Posted by Dinah on February 28, 2007, at 10:01:10 [reposted on February 28, 2007, at 11:21:03 | original URL]
In reply to Re: Why is it that my mother makes me sooo angry?, posted by Jo U.K on February 28, 2007, at 3:51:57
Well, I appreciate how terrific a mom she was when I was very little. I appreciate all she taught me, and I really really appreciate her insistence on inclusiveness and kindness. Not just from me, but from all her kids in class, towards all the kids in school. I appreciate how she threw herself into whatever interested me and supported me fully in whatever I wanted to do. She loves kids, and kids love her. For good reason.
But I sure could live without her spending renovation money that's already scarce to pay someone to carefully box up thirty year old catalogs and magazines - even if they're gnawed by rodents or have been under flood waters - while she lays in bed, refuses to let anyone throw away anything until she looks at it, yet refuses to look at it. I can live without her putting off the people who want to help her, and I fear that one day the offers of help will stop coming. I'm scared at what's going to happen to her, and to the house. And I'm responsible because she doesn't have a dollar left of what Daddy left her, although she still owes thousands of dollars.
I don't know what to do. Any sensible soul would just toss the flooded stuff. My brother and I have talked about it during her six month trips since the hurricane. But we're both afraid of her rages. So is the person who is doing the work. So the old magazines and catalogs keep getting boxed, and I keep paying to have them boxed and I yell, but I don't do anything. And the house remains partially ungutted and unemptied a year and a half after Katrina. Never even mind putting walls back. I do have to admit that spreading mold doesn't seem to be a problem. I have no idea how she had such rare luck in that.
I know I have to use the only power I have, the power of the pocketbook, to make sure she doesn't end up with a house that's unliveable. But I can't bear to think of the fights ahead. I have neither the time nor the emotional resources.
And of course, she's got two people living there with her, and she refuses to make sure sufficient living or sleeping area for three people is cleared. She is totally uninterested in the fact that she's making their lives miserable. I guess they don't complain, so I shouldn't. But I guess it brings back memories of when the hospice basically had to take my father into protective custody before she'd allow a hospital bed to "clutter up her house" as she screeched to the social worker, and agree to get healthcare workers to make sure he was kept clean. But these are healthy men, and they aren't as vulnerable as Daddy was.
All of this makes it sound as if she's suffering from senile dementia, I guess. But she's been this way all my life. :(
poster:Dinah
thread:737030
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/relate/20070210/msgs/737034.html