Famn Damily

I love my mom. But she’s driving me crazy right now. For the most part, we have a very open relationship; she’s someone that I share the vast majority of my life with and she does the same. We talk once a week, for a couple hours each time, and discuss everything that has happened since the last time we talked.

And, for the most part, I love that. But every so often, she drives me absolutely bonkers and I want to start screening my calls Sunday morning. This has been happening consistently for the past couple of months.

Mom was going through a rough time with her business and she was quite stressed out about it. Naturally, she wanted to talk about it and vent. But I swear we had the exact same conversation, every week, for three months.

I didn’t mind that I felt as if we were just rehashing the same topic over and over; she needed to talk about it and I know I’ve kept her on the line for far too long because I was upset about something.

But after a few weeks, the topic of conversation no longer shifted anywhere else. We stopped talking about other aspects of her life and, short of “And how has your week been?”, the topic never seemed to shift to me. Sometimes the conversation would end immediately after her asking that question.

I found it a bit odd, but let it be, because, clearly, she needed to talk more than I did.

But things have changed for awhile for me. It was crazy busy at work and as a result I had been operating at an elevated stress level for quite some time. It started to wear on me.

Nothing bad – it’s not like I’ve stopped eating or sleeping or anything, I just felt a bit worn out and the time came where I need to vent to someone about it.

A couple weeks ago, my mom, after discussing her topic de jour, asked me how my week at work was. I said it had been crazy. She asked why. I took a deep, sighing breath and said “It’s just crazy. Like absolutely insane.” I took another deep, sighing breath.

I guess she thought I was done. She continued telling me about her week at work; how many hours she worked (not many), how many customers she had (even less) and when she was done:

Are you fucking kidding me?? I guess she thought I was done.

A couple weeks ago, she started asking me if I'd started on my school project. I told her I hadn’t had any time. She started questioning me on it, with judgment creeping into her voice. I told her it has been crazy busy at work and I just didn’t have time. She said “Really?!?!” as if it’s the first she’s heard about it.

I told her that I had been working 10-12 hour a day, going in for a “half day” (a mere 6 hours) on the weekend. That I’d been doing that for the past three weeks. That I barely eat dinner anymore because I don’t get home until 9pm and then I have to start thinking about going to bed so I can do it all over again. That I hoped it would slow down soon, because I don’t know how much more I can take. 

The good news is that my mom doesn’t read my blog. The really good news is the chaos at work has reduced itself to a much more manageable level and I feel a lot more balanced. I might even have time to start working on my project!