Tonight I fixed my mother her favorite garlic chicken, with mashed potatoes, and veggies.  She's always on my ass about getting certain food, and tonight, I realize that I have no idea why.  I think it's because she likes to think something is her favorite, but in reality, she can't taste a damn thing.  I could feed her rubber chicken and she'd have no clue. 

So there are these frozen garlic chicken breasts from Spauldings, our local cheap (but good quality) grocery store.  She's always asking me for them, and I made one for her tonight, as well as putting some really potent garlic butter in her mashed potatoes.  She asked me for those French-fried onions that you put on top of green bean casserole to put in her potatoes, but I didn't have any.  So I surprised her with the garlic butter I bought for when I made garlic bread a few nights ago.  

I walked into the room after she was eating and I said "Hey, you like those potatoes?  There's garlic butter in them!".  She said "Meh.  I can't taste any garlic in them, but they are pretty cold."  I just stared at her.  So she looked back and me and said "Well, that doesn't mean they're bad."  I wanted to yell "You know where the microwave is, don't you??  You can warm your food up if it's not warm enough, rather than complaining to me about it!"  But I didn't.  I just left the room.  

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I refuse to do anything special for her anymore.  Because when I do, she just crinkles her nose up at me.  

And she didn't even realize I gave her garlic chicken.  Or if she did, she didn't give two shits.  So I am not buying them again.  They are expensive, and I only get them because if I don't keep them in supply, she gets on my case about it.  But no more.  I am done with that.  I will give her plain chicken, mostly because why waste spice on a person who can't taste??  It's just silly. 

Also, she's a diabetic and insists on me buying her massive amounts of sugar.  I don't.  But she insists.  Including soda.  So I started buying her diet A&W, and I take all the labels off of them and she has no idea.  The same goes for Dawn dishsoap.  She INSISTS I buy her dawn, so I buy Dawn, and refill it with the cheaper Dawn-knockoff brand.  She has no idea.  

I am not writing this because I am angry with her.  Yes, it's annoying whenever I think I am doing something she likes, she has to put it down or complain about it.  She's done that for my entire life.  And unlike my old idiot therapist, Jake from State Farm, I don't deserve her treating me that way because I should know better.  I don't know better than to just forget for a moment I have a mother with NPD and expect her to act like a normal person.  I don't know any better than that, because it's freaking normal.  But she can't give me more than what she has to give, so I can't get super angry about it.  Instead, I will just stop doing nice things for her.  And just give her what she needs.  

I don't like that, though.  I don't like changing the way I am as a person just to protect myself from her.  What if that changes me?  What if I forget who I really am and instead become this grumpy person who doesn't do nice things for others?  I feel that if I am this way with her for too long, that it may end up affecting me.  But I don't honestly think that will happen.  I just feel weird doing it at all. 

It's not that I am trying to punish her.  Rather, I am a) not giving into her expensive whims (and she has a LOT) for no reason anymore and b) protecting myself from being punished BY her.   What other kind of mother punishes her daughter for trying to make her happy?  Only NPD ones.  

I refuse to feel guilty for not trying anymore.  I'm going to take care of her basic needs, and no extra stuff.  I mean, I run myself ragged trying to take care of five adult humans.  I have two sons who are awesome, but have ASD, and need more of my help than other people's kids do.  And that's my job.  They are my kids.   But my mother, or as I call her in my memoir "The Warden", is not my child and she does not do anything to deserve me going out of my way to please her (and it never pleases her when I do).  So, I'm done.  

Which kind of feels good, in a way.  To know I don't have to do as I've always done since childhood and do everything I can to please The Warden.  Because there is no pleasing her.  So I quit.  

See you on tomorrow's post.

Oh, today's mantra is: "You can't please an old dog who refuses to learn new tricks, so don't even try."