The last time she got angry with me, she said "I have to constantly beg you to get the thigs I need done!"  Because I was late getting her cigarettes to her and I didn't do her laundry in the exact moment she wanted it.  Then last night she said "Can you PLEASE leave my cigarettes out at night??" in a very exasperated voice.  I said "Yes, I will."  Then she started threatening me.  "Because if you don't, I will wake you up!!"  Like I would answer the door early in the AM just to give her the drug she's addicted to.  "I almost woke you up this morning!!"  Again, I would not have answered the door.  But she asked my son at 8am to go in my room and get them, and he did, and she was fine.  But she said all this around 7pm at night, as though I hadn't given them to her all day.  So I added "Wow, sounds so horrible!!" in a goofy voice.   Because she honestly sounded like she was so exasperated and annoyed.  She said "Well, it IS!!  I mean, I have to beg for them, and then I ask myself, what am I even doing??"  The funny part is, I know she has a stash of cigarettes in her drawer, so I know she wasn't out.  She was just acting like she was completely out to guilt me, which never works, btw.  And I don't normally forget to give her her gross nasty cigarettes, just once in awhile I do.  And when I do, oh "WHOAH IS ME!!  IF I HAVE TO ASK MORE, SHAY IS MAKING ME BEG FOR THEM!"  She just loves to complain and play the victim.  

But this new thing, this new thing of saying I am making her "beg" for the things she wants done or the items that she wants, it's just cutting.  I know what her problem is.  She used to force me to make her the center of my attention.  If I didn't give her ALL my attention, to the point of ignoring my own children, she would punish me.  Nowadays, she gets ZERO of my attention, other than when I have to (to take care of her), and nothing extra, so she has to find different ways to punish me since she doesn't have any power over me anymore.  

You'd think I'd be rejoicing in the fact she has no power over me anymore.  But instead, I am just dealing with the anger and processing the grief of being abused up until recently.  

My husband said yesterday "Make her beg you?  Ha!  You know what begging is?  When she takes her daughter and grandchildren to the grocery store with her, knowing damn well her daughter doesn't have money to buy her own groceries, and then playing a game if everyone treats her right, she'll buy her daughter's family groceries that day.  If not, she'd wait until everyone was in line with their carts to say 'Oh sorry, I don't have enough money to buy you anything today'.  Like, why did she even force you to come with?  To play games with you like that?  She treated you like someone applying for a job, but the only way to get that job was to beg for it by lavishing the boss with praise and attention.  Now THAT'S begging!"  

She has made me beg for my entire life.  When my father died, he had no will, so I got ZERO money from his death.  But my mother?  She had enough to live on for TEN YEARS, all the while spending money like it was going to expire.  She wasted thousands and thousands of dollars and lost so much of it and STILL had enough to live on for ten years.  But she still made me beg for help with our bills and groceries.  She easily had at least $500,000.  She renovated the house.  She invested some of it.  And she spent 90% of it on QVC (a home shopping network) on random bullshit she always gave away.  She spent the last of it on a trip to Alaska with a bunch of lesbians (I say this, because my mother didn't know she was with a group of lesbians when they went LOL).  She had money oozing out her pores and still dangled it in front of me and my family, who were making around $25,000 a year (that's super poor in America, for anyone who doesn't know).  We did not have enough money to pay our bills and feed ourselves and keep our lights on.  And she loved it!  She loved us being poor and her being "well off".  Sure, she didn't pay down her loan or anything, so she eventually lost my childhood home (good riddance).  But she could do whatever she liked, which usually meant QVC and going out to eat.  She loves being the person to make others beg.  

She never once offered anything to me.  She never said "Let me pay your electric bill!" or "Oh, let's go get your family some groceries!"  She always said "Oh, it's our monthly trip to the grocery store."  And she forced me to go with, because if I didn't, she wouldn't buy us groceries on any other day.  And I always had to go with.  If my son went alone with her, she wouldn't buy us anything.  "Your mother didn't want to come with, so I'm not buying you guys anything" she'd tell him.  Screw the fact I had a migraine or whatever.  I was to be at her beck and call and if I didn't conform, I didn't receive the things my family needed to survive for that month.  It was a game to her.  She loved to see us suffer (reminds me of Mother Theresa--who was a sociopathic murderer who loved to watch people die in pain).  Because if she didn't get what I was supposed to supply her with, then we suffered and it brought her joy to have that much power over us.  

I just want to put her in a home and be done with it.  I know damn well she will call me every five minutes to try and occupy my time, but I will set hard boundaries with her once she's in a home.  I will say "I will visit you once a month, that's it, don't ask me for more."  She will end up hating me in the end.  But that's okay.  I wasn't supposed to come back into her life anyways.  She was always supposed to end up hating me.  I only came back into her life because we became homeless.  Had we not?  I'd never would have seen her again.  And you know what?  I think it would have been okay.  I mean, I am very very glad we came back and I've been tortured for the past four years with her.  It's been healing in some ways.  Moving in with her in 2020 was beyond torture and every single one of my childhood anxiety triggers came back.  But I dealt with them and became stronger.  I am not the person I was in 2020.  Granted, I am also worse off in many ways, too.  But in other ways, I am so much better.  I've learned a lot too, about home ownership.  And things you need to keep a home from falling apart.  Also, I would have never owned chickens had we never moved here.  So that's a plus.  Now I have 10 (I had 15, but we sold 5) chickens, maybe soon to be 9 because I hate one and scream profanity at her a lot (she's mean and bites me every chance she gets!!).  And we have pets we'd never would have gotten if we hadn't moved here.  So, like I said, I am grateful.  Not for the abuse.  But for everything else.  

And mostly, I am grateful I got to take away all her power.  But I am really?  When I say that, I realize those words do not resonate with me.  I don't feel better having all the power in our relationship.  I thought I would.  But as it turns out, I am not a shitty person who loves being in control of others.  So it doesn't feel good that she requires either all the power in a relationship, or none.  The only way you get to have any power over yourself or anything with her is to take it all.  And that's bullshit.  I don't like that.  Which is another reason I need her to go in a home.  I am not this person and don't want to have to be forced to be this person.  I don't want to be in control of another adult.  But I have to be, since she a) can't take care of herself and b) if I don't, she will take control of me and my life.  

Here is a scenario of what I mean:  I leave to go to the store.  She will guilt me that she can't come with.  And I don't take her with because she will spend all my money.  "Just tell her no!" you say.  Okay, I'll do that.  And then watch her be a horrible bitch to me the rest of the day.  It's just easier to not take her to begin with.  I allow her to go to certain stores, once a month.  Like, resale shops.  But she spent $100 last month at a resale shop on random bullshit, then immediately wanted to go to the dollar store to spend $100 more.  It's ridiculous.  The more I take her with, the more she wants to go.  So I have to sneak out.  She's not allowed to go to grocery stores or dollar stores, or anywhere that sells food or cleaners.  Because she will fill her cart with cleaners and candy.  She has diabetes and I have chemical sensitivities.  We want to Walmart last fall and she filled her cart with huge gallons of apple cider, cakes, cookies, donuts, and anything else you can think of.  It was soon after that I took her debit card away because she can't make proper decisions on what to buy.  So now, instead of transferring money to her spending account, I just pay for everything myself.  It's fucking tedious.  

If it was up to my mother, she'd still be driving, and spending all her money to point of being homeless. 

I've taken my power back in other ways, too.  To the point, that's I've pretty much gotten all of it (though not quite all).  But she still knows how to cut my wounds open.  She still knows how to be cruel to me.  Telling me that I am requiring her to "beg" for things, when I have ADHD and I just freaking forget sometimes.  Also, I am fucking busy a lot, and don't always get around to the things she wants done (like laundry) on the exact day she wants me to do it.  It happens.  But not to her.  She apparently still thinks I should give her all my attention and she should still be top priority.  

Anyways, after rambling all that, I forgot to add that I gave her her cigs two nights ago (I make them, btw, to save money--it's over $120 a month to buy her cigs, but it costs me maybe $30 a month to make them...it's a pain my ass, but it's worth saving the money) with a sticky note that read: 

"Asking me more than once to do something is NOT begging!  Please stop acting like when I forget to do something it's on purpose!"  

And she said NOTHING about it.  No apologies.  Nothing.  If she brings up the begging thing again, I will remind her how many times she's made ME actually beg for things I needed from her.  I will also ask her if all the times I reminded her to put the draft snake in front of the door in winter last year or how many times I have to put signs up because she refuses to do the things I ask, if those things are ME begging for her to do what I ask?  I will say "Well, I've certainly actually have had to beg you to do things, so I don't think you realize what that word actually means!!"  I she says "Oh I just forgot!"  I will say "Well, obviously I am forgetting to do the things you're asking, too."  

But that other part she said, the part that said "then I ask myself what am I even doing here?"  As though her "begging" me to give her cigarettes when I forget to leave them out (one time I just ran out of stuff and didn't have money to buy more until the next day) is beneath her.  As though she's so special in this life she shouldn't have to ask more than once.  But deep down, I know exactly what she means by that.  She means that she's playing pretend with me, just "allowing" me to take control of everything for her: her finances, her doctor's appointments, the house, everything.  That she, at any time, can just take all the control back.  That I am just doing stuff for her.  Like somehow I am just her house manager and she can fire me at any time.  If I do a bad enough job, she'll just take control back.  You know how I know that?  Because the last time she blew up, a couple weeks ago, she basically said that.  

She said "You know what, I will just call and get control of my own money again, because I am sick of having to beg you for things!"  This was over the fact I didn't get her cigarettes out to her on time because I had run out of money to get more tubes.  I had filled up on her box with like 10 cigarettes, instead of whatever number she was getting at the time.  I said "I am going to the store to get more tubes so I can make you more, I ran out of tubes yesterday, today we get paid so I am going to buy more.  I am not punishing you or anything."  I was rude about it, not nice in my response.  Because it pissed me off.  And then I said "I'd like to see you try to get your finances in order, you wouldn't have the first clue how to."  And she said "Oh yes I will!"  I laughed.  She said "You never tell me anything, I didn't know that!" (about the cigarettes tubes).  My son said "Because, grandma, you don't understand anything she ever tells you!"  And when I do tell her, she either obsesses or is rude to me, so I don't tell her things anymore.  

But yes.  That's what she meant and thinks.  She thinks that I am just playing pretend here, I guess.  You know what?  I wish I was.  I wish didn't have to do all this shit for her, but I have to.  It's my fucking job.  Until she goes in a home.  Which I cannot wait for.  

Okay, I need to go clean my chicken coop and collect eggs and mulch the leaves.  It's nice out today at least.  Then to clean the garage to make room for two new winter chicken coops.  Party time.