Mother has been quiet.  She's been avoiding me.  Except for two days ago when she was up my ass about everything.  "Buy me this!"  "Buy me that!" "Do this for me!"  "Take me to the gas station!" "Do that for me!"  "Let me spend money!"  "Buy me clothes!"  Blah blah blah.  I am fine with buying her whatever she wants or needs, as long as it's not stupid.  And that day she wanted to go buy lottery tickets, candy, and sugary drinks.  Do I need to keep reminding her she has diabetes??  She thinks that because she takes her meds, she can do what she likes.  And that's not how that works.  So, I said no.  She did not like that and has avoided me since.  Oh, well.  Good for me!!

But also, bad for me.  This means she could be gearing up for something big.  Who knows, she always takes me by surprise.  When I think she's gearing up, she acts normal.  When I don't expect it, then BAM!!!  She hits me with a door!!  Like, literally.  

She did tell me she ordered a catalog from the flower shop online, which means she'll want to spend another $100 on flowers this year.  And I am going to say no, because we are not living here forever.  And she buys shit to plant to keep here forever, thinking I will take it with me when I leave.  And I am not.  Because I hate her stupid flowers.  "Oh the bleeding hearts are coming up!!"  And all I can think is "I fucking hate bleeding hearts."  "Oh the roses are growing!"  "I fucking hate roses."  Why on earth does she pick the ugliest flowers to plant?  I am just very particular about my flowers and everything she picks is just so ugly to me.  Roses stink and have thorns are just not pretty.  Both my NM and my NMIL love them.  That's reason enough to hate them.  

I love the spring weather, but I hate how my mother is when the weather is warm.  She takes over everything outside.  I planted some lilac bushes a few years ago, before we knew we were leaving, and she got so fucking mad at me for planting them without telling her (because apparently SHE was the only person who was allowed to plant things in the ground here--something she vehemently denies doing now).  THEN she took them over as though they were hers to worry about.  So, I honestly hate anything to do with planting in the ground here.  I am even nixing the idea of another food garden (I plant one every year).  The first year SHE picked out all the fucking plants, and then DEMANDED I plant them where SHE wanted, and when I didn't, she threw a fit.  Then she just stopped watering half of them and they all died.  After that, I had to separate her from my garden.  Now, I don't even want to do one (after a HUGE crop of mine failed last year due to bugs), and instead I am only planting herbs and sprouts (indoor sprouts).  They are healthier anyways.  

I am really not in a shit mood, even though I seem like I am.  I am just not looking forward to another summer with her.  She can't get a knee replacement, so I am stuck with her with no vacation.  Oh well.  

When I am feeling like this, I remind myself that my life isn't the worst.  Today I was reminded that my friend's son is dead.  He was a good man and I have no idea how he died.  He was my little buddy when he was little.  And somehow, this young man in his early twenties doesn't get to be here anymore.  He's one year older than my oldest.  And I realize just how fucking lucky I am to have both my kids and my hubby and who fucking cares if I have to be around my mother.  At least my sons are still here.  At least I am not a widow (I had an old friend who TWICE widowed before age 40).  And I have to be grateful for what I have.  I am listening to little Jimmy's death song right now (I have this thing with death songs--they come to me after I find out someone's died...like my grandma's is Train's "Calling All Angels" and my ex-NFIL's song is "Already Gone" by Kelly Clarkson.  Little Jimmy's is "Lenticular Clouds" by The Floating Whale).  And I remember him being a toddler and I thought to myself "She had no idea back then he wouldn't live to be 25."  Being a mother is scary as fuck.  But that what keeps us humble.  That's what keeps us grateful, right?  And while I know my mother is crazy, I am goddammed lucky to still have my actual family around me.  And that's what I have to keep my eyes on: what I have.  Because I may not have it one day.  And Jimmy makes me remember that <3  

Someone pulled on my cabinet so hard that it broke my hinges off in the kitchen, the one with the baby locks on them, so I had to fill in the holes on the cabinet door with wood glue and reattach them.  The kids both say (they're adults, not children, mind you) it wasn't them and it wasn't my hubby or me.  If they kids had done it, they'd say immediately "Oh yeah, that was me, sorry".  But I think my mother started yanking on it and it broke.  Maybe, maybe not.  It could just be that they're old, too.  But it's odd that it just so happened to the one with a lock on it.  So, she got free access to my fucking cabinet, filled with cleaners for 24 hours while the glue dried.  Knowing that in the past my mother has stolen my items before, I now need to raid her room while she's out to make sure she didn't take any of my cleaners or my scrubbies.  

Sigh.  

I wish I didn't have to hide things from her, but she uses them for disgusting things and then cleans my sink and counters and stove with them.  

The funniest part?  It didn't break my child locks! LMAO  I am sure that's what she was trying to do, but it didn't.  It just pulled the screws out of the holes in the cabinet door.  OOPS.  

Well, anyways, that cracks me up.  

Also, she's noticed the cameras and has said nothing.  She's also said nothing about the locks on the cabinets, too.  One day, I was looking into the kitchen to see who was making noise, and saw my mother looking directly into the camera at me LOL  I was like....uhhhh.....okay.  She stood there for many seconds and then just walked away and said nothing.  She's never brought them up or asked about them.  I am not sure what that means.  But it's never good.

Another thing is that she has always pushed back on my rules.  But now she goes overboard to show me she's following them, only to not follow other rules.  I keep telling her to keep her bedroom door closed, and she refuses.  My mother has a cat.  He's an asshole.  And he attacks my dog.  And my dog LOVES cats.  But he literally tries to kill her cat.  A) I don't want the cat killed.  B) I don't want to have to deal with the aftermath of my dog murdering a cat (like, having to put him down or something).  C) my dog knows the cat lives in her room and will seek him out to attack him, just as the cat seeks out my dog to attack him.  They are like oil and water, if oil and water wanted to murder each other.  I am not even exaggerating here.  The dog will eventually murder that cat if the crazy bitch doesn't shut her fucking door.  

My ENTIRE THING was having my mother go to rehab after a knee replacement and I was going to get rid of her stupid cat and say he ran away.  Now, I am going to have to try to catch the little asshole outside and do it.  But that will never happen, as whenever my mother is around, he's terrified of everyone else but her.  When she's not around, he loves everyone, including dogs.  

This cat needs a good home, away from my mother (who abuses him), and away from my dog.  He's also a menace to dogs in general, so he needs to go to a non-dog home.  I will call the shelter (non-kill) first before bringing him to make sure they have room.  If they don't, I am not sure what we'll do.  

Today mother is walking around like she's got sticky shoes.  She's picking her knees up and says to my husband "Look, now people don't have to hear my dragging feet!"  She's so freaking weird sometimes.  Which is a bad thing, as she may fall again (she recently fell after putting her leg up on a chair to put lotion on).  I had a dream last night that she fell in the basement, and I had to call 911.  I swear, I can't even get away from this crap in my sleep. 

That is all for now.  The cabinet is fixed (for now) and we're going to clean out our basement this weekend and the garage next week.  Mr. Brooks is in spring break from college so we can get some work around the house done, finally.  We're both looking forward to it.  

Okay, that is all for now.  

Today she wanted me to email her sister because her sister was blaming my mother for my aunt's own caller ID not working (she lives 6 hours away in another state).  But here's the kicker: my mother wanted me to email her pretending to be my mother.  It was as though me emailing my own aunt myself was not an option.  As though me emailing her myself was not only unnecessary, but completely unheard of.  It was as though I am not a part of this family anymore.  Period.  

Sigh.  I am so fucking done with this game.  I refuse to be ignored anymore.  I take care of this crazy person who lives in my house and I will not pretend I don't.  I will not pretend I do not matter.  And I will not let them pretend that either.  They do not have to like me.  But they do have to respect the fact that I exist until my mother passes on.  After she's gone?  They can forget I ever existed in the first place.

So, I emailed my aunt, as myself, without my mother's permission or knowing about it, because why should I have to hide the fact that I exist?  Why?  It makes zero sense.  She literally wanted me to misspell things, leave out punctuation, and not capitalize words to make it more believable.  What in the holy hell is wrong with her?  Why not just say "Hey Shay, can you email my sister and tell her how caller ID works?".  Because that would be too weird, I guess.  I am not supposed to exist anymore.  I am not supposed to be in a familial relationship with anyone, not even my own mother.  But I emailed my aunt, explained what she needed to know, and told her it has nothing to do with my mom's phone why my mother's name doesn't come up on my aunt's caller ID (it's the phone company's issue) and that she needs to put my mom's name and number in her phone's directory (a cordless landline phone) and that would fix the problem.

I started to rectify this last year by signing my name to certain Christmas cards of hers she had me send out.  But now I am going to do it to ALL of her cards this holiday season.  Or should I say "our" cards.  Because fuck that.  I am done letting her erase me.  And I am done letting her let other people think she's erased me, too.  They all need to know that we ALL live in this house, TOGETHER, and my mother is not the one running the show.  

Well, that felt good.  Today hasn't been the best day, but that made me feel great to know I have the ability to take my own power back still.

That is all for now.

Right now I am printing the pages to a new journal I am going to create.  I am going to try a different way of creating this one, compared to my normal hardcover journals.  And this one is only going to have one signature, but it shall be stuffed with ephemera.  My normal way to make journals is to make writing journal on hand-dyed paper.  But today I am creating one that's more for adding things into than writing.  And of course, in true ADHD Shay style, I took and ruined an entire sheet by printing an entire page over another one, right after I was done printing the back.  That's a LOT of ink to waste.  Ugh.  Oh well.  I am reprinting now.  

I am having issues making my signatures fit in such a way that looks seamless.  They always get messed up and are crooked most of the time, which is discouraging.  But maybe it works, I don't know.  We'll see.  

My biggest fear is that I create my items and nobody buys them.  That's what's happened so far.  I've made books on Amazon, printed books for writing in (different types of journals) and I've not had a single sale.  Granted, they are lone books in a sea of other created books, so I need to market them, but ugh.  I am a creator, not a workhorse.  But in today's world. you have to be everything.  So, I guess that means pushing myself to do all that needs to be done, otherwise I don't stand a chance in selling anything.  So annoying.  I just want to create.  

I guess that's the price you pay for not being able to work outside the home, right?  You don't get to be just one thing.  You have to be all the things, otherwise you're lost in the shuffle of all the other people who know how to do it right.  I don't have a choice here.  It's either create for fun or create and edit and market and package and everything else for profit.  Those are your two choices.  

Well, l just need to finish several projects to get them listed and get my shop open.  I also need to sew some stuff, too.  I have so much to do and I am stalling by purchasing items to create with, rather than creating.  I wish I could find a way past the wall of creator's block and just get this shit done.  

I'm always so gung ho about doing the things, until I actually have to do the things.  Sigh.  Okay, enough stalling, back to work.  

I remember when Saturday nights were for fun LOL  

Today she told my cousins that SHE put down HER dog.  She didn't say WE put down OUR dog, which still wouldn't be correct, but it would be better.  She wants to keep me separate from my family.  She wants them to think of her as a single entity, and not us and her as a family.  The dog was MINE.  I put her down, not her.  She didn't make the choice, she didn't take care of her when she was sick, and she didn't pay for any of the vet bills.  But by telling my family it was her dog and she had to make the decision and do all the shit, SHE gets all the sympathy that way.  Awww.  So cute.  

So maybe it's more that reason, than excluding me?  But she always excludes me, so it just felt like yet another jab at putting a divide between me and my family.  Because the dog was MINE and I was the one who held her as they got ready to put the shot into her after she had had a stroke that morning, and my husband was the one who held her as she passed, SHE gets all the "awws, poor baby lost her doggie!".  How fucking sick that is to take credit for a dog she gave up on YEARS ago?  It makes me so angry and so sad for our dog, to have a woman who couldn't stand her, so she gave her to me, get sympathy for her dying.  What a fucking asshole!  

My mother is the reason my family hates me.  Now, firstly, I wrote a blog post about the TRUTH of my life being abused growing up and how my family knew it was happening and ignored it.  I also wrote another blog post (just two in total) about how my family abandoned my grandparents who had Alzheimer's to me and my mother to take care of (thought if you asked my mother, she'd tell you I did nothing, even though I did a LOT for both of them--but that's how she is: Shay is a lazy bum who did nothing in life, she did everything--yet another thing that triggers me about my dog dying).  So, wrote two blog posts and my family got mad and we talked about it and it was fine.  BUT THEN my mother stepped in.  And now I haven't talked to them all since.  Well, pretty much.  That was in 2013, which was The Great Awakening (the time when I realized mother had NPD).  Mother went to the family reunion and did nothing but talk shit about me the entire time and made them believe I was fucking crazy.  

THIS is why I am writing memoirs.  THIS is why I need to publish them.  I am sick of her curating my image for me.  I need to the truth to be told to the world, even if nobody cares but me.  At least the truth is out there.  At least I said what I needed to say to set the record straight in the world.  I am so tired of this bullshit.  I am tired of her lies.  I am so tired of all of this.  But like my shitty therapist once said "it's only temporary", meaning taking care of my mother.  And I know this is true.  So, I will deal with it until I don't have to anymore, no matter how long it takes.  I have to remind myself, who cares what my shitty cousins think of me?  I am free of them.  Let the narcissists play games with the other narcissists.  Half of what they say are probably lies, too.  I don't even need to care about it.  

We've been working on our credit, paying down debt, and now we're going to get a loan to pay off a HUGE debt that we got sued over, and now we're paying on, BUT we're not getting any freaking credit for it (they don't report to credit agencies).  So if we get a loan and pay on that instead, we'll get our credit scores moving up. 

Also, I've been working non-stop on my store: creating all my online crap as well as working on products and doing product research to make my products better than they are.  It's hard work, especially when you have POTS.  I walked two miles two days ago, and yesterday I could have slept all day.  But I've also been super freaking sleepy all week (this happens sometimes) and I haven't been able to get the work done I need to do.  Also, last night, I had a doctor's appointment for a consult for my hysterectomy, and I chickened out.  I am terrified of both the doctor himself and of having it done.  Ugh.  I am also terrified of having it done when my mother knows about it.  She will tell my business to everyone.  And I don't want her to know about it.  So, I will wait until she sees her ortho for a consult for knee replacement surgery and see when they schedule her for and then I'll know when she'll be in rehab, and hopefully schedule my surgery for then.  It's only one day down-time, so it won't mess up my vacation away from her, I hope LOL.  

So that's it for now.  Kinda.  Time to go work on my store's inventory.  

My mother carefully cultivates other people's perception of me.  Even now with dementia.  She keeps up the lies, knowing which of her friends she's told what about me, and makes sure she keeps that person thinking the same ideas about me as they've always have.  

Take her BFF Christmas, for example.  She's made her believe I am lazy, I am an overreactor, I am a liar, and that I am selfish.  At one point, she made her believe I was so much of all of these things that I held her hostage in our own home.  Even though the reason I wasn't letting her leave was because we were on lockdown from our state, Christmas almost called elder abuse services on me because of it.

This is why my mother is only friends with idiots.  A smart person would say to my mother "Your daughter is keeping you safe.  You should thank her."  

But she is friends with smart people.  But she doesn't tell those people the same lies about me.  She knows damn well they won't believe her.  Well, at least on that on particular thing.  She does have my entire family believing I am horrible and that I am severely mentally ill (even though deep down, they know better, because they know me and they allow me to take care of my mother--if they truly believed I was totally insane, they wouldn't have let us move in together--or would they?--shows how much they care about her well being if they think I am insane and let me take care of her LOL).  

They think I am insane because once I wrote a blog post about my entire family being assholes.  And they found it.  I only stated the 100% truth about my life, but they're all narcissists so they all think I literally insane for writing it.  Sigh. 

Anyways, some of those family members have enough smarts to know that I kept my mother indoors during lockdown because dat bitch is crazy and never keeps herself safe.  Like, ever.  So, she didn't bitch to them about it, because she knew better.  She only complains to the ones who will believe her. 

And she still keeps her BFF Christmas believing I am a lazy asshole who doesn't do anything, other than cook for her.  

Here is something I noticed-she will tell C that she has a personal cook: me.  But never once has she ever said "Wow, last night Shay cooked the most delicious dinner!"  Or "Wow, sometimes Shay cooks three meals: one especially for me and my dietary needs (haha she'd never say that, but it is what I do, including making sure each piece of food is soft enough for her toothless ass), one for her and Mr. Brooks, and one for the kids, as they are on a special diet.  I can't beleive she does so much work!". (haha she'd never say that, unless it was in mock "surprise").  Or "Shay is such a good cook!  You should come over and eat with us sometime!"  Or anything like that at all.  She always tells her I am the only person who cooks (though I'm not, my kids cook all the time, like tonight, my youngest made leek/mushroom soup from scratch), but never says what I cook or how I cook.  Her schtick used to be "she cooks, and I do all the dishes!"  But then I made her stop washing dishes because she used to dig scrubbies out of the trash and wash them with them (fucking YUCK!).  So now she never says much about me at all.  Which, I guess, is a good thing. 

Yeah, she stopped talking shit about me when I started calling her out on it (and saying I could hear her because she talks so loudly). Thank goodness.  But she never ever talks good things about me.  

And that's because she wants Christmas to think I am a dirty asshole.  She has to keep up the facade.  

Funny, I grew up in filth.  Like actual filth.  My house stunk and was so gross that my mother's go-to saying to guests was "Don't take off your shoes, your socks will turn black!".  And she wasn't wrong.  My mother didn't clean, she put things away, stuffed behind closed doors, drawers, and closets and pretended she was clean.  Even though every surface was sticky and smelly and yellow.  It was disgusting.  But she sure loved to pretend she was the cleanest housewife in the world.  

Oh, she did the dishes each night, too.  That's it. 

But she loves to make everyone around her believe I was/am just plain nasty because I have ADHD (and I'm very creative) and I was/is (though I am better than I used to be) cluttered.  Or because we didn't always do our dishes every single night and still don't.  Also, I am lazy (even though I do almost all the laundry in the house, I do all the grocery shopping and cooking-again, sometimes my kids do, too, I do yardwork and take care of everyone' appointments and pay all the bills, etc.) and I don't give two shits about her (even though I do everything my stupid power to protect her from herself and make sure her meds are right and blah blah blah everything else).  It's not just Christmas she told this stuff too, but other two of her old posse are dead, so I guess they don't count anymore.  But they died believing I was a total asshole.  And both were dumber than a box of rocks and worshipped the ground she walked upon, just like Christmas does.  If she told C that she farted cupcake-scented farts?  C would gladly stick her nose up my mother's ass begging her for a smell.  

Here's the deal: I know my mother is like this.  I know if she does change, it's for her own selfish purposes.  The only reason my mother doesn't really talk too much shit about me anymore is because she's too scared to.  She knows that C will tell me.  She likes C thinking bad things about me.  But she's careful in what she says.  Her insults and jabs about me are quick short bursts and then she takes them back right away or flat out denies them in order to gaslight C.  It's screwy.  But it's enough to keep bad ideas about me in C's head.  It's very purposeful.  Like C will ask if I cleaned something and my mother will do a quick high-pitched laugh, as though it was the funniest thing ever for C to ask that and then when C asks questions about it more, mother will change the subject.  Sometimes the subject change is obvious, as though its done on purpose for dramatic effect, but other times it just looks like my mother lost her train of thought.  And she didn't.  She just wants C to run with it in her own mind (and she will and my mother knows this) without my mother having to elaborate to get herself into hot water if it comes up later to my attention.  She can easily explain a "laugh" away.  But she can't explain words away so easily.  That takes some word salad and whole boatload of lies.  

Like I said, she carefully curates my image to others.  But more than that, she carefully curated my own image to me.  She's made me believe I am lazy, incapable, stupid, and not worthy of love.  Why would anyone do that to their own child?  I know it's because she feels those things about herself, but what the fuck is so wrong with the brains of these assholes that they make their own kids feel the same way?  

I have dyscalculia.  It's like dyslexia for numbers (but not quite).  And as a kid, I was made to believe I was a fucking idiot at math and reading analog clocks (because mother is an analog clock expert, did you not know that?--well, now you do).  I ended up with a legit math phobia because of it.  And she'd choose to put me in positions to have to do math in front of her (like play her favorite game Yahtzee) so I'd struggle and she could pick on me for it.  The same goes for clocks.  

Can you believe in 2020 when we moved in together in this house, she literally started doing that again?  Made me read a clock in front of her and brought out her old "C'mon Shay, what does it say?" bullshit all over again?  It was like she wanted to go back when I was a child and she thought she could abuse me all over again (it was so much more than just clocks, though, she brought back EVERYTHING she abused me with as a child).  I was 43 years old!!  

I didn't find out I had dyscalculia until 2022.  That was a fucking relief!  I wasn't stupid at all, I have a god-damned learning disability.  And yet, she had all her friends believing when I was a kid that I fucking stupid.  

She had me believing that, too.  

So, I am going to curate my own image from now on.  Because fuck her and insecurities.  I get that C is an idiot.  I know this.  And I do not owe her anything, nor do I need to teach her about who I really am.  If she doesn't know by now, then she'll never know.  But I will no longer stand for letting my mother curate my image.  In 2021, my mother sent out Xmas cards to our family and her friends and I took the ones being sent to my family, opened them, and then signed me and my hubby's and kids' names, too.  I wanted those fuckers to believe we were a united front.  So guess what?  None of them sent my mother cards in 2022.  HA!  They only want her attention when they think she's against me.  When I am here?  they have no need for her.  I refuse to let my mother, or my family, act as though I don't live here.  Because fuck them all.  If my mother can eat my goddamned holiday food?  Then she can damn well let me sign our household's holiday cards!  Even if she doesn't know I am doing so.  Ha! 

Also, I will be talking to C soon, and I will be bringing up a few things that need to be talked about.  Again, I am not letting my mother curate my fucking image anymore.  C is too stupid not to believe her, but I am going to set her straight.  Granted, it's dumb to do this, I know, but it really bugs me, because C used to be my friend.   I guess I was just a friend of convenience, as I know she's a reverse narcissist and as soon as my mother only had her left as a friend, C went hardcore into my mother's orbit.  I know it's useless.  But it will make me feel better.  

Thank goodness my mother has ZERO friends in this neighborhood.  None of them think bad things about me due to my mother's meddling, unlike our old neighborhood.  Now my neighbors just think bad things of me because of me LOL  

Also, I am revamping my own self-image, too.  Or at least I am trying to.   I am pushing myself to do think in new ways about myself and to do new things that will help me feel better about myself, too.  It's kind of terrifying.  But it's necessary.  

Because fuck that.  I am not the things my mother has led me to believe I am.  Neither are you.  So, let's move forward, as best we can, in 2023 and beyond, into the realm of "Who am I and who will I be without her abuse?"  Because they don't matter anymore.  Life is too fucking precious to allow some potato to have that kind of control over us anymore.  

Sigh.  Well, let's see how this goes.