her head.  She's ridiculous with the way she sees the world.  She has no idea how to have relationships with other people.  Each year on Christmas, my grandma would send me a box of fun stuff when I was a kid.  Like, stuff she picked up on her travels and other neat stuff.  So one year, out of the blue, my birthmother started this with us and our kids.  She'd buy us journals and cute things and fun stuff for the kids.  She did this for about three to four years.  Then I never heard from her on Christmas again.  We were so confused.  It wasn't the stuff we looked forward to, it was a connection to her.  Just like it was with my grandma.  Then she started sending me birthday cards.  Then she just would forget for years at a time.  She's completely stopped sending cards to my kids and my husband.   My 40th went by and I didn't get a single card from anyone that year.  Who forgets shit like that?  That birthday was my all time worst. Well, since childhood.  As my parents super fucked up all my birthdays when I was a kid.  So much so I learned to hate my birthdays, which didn't stop until a couple years ago (though, now back with mother, I am beginning to not like them again). 

So watching this man's mother on TV bawl her eyes out, out of love for her birth son, I was so very jealous that I didn't get that.  I didn't get anyone saying "I missed you all the time!" or "I thought about you all the time!"  Nothing like that.   I wanted to bawl my own eyes out watching it.  But my hubby was with me and I don't cry in front of people (something I carry from childhood).  Had I been alone, I may have cried myself into a migraine.  

When I see people who want to meet their birthparents, I always say to do it.  My story sucks.   but so many turn out good.  But even if it does suck?  Do it anyways.  Because it's worth knowing, rather than not knowing.  Meeting my birthfather was pretty fucking terrible.  But in a way, it was better, because I could see his insanity right off the bat (he's got paranoid personality disorder) and I had to exit his life shortly after we were in contact because of that.  That sucks too, but I knew right away what I was dealing with.  So I didn't get sucked in and hurt.  I mean, it still hurts.  I wanted that fucking fairy tale, like in August Rush (fuck you writer's of that movie, you give us all such false hope LOL).  When you're seventeen, you think someone out there loves you and misses you and is wondering about you.  Then you solve the Scooby Doo mysteries of where and who you come from and find out those people are just regular people who suck, like everyone else in life.  And no, I never expected them to be perfect.  But I did expect more than just "thanks" and being ignored most of the time.  Or having a father who only rants and raves about how Microsoft Encarta 95 translates the bible for him so that he can figure out "the truth about the world".  I know he can't help it.  But what a fucking let down.  Then again, his brain is a fucking let down to his life---I am sure if he could choose to not have a brain like his, he'd rather be normal.  So he gets a pass.  

I could say that my birthmother was only twenty when she had me and that she's autistic.  Those two things could give her a pass, right?  But I was twenty when I started my family and I am also autistic.  And when my first child was six months old, I didn't just think "Oh, I am really not a mother, goodbye baby!"  I was responsible and if I didn't think I could have been a mother I would have gotten an abortion or give up my baby up immediately.  I wouldn't wait until that baby was attached to me and my family and rip it out of the only home it's ever known.  And if I had given it up, found out later that my child was abused?  I would do whatever I could to make up for it.  It wouldn't be my fault, but my choices did lead that kid to end up in that position, through no fault of it's own.  

I mean, didn't ask to be born.  She chose that for me.  Abortions were legal back then.  Condoms didn't cost much.  It's not that hard not to get pregnant.  I was told by my OBGYN I am the most fertile person she'd ever in her practice, and how did I only have two kids?  Because I knew how how no to get pregnant, that's how.  But she did get pregnant, and I was born and then through series of bad choices in her life, I was put into a the home of two violent abusers.  I don't want to her to take responsibility for that, but I'd like maybe a little sympathy from her.  It doesn't feel right for someone in her position to not be sorry about what happened to me. 

So she doesn't get a pass.  I know we're different.  And I get it.  But that doesn't negate how she treated me in the past or how she still treats me today.  I've talked to her about it before, too, and she's nothing but cold.  Maybe she doesn't want to access her feelings.  But my own mother doesn't want to access her feelings, which is why she lies all the time.  We can give excuses for our behavior all we want to in life, but there has to be a point where we just take responsibility for it.  She's 64 years old.  She can take responsibility for how she makes other people feel in life.  Because by 64?  No matter your excuses, it's who you are now.  And maybe you can change.  But most likely, you won't.  Like that movie, Hillbilly Elegy, where the scriptwriter tried to make excuses for the main character's mother's behavior, like she never had a choice to be who and what she was.  No, sweetheart, she chose that.  She chose to be an awful mother.  We all chose who we become.  Every single one of us.  No matter what happened to us a as kids.  No matter what happened or who did what to us in life.  The excuses fall away when we become grown.  We either change as we grow, or we don't.  It's as simple as that.  We can look to others and understand the reasons other people did what they did to us, but that doesn't excuse what they did.  It doesn't excuse what they still are doing or what they will do in the future.  It just gives us insight into their toxic or negative behavior. 

I love hearing about good reunions, though.  I do get a twinge of sadness when I read about them or see them in a show.  But the raw emotion that Robert's birthmother was displaying really got me in the gut.  I wish I would have had that.  I hope Robert realizes just how lucky he really is.  I mean, I get his life probably is and was not perfect.  I get so much of his life may have been hard for him in ways life wasn't hard for me (though I was a fucking little weirdo as a kid, so I got it at school as much as I did at home).  But his birthmother loved him when he was born.  And not all of us get that.  Some of us only get taken home for a few months because someone else tells them to do it.  And then they fight like hell to be able to give us up for adoption because they cannot find a way to love them.  

Whatever the real reason she had for doing what she did, she never missed me.  She said so.  Even though a day never went by when I didn't wonder who or where she was, and if she was thinking about me.  Turns out, she wasn't.  And I have to find a way to be okay with that.  

So today that card got sent, the one from the last post.  Mother hasn't asked me about it yet.  I saw the mail lady pick it up and deliver a large stack of mail, so I went out to retrieve it all.  And in it, was a wedding invitation from my cousin's daughter, who lives in another state.  Addressed only to my mother.  And not even my mother's name, but her maiden name, which she hasn't used since 1969.  The postmark was 8/12.  When we looked at the invite, RSVP was on 8/1.  Oops.  Someone forgot to invite my mother to the wedding.  I mean, they knew she wouldn't be able to come and even if she could, she wouldn't (though she'd blame it on me, like she used to for family reunions "Oh Shay won't take me!"  "We'll come get you!"  "No, no, that's okay," she sigh in her defeated voice.  "I don't think I should come if Shay doesn't want to go."--so then everyone thought it was my fault, when in reality, she just didn't want to go to whatever it was).  

So, you send an invite to MY house addressed only to my mother, knowing damn well we all live together?  Yeah.  So that shit went right in the garbage.  Because I am not someone you get to ignore like that.  I bet you a bunch of pennies (because my cousins are not worth more than that) that her mother told her to send it, just to show me how they all leave me out.  But then again, this girl may have done it for the same reasons, as she's the reason this all exists in the first place.  She's the one who found my original blog and told the entire family.  And then soon after, I would get strange mailings in the mail, unsigned and no return address, copies of magazine articles that had to do with stuff my family said about me, and shit like that.  My family is kind of crazy, no matter how much they want to portray me as the crazy person.  I joke about doing stuff like that, but I never would.  And I'd never send an invite to my cousin's mother (who does live with her, by the way) and not the rest of the family, to something like a wedding.  Just like in grade school, you invite them all, or you invite none.  Picking and choosing certain people is just rude (though, the only time I invited my entire class to my birthday was grade K--which was kind of fun).  I don't care they don't like me.  That's fine.  But why remind me  every chance they get?  

When we moved in here in 2020, my cousins all bought my mother a housewarming gift, not me.  They sent her mother's day cards, not me.  They sent her a birthday card, not me (and our birthdays are a week a part).  A year later?  They sent her nothing and never called.  I think one finally did weeks later.  But goes to show it was all fake.  They didn't care about her.  They just wanted to remind me that I was not included in our family by sending her stuff and not (or maybe they just were all hyped up about her moving in with me after she badmouthed me so badly and now they just forgot about her?).  Same goes for this invite...if they cared about my mother they would have addressed it with her real name and sent it on time.  But they didn't.  It was just for show.  So it's in the trash where my family belongs.  

Again, I know they all hate me.  Which is perfectly fine because I know they are stupid and narcissistic and I don't like them either.  But to keep reminding me of that is just beyond childish.  Invite us all and include us all, or none of us.  That's the adult thing to do.  Before I went no contact?  They couldn't give two shits about my mother.  She wasn't even on their radar.  They'd come to visit my uncle for Christmas, who lived downstairs, and they'd know we'd all be upstairs and they'd leave before saying one word to us.  They could care less about my parents and about me.  That was the message sent ever since they were old enough to stop coming to the holidays.  Even when they did come, it was always about everyone else, even though they were at OUR house.  Our family used us for free food.  That was it.  So now my mother thinks they love her.  No, my mother put them on her life insurance immediately after I went no contact instead of me.  They just wanted her fucking money.  The minute she changed it back to me (and the promptly stopped paying on it)?  They pulled away from her.  But not before pretending they cared just to show me they could leave me out (the cards and the gift and stuff).  Not that I want cards from them or a gift.  But they could have included my name on them, just as a gesture to not be rude.  But they didn't.  I like honesty, so I guess I can't complain too much.  

Anyways, that's my Monday Funday for ya.  Wheeeeeeee. 

Today I bought a sympathy card for an old neighbor who's mother just died.  My mother asked me to buy it, even though she hated them.  Right before we moved, she used to talk shit about the husband in her yard loud enough for him to hear her.  She's always been pretty volatile.   But only when she has power.  When you take her power away, she becomes more docile...well, not really, she just appears that way.  Behind your back, she's just as saucy as ever.  

Anyways, so I bought the card and I realized something: if I am picking it out?  I am paying for it?  And I am paying for the stamp?  Then I'll be damned if I am not going to sign it!  So I signed my mother's name first, and then mine and my hubby's and both our kids.  Back when the kids were little, our kids and the neighbor's kids used to be best friends.  So I deserve to be included on the card.  So I addressed it, stamped it, and put it in the mailbox.  I did have in on the fridge first, so she could see it, but she never cared to look, so I went out stuck it in the mailbox.  

And this shouldn't matter, right?  I mean, I should be able to just do something like this and not give a crap.  But here I am, getting triggered, due to the fact how she used to treat me when it came to her mail.  

Back before 2020, we lived in the same duplex.  And we had the same landlord (obviously).  And so I talked her into sending him money orders instead of checks for our rent because he never cashed the checks until a month later (he was eighty years old--so it was always a guess if maybe he died before cashing them).  She had me go and buy the money orders each month, but she never let me send hers in the mail.  She even would force me to drive her to the mailbox to go send it, because for some reason putting them in her mailbox at home was unsafe.  She wouldn't even let me get out of the car to put them in the mailbox, she had to do it.  It was kind of insane.  Eventually, I would just send them at the store and not even bring it home for her to sign (I'd sign them for her).  And at first, she was angry, but she eventually got used to it and got over it.

But then we moved here and she started doing the same thing.  I wasn't allowed to send her mail.  When we left our old duplex, we both owed our landlord money for rent.  She owed him lots of money because she had dementia and forgot to pay him much of the time and my husband and I owed him because we were poor as fuck and we owed him from the time we moved in and had no jobs and no car.  And even though he said it was cool to move in and not pay him in exchange for cleaning the place, he still threatened us with a lawsuit.  So what did my mother do in 2020 after we moved in here?  Sent him a fucking Christmas card.  Even though I told her not to.  Even though I explained why it was a bad idea.  She treated me as though I was a little kid again, asking her not to smoke in the house because she was poisoning my lungs.  To which she just laughed with her condescending laugh said "Oh Shay, you are a child and I am the adult.  What right do you have to ask this of me?" 

And she refused to let me put them in the mailbox.  Granted, this was the one and only time I messed with her mail.  But all the other times made ZERO sense, as I have never messed with her mail before.  I have no idea what she thought I was going to do, especially when she'd have me purchase her rent money order for her...if I was going to mess with something, that would be the time to mess with it.  But she never trusted me and I have no idea why.  I mean, I get it.  She wanted me to feel bad about myself and this was just one more way to get the job done.  But I did what I had to do that day, and I went out to the mailbox after she went to bed and took that damn Christmas card out and threw it in my burning pit and burned it.  Because I'll be damned if I was going to let her tell him where we lived so he could come after us (as I have no proof he said we could move in without paying, as he told me this on the phone--some months he forgot I even paid him rent!).  Any normal mother would have stuck up for us, knowing what he told us we could move in, but not her.  She always takes the opposing side, even when they are so very are wrong.  

But for years, she's been that way about her mail with me.  As though somehow I was going to steal it or something?  Sure, I did it once, but only to protect my family.  All the years before that, I never once did anything like that to her.  It was like was punishing me for something she assumed I did, but didn't.  And now I sent the card she requested me to get for her (again, for what reason, I have no clue, as she hates the people...but then again, that's a narcissist for you), and I'm waiting for her to get angry.  But why do I even care?  Let her be mad.  She'd look pretty dumb if she went and bought another card and send it herself (well, they'd probably blame it on her dementia).  And I think that's more what I fear.  That what I did will not be good enough (because she was getting the card for herself and herself alone...not even thinking that we used to know these people for longer than she did and should be included) and she will be stupid about it.  Because it will hurt my feelings.  Which is stupid, I know, but I can't ever not let it hurt my feelings when she treats me that way.  

I hate that something as simple as buying a card for someone has to be so dumb and triggering.  It doesn't help that she was kind of rude to me right before she went to bed, after I had put the card on the fridge.  So my mind ran in different directions:  Did she see the card and was angry I signed it with everyone's names?  Was she angry thinking I didn't buy a card?  Etc. etc.  Why am I like this?  I need to let her covert abuse go, and just stop caring.  But I can't find that magic wand that does that for me.  I did with my father.  But can't seem to do it with her.  Granted, Pa was dead twelve years by the time I found that wand, so that made it quite easier.  And I live with the crazy woman who is still doing dumb things to me on a regular basis, so I can't seem to find that space where I can just not care anymore.  I had it once.  It took me a year, but I had it.  When I was no contact for fourteen months.  And I finally found that space.  But in 2018, I lost it again.  Sigh.  

Well, I'm going to go untrigger myself by watching Nancy Drew on HBOMAX (though that show is kind of gross at times, yuck!).  Hopefully mother won't even care I sent it.  She won't say thank you, she never does, but maybe she'll just finally trust me enough to do the right thing for once.  I mean I doubt it, but maybe she'll just either choose not to care about it or forget.  I can only hope. Sigh. 

So, I've been purging our house's storage because if it's being stored, why we do need it?  I am on a more minimalist journey for years, and little by little, I keep purging all my stuff.  And, I've been purging mother's stuff, too.  I know that sounds douchey, but she's a bit of a hoarder and I am only getting rid of things she will never ask for again.  Like a box of holiday towels.  So yesterday, she went out in the garage where I was storing all this stuff to put into my SUV, and she found the box of towels and brought them into her room.  No reason.  She just likes towels.  She likes a LOT of towels.  Why?  I think it's so she doesn't have to wash them as often.  If you have a thousand, you only have to wash towels every thousandth towel.  She doesn't do laundry anymore, so she just wants towels for the sake of having a thousand towels.  And so I went into her room and took the box and put it in the car, because dammit, I finally got the towels out of the cabinet and then into a box last year, and I almost got them donated.  But we'll donate all that crap tomorrow.  Plus a bunch more.  

Then I headed out to the heart doctor with my hubby.  My mother has no idea what kind of doctors I see.  But lately, she's been acting super fucking strange about me going to my appointments.  She overreacts and pretends like she's freaking out about me having to see doctors.  Now, this could be her dementia, but nobody else in the house is she freaking out over.  It's odd.  And she's never EVER once done that before.  When i was a kid, if I was actually sick, she would refuse to take me until I would call someone else to come take me.  And then she'd say "Oh, I was going to take you!"  Bullshit you were, Ma.  

Then I got back and headed to my room and forgot about making dinner.  I normally don't forget, but my hubby was home with me and when something different happens, I lose my train of thought and forget what I'm supposed to do.  Like, if someone calls me early in the AM, I forget to take my thyroid meds, even though I've done it for almost twenty years.  My life has to be the same every single day, or else I get mixed up.  Blame my ADHD or my ASD, either way, it's damned annoying.  

So today I forgot all about making dinner.  6pm rolls around and she's outside my room whispering.  I waved to my hubby to be quiet.  I pointed to the door and we both listened.  She kept talking real low and eventually she got a little louder and then I realized she was talking to me.  "Are you sick?  Are you feeling okay?"  I yelled back "I feel fine, Ma!  What's wrong?"  Then I saw the time and said "Oh goodness, I forgot to make dinner.  Sorry!"  She said "No, no no, I knew you went to the doctor and thought maybe you were feeling bad so I didn't want to bother you!"  Good thing the door was shut so she didn't see my eyes roll.  She does not give two shits about me, which was clear when I went into the kitchen and all she talked about was how my blender "sliced" her today (it was Friday the 13th, so she thinks it was bad luck).  I told her earlier when she already told me about this to never touch my blender blades, because they are evil and they will always cut you if you try to wash them like a utensil.  I said "Just leave it for me wash, and I'll wash it at dinner".  But she washed it, and it "sliced her" (her words, not mine).  So I relayed how I almost cut two fingernails off two days prior while chopping kale and spinach for dinner.  She ignored me and just talked about herself some more and how she broke her favorite cup, too, and how Friday the 13th is so unlucky.  So reiterate, she doesn't give two shits about me.  Even though I played into her pity party for getting "sliced" by my blender blades (she used this term several times so everyone knew just how hurt she was), she still ignored me when I told her about how I was bleeding everywhere and took a chunk out of my finger (for real, I need to stop using a huge filet knife for chopping).  She literally said nothing.  Not one word. 

She just wanted to eat fucking dinner.  

And she didn't want to look like a jerk forcing her "sick daughter" to cook for her, so she pretended to be worried about me.  Eyeroll.  And after that, she never brought it up again was just happy I was making her some Italian food (I made it last night...and she had no idea it was the same thing...that is definitely her dementia--though whens she found out it was the same thing she complained it wasn't the same as last night's dinner).  Of course she choked on it and gave it to the dogs instead.  So that was worth wasting my time cooking.  FUN!  

Now I have to find a new way to cook for her.  We found out she has esophageal spasms, which fucks with her ability to swallow and gives her horrible chest pain (she was in the ER THREE times for this and nobody knew what was going on!).  So now I have to find how to cook for her so she doesn't choke.  She used to make her own mother, my Meemaw, food by blending it or cutting it into tiny pieces in a food processor.  I know she won't like that if I do that for her, but nobody wants her to barf up her food at the table.  So yeah, she's getting chopped everything from now on.  I will say that mashed potatoes and Smart Ones seems to work really well for her (I use it as a base for the meal).  I used to use rice, too, but now she chokes on that (though...I could chop it up first).  Now I'm going to be back to creating tons of frozen meals for her ahead of time, because that's a lot of work to do each day.  I am all about making chores easier.  

But yeah, she wasn't worried about me one bit.  She's just 1) being nosy...she thinks I will divulge information to her if she pretends to worry (she just wants info if I am getting my covid shots...something she's been talking shit about me for behind my back to her friends...I do have them, both, but fuck if I'm going to tell her for no reason LOL).  So as a way to keep telling me she wasn't asking for food (because she really thinks it's shameful to eat food and be hungry) "Oh, I have to worry about my baby!" as an explanation for knocking on my door.  It was all I could do to not laugh at her.  For fucking real.  If I have a migraine, and she knows it??  This woman will do EVERYTHING she can to make as much noise as possible on purpose.  And when I tell her to stop, she will only get louder.  BUT if my hubby or my youngest son has a headache, she will say "Oh oops!  I better be quiet!"  And 2) she wanted to eat and didn't want to look like a jerk asking me to cook (she ALWAYS takes a roundabout way to ask me to cook for her if I am one minute late making something--which is because of the reason I stated above--she used to shame me about eating, too, up until last year even!).  

And yes, I did get a diagnosis today for an incurable and mostly uncontrollable syndrome.  Finally, after twenty years of being sick.  TWENTY FREAKING YEARS of doctors having no idea what's wrong with me.  And after getting a thousand diagnoses, but none of them applied to all my symptoms.  And now I get to go to a specialized clinic to go and see what they can tell me about it.  Party time!  And not to be a drama queen about it, because I am exaggerating above (though it is incurable and mostly uncontrollable--it's just not that huge of a deal).  I have POTS.  And it makes me feel like shit when I'm having flareups.  Which I have been for weeks now.  And UGH.  But oh well.  I still gotta take care of old mother.  And even if she knew what was wrong with me, she would pretend to care for a moment and then just stop, because it wouldn't suit her anymore.  But it's not her business.  So I'm not telling her.  So there.  

I need to protect my privacy from her, as she is the queen of privacy invasion.  And so I don't share with her things that she doesn't need to know.  And this?  She doesn't need to know.  So I got her off the subject by gifting her a HUGE box of my old books from our basement haul.  And now she's happier than a clam in the ocean living that #sealife.  So I did good today.  I finally got a diagnosis.  I made mother happy (like it's a huge box of Jodi Picoult books as well as a couple others).  I got to hang out with my hubby.  I felt better today than I have all week.  AND I got some writing done, which I haven't been able to do all week due to my POTS flareup (and my arthritis in my neck).   And I got a bunch of shit from the basement into the car before Ma stole it all back (almost didn't though, that was close).  She didn't even know the towels were hers.  Which makes me sad.  But it also makes my job easier, too.  Which sounds horrible, I know.  But you have to take the good with the bad.  

I am just stoked I got a lot of writing done, today.  I've finished three memoirs this past year.  And now I am working on two other self-help books for adult children of narcissistic parents, which are halfway done.  I am on a roll!  Whoo hoo!  So yeah, strange day, painful day (my arthritis causes pinched nerves in my neck and head and shoulders), but also a good day.  

Time to finish a class I'm taking.  Goodnight (it's like 11:15 pm LOL). 

My mother likes to keep me on my toes.  She'll respect my boundaries for days on end (or longer) and then just stop, for absolutely no reason.  One of my boundaries is that she cannot come into my room, period.  It's unspoken, but enforced regularly.  So much so, I know that she knows there is a boundary there.  Along with that, she's not allowed to open my bedroom door, also for any reason.  When we first moved in last year (in 2020), she used to just walk right in, like it was her room to do as she pleases.  I woke up plenty of times with her standing over my bed and shaking me while saying "Shay!  Wake up!" and then asking me some asinine question.  And then she'd push me over to sit on my bed, while she snooped through my stuff.  I am a very private person, when it comes to her.  I do not like her in my business or my stuff.  Mostly because I do not trust her with information about my life, because she uses it against me.  Always has, ever since my childhood.  So I do not tell her things and I do not share with her, and I do not allow other people to tell her things about me either.  Though they do anyways.  

Speaking of that, I didn't call C, by the way.  Christmas, her BFF.  I didn't straighten her out yet, because it was giving me horrible panic attacks, because I really hate confrontation. I don't know why, though, as C usually listens to me to some extent.  But I didn't call her, even though I know I still have to bring this all up to her.  

But back to the boundaries issue.  So, I've been able to keep my door unlocked for months.  MONTHS.  And she hasn't violated my boundaries on this.  Then, all of a sudden last week, she started doing it again.  She started out small, and then quit, but then the past two days she's been crazy about it.  So much so that yesterday she tried to literally push past me to go into my room, even though I said my husband wasn't dressed (he was, but he had a migraine and was napping).  She said "Oh, tell him to cover up!" and still tried to push past me with her body to go into my room (and she tried to peek around the corner at him to see if he was really undressed...he could have been dressing! wtf was that about??).  So squared up my body and put my face in her face and said "Move back" in no uncertain terms.  I wasn't playing around.  And I used my body to step forward to usher her into the hallway.  And then I shut my door and addressed what she wanted.  

What she wanted was that she removed her bandages from her surgery from Thursday and wanted my husband to look at her stitches.  And then she said "Is your son awake?  Don't tell him, I'll just go in there."  I moved past her to his room and said "Grandma wants to show you something, hurry up and come look."  The entire time I was walking, she was behind me repeating "I will just go in his room, don't tell him!"  He hates people in his room, so I moved faster than her and hurriedly got him to come see.  I don't know why she was obsessed with going into people's room yesterday, but it was annoying.  She opened my door twice yesterday, too, and the day before.  And, she tried to push past me on Thursday to get into my room as well, to show me her papers after surgery.  It's getting a little crazy with her obsessive behavior again.  In the past, she's obsessed about coming into room my room, but it was literally her saying over and over "I'm going to go in your room!"  And once she told my kids to trick me by knocking for her and she stepped in front of them to come in here.  And even though it's seen as rude, I jumped right up and ushered everyone out of my room.  

Yes.  I allow my kids in here.  And yes, that's fucking rude of me to do, to allow everyone but her.  BUT, nobody else BUT her has violated my privacy for my entire life, especially in 2020.  Back then, I would ask her to shut my door when she'd open it while I was getting dressed and she'd refuse.  That's why I got a fucking lock to begin with.  IT happened so much, with a few times of her citing "I've already seen what you've got, don't be so silly!" as though my naked adult body is hers to see whenever she likes.  Fucking gross.  

Speaking of that, she did that on Thursday.  She opened my door without knocking and I said "Excuse me, I'm getting dressed, shut my door."  She refused and just held the door with her hand, waiting.  So I yanked the door open, which almost made her fall (which is how I found out she was holding the door with her hand, I had no idea--good thing I caught her).  So yeah, safe to say, she's violating my boundaries left and right again.  Today, my dog was in my room barking and I let him out and she said "Oh, you can just tell me to do it and I'll let them out."  I said "No thank you.  I've got it."  I wanted to drive the message home that she's not to be opening my door at all.  But then I added to be funny "Besides, I'd get there before you anyways."  Which she found funny.  

I know I could just tell her outright.  But if you know narcissists, then you'd know it would be a HUGE deal and something she'd bitch about to her friends and I would never hear the end of it.  Plus, she'd be doing the same thing she is now: only following my rules for a moment, then pretending like I never said them.  I hate not being forward with someone like this (especially after all this time), but what's the point if nothing would be different?  She knows my room is off limits to her.  And she doesn't care.  When she respect my boundaries, she's not respecting them at all, she's just biding her time to dive in again.  That's it.  So it's just less drama to lock my damn door and keep her out.  Which always sends the message straight home.  

Well, for a period of time, anyways.  

But this whole trying to push herself into my bedroom bullshit is not cool.  I know whenever she gets hopped up on something (like when she found out she had cancer recently, and now having that cancer removed) she gets really really crazy.  But she's been opening my door since last week.  So now I have to start making my kids lock the door behind them when they come in again.  The thing is?  If my door is wide open and they are in here, she will walk right past and say nothing LOL  Though, I do not have my door open because I know that's an eventual invitation for her to just come in.  So it's always closed, unless one of my kids leave it open.  

I also lock my door when I leave the house.  Which I know is a clear indication to her I do not want people in my damn room.  But I need to remember: she's a narcissist.  She doesn't care what I want, so it doesn't matter what messages I send.  She WANTS me to tell her to stay out of my room.  She WANTS Me to start a fight about it.  Which is why she violates my boundaries.  I refuse, though.  I don't need to engage with her about anything if I don't want to.  And why?  Like I said, what good would it do?  

So, I am just glad I have a lock on my door.  So I can just keep my room locked until she lays off again.  

So much fun living with a narc.  But for now, this is where we have to be.  And a lock on my door goes a long way to keeping me sane LOL 

Christmas is my mother's childhood friend.  But the moment my mother moved away from the neighborhood, she never spoke to her again.  I grew up believing the Christmas was either mentally disabled or completely insane, because that's how my mother felt about her.  But then mother moved back and all of a sudden, Christmas was right there, ready to be her buddy again.  At first, my mother treated her like total garbage.  Because that's how mother is: when she has power, meaning when she feels good, and is in charge of herself, she acts like a lunatic.  When she has no power, well, she still acts like a lunatic, but in a different way.  When she has power, she will be cruel to your face (and behind your back).  When she has no power, she will only be cruel behind your back.  

And Christmas knows about all of this.  And yet, she still acts like a little puppy dog lapping up at whatever spills out of my mother's mouth.  

I wrote about her once, calling her the "unaware flying monkey".  I take that post back, because she's not unaware at all.  She's just as much of a lunatic as my mother is.  

And today, I have to call her.  

Ugh.  And now my stomach is in knots because I hate confrontation.  But I have to set this woman straight.  And if you read my last post, you'd know what about.  Because today she called to come visit.  And I can't have her coming over to start shit if she doesn't know the truth.  

Per their last phone call, she said "The next time I come over, I will ask your daughter (meaning me)...actually, I don't even know why I'd have to ask your daughter if you can go for a walk or not, because you're a grown woman who can make her own choices."  And my mother gave her some shitty reply.  "Yeah, well, she'll probably make me take that damned walker if I go!"  As though me making her take her walker is evil, even though she's a fall risk.  And even though her physical rehab guy told her if she goes for walks she has to take one with her.  But of course, I am the evil one for going along with what her doctors say.  

As for the permission part, apparently she told C that I don't allow her to leave the house and won't even take her for walks.  Which is total bullshit, because she's never once asked me to take her for a walk.  In fact, I have asked her several times and she refused to go.  So I stopped asking.  

So I have to call C and set her straight about all of this.  About the whole "holding her hostage" BS that was said between them.  Because I refuse to have this woman come into my house and have my mother say this kind of shit about me in my own home to her.  If it wasn't something that was so devastatingly awful (they both used the phrase "elder abuse"), I would leave it alone and just ignore it all.  But this is a serious accusation (C actually used the phrase and then my mother agreed with her).  So I need to fix it.  Not only that, I also need to bring up the stuff C said about me that was cruel just on its own.  I thought C was kinda sorta my friend.  I was wrong about that.  But then again, I been wrong about her since I've met her.  

I hate this stuff.  I hate having to deal with shit like this.  I hate that I have to in order to keep my family protected.  I feel that by living here, we are completely vulnerable to these idiots who want nothing more but than to hurt us.  But I've done it before and gotten through it.  And now it's just a money game--make more money, and we can leave.  It's as simple as that.  

Now, if I could just feel better, I could actually work on the money thing (I am having a bad flareup of my POTS right now...ugh).