This is a hella long post so I apologize in advance. I don't mind if you don't read it. I just need to get this out of my head. It's something of a twice-yearly ritual...an exorcism, if you will.
I don't post here too often because I've largely made peace with my relationship (or lack thereof) with my mother. It's really only when she tries to re-insert herself in my life that I reach out for advice or even just anyone who feels that feel, since everyone I know IRL has no fucking concept what narcs are like - or at least they haven't realized it yet.
The last time I heard from my mother was last year around this time, when she wanted me to bother my youngest brother on his birthday. Something about "needing his help", probably car repairs (free, natch) or just a straight-up cash handout. I was not about to put him through that, after everything he's already been through, so I told her via FB message, "I don't think there's anything any of us can do for you anymore," and that was that. (FB messenger is the only way she ever tries to communicate, on the rare occasions she does. I don't get why she wouldn't call or text but I'm honestly glad she doesn't.)
She'd been living in her truck in the Walmart parking lot for about 3, maybe 4 years at this point? I lost track...but I'd be reminded of her existence every time I had to shop there. There's her vehicle, parked at the back of the lot, sunshade in the windshield. I never knew if she was just sitting in the cabin, or lying in the covered bed of the truck, or what...and of course the human part of me, the soft heart of me, tortured me with images of her sick, dying, freezing to death in the winter. I hate what she did to my siblings, my father, and I, but I'm still human, and I still miss the moments of "normal mom" I managed to get out of her. I kept it together and never let myself be weak enough to try to talk to her again, though. I knew what that would get me, ultimately.
Sometime last winter, the truck disappeared. Relief flooded me; I felt slightly more at peace, imagining that she'd found another mark online to con into letting her stay with them, or maybe she'd just ripped someone off for a couple hundred bucks and driven down south, where there's not much snow in the winter - anything I could imagine to cling to the hope that she'd left my city and left my life. I was so wrong.
This nosy old bitch at "my" gas station, the one right by my house and the one I've been going to for 15 years, had to mention my mother to me that winter. Apparently they have a friend in common and said friend had told Nosy that my mother was in the hospital for something, she almost died. Nosy didn't know why exactly, but still felt compelled to drop that kind of info on me. I'd also told her in the past, please don't talk to me about my mother, you have no idea who that woman really is and if you did, you wouldn't be so fucking concerned about her, but she just had to let me know about this incident. After telling me this latest news, I told her that if she ever mentioned her to me again, I'd stop coming to the station and file a complaint against her to corporate. That's had her shut up about it ever since. With time, I put two and two together and came to the conclusion that while she was in the hospital, she must have either lost the vehicle to impound for it being "abandoned", or she left town once she got out, because I haven't seen the truck since. I still look for it out of habit when I'm there, but once I verify she's not there I feel reassured.
So on to today. I get a FB messenger request from her - under her real name. Not the childish pseudonym she's been rocking since I was in high school. Her profile pic is some anime girl, which I can't even comprehend; we're talking about a 60+ year old, white, morbidly obese, racist, homeless alcoholic woman IRL. The fact that she's made herself a new profile in and of itself pisses me off, for starters; her life is gone, her children have abandoned her for their own mental health, her husband divorced her years ago because of her bullshit, but here she is, still happily tweeting and facebooking it up with her shitty homemade images of Micheal Meyers with sexy quotes on them, or memorial images made for her pet ferrets (which she stole from the pet store, knowing full well they'd be living in a vehicle with her), or some other stupid fangirl bullshit about Norman Reedus or what the fuck ever she's obsessing about lately. I open the request because I cannot control my curiosity and it's some jpg'ed to shit image she probably stole from someone else's blog that says,
"You are my child. I worry if you are tired and how your day has been. I pray that you are happy and surrounded by friends. A part of me still needs to hear these things from you. You may be busy but a simple 'hello I'm fine' definitely will do. You are an adult and have told me so, but the parent in me will never completely let you go. You will always be my baby in my mind, and sometimes I need to hear, 'hello, I'm doing fine.'"
SINCE FUCKING WHEN? Since the half-hearted birthday message she sent me over a year ago, just before trying to get me to shake down my younger bro? I don't get it - I don't understand why she thinks this is going to get me to crumble. This fake-ass, half-ass attempt at reconnecting? A shitty "needs moar jpg" image is what I'm worth?
I know what it is. She needs something. AGAIN. I've been sitting here for the last couple of hours trying to figure out what to send back, if anything. "I'm doing fine. Goodbye." or "I've been dealing with a major medical issue for the last two months, not that you'd know or care." or "How much do you need this time, Mom?" or "What have you done with your life to make me want to come back into it?"
If she would drop all the shit - the fucked up fb and twitter pages, the obsessions with fictional characters and dead pets, the macabre fascination with death, with all the childish garbage that makes up her identity - and wrote me a sincere letter, as my fucking mother, I might have a little more tolerance for this shit. If she told me she's been living in a shelter, getting counseling for her mental issues and alcoholism, if she could show me she's been working a job, any kind of job at all, if she could show me some AA chips or prove to me somehow that she's been doing something, anything, with her life, other than stewing in her own rancid juices. If she could somehow make me feel anything besides disgust and revulsion for her, I might be willing to give her the most limited contact in the world. I miss my mother. I miss having a mother, period. But there's no fucking way I'm letting this demon back through my door.
I'm sorry for the rant, if you've made it this far. I hope I didn't take up too much of your time. Thank you for reading it, though.
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