Growing up sucks

Today was A.J.'s 1^st birthday party. My job was to take pictures which was very difficult with her 4-year-old brother want to “be part of the show too!” But AJ turned 1 and that's all that matters.

Hey AJ, is it your birthday party?

It was one of those days, though, where it was spent with family. And this isn't a bad thing but there are a lot of things going on that are causing some underlying tension. I try to stay out of it all but I'm part of it too, natch.

A big one was that I hadn't told my mother about the marathon in October. So many reasons – 1) whenever I tell her I'm going to do anything it immediately becomes the point of every.single.conversation with questions about how it's going and what are you eating for that and if I were seen eating anything 'not good' I would get the third degree about; 2) she may (emphasis on 'may') have offered to come up to watch me run and I didn't need that extra stress of taking care of her too; and 3) by the time I felt maybe comfortable with telling her then the inevitable questions of “why didn't you tell me this before” would have come up.

Well, the cat got out of the bag today. My SIL knew because I had to call her to see about blisters and a couple other issues that weekend and I had already told my brother about it. But she was sort of sworn to secrecy. Today we were talking to her about all her accomplishments this year and the spotlight was getting pretty hot on her so she blurts out, “Moe ran a marathon this year.”

Oooohhhh the burning of the eyes from my mother. I have scars. You can see them all over my face from other times this has happened. And the first thing out of her mouth was “You didn't tell me that.”

There was no word of “that's great!” or “congratulations” or “wow, that explains your obsession with running this year.” Just “you didn't tell me that” and “when was this”.

The tension was THICK.

As I drove home, watching intently for deer – damn hunting season, I pondered this. It's not like mother/daughter relationships are easy, and with being the youngest, that hasn't helped some situations either. Mom is one who likes to be needed, and I'm desperately trying to keep my own life my own, especially since I've moved back closer to home. When I was in the Cities it was easier because I did need her to keep me in touch with my siblings a little bit more. But now, I'm here and I can do that on my own, and I do. When I was in the Cities I spent my nights much as I do now – reading, knitting or watching tv or baking, I didn't go out and party. And Mom had told her boss earlier this year that she felt like she needed to make sure I got out and did things because I didn't have any friends. Which is wrong – I have friends here, I got out and did things, just maybe not what she was thinking I should be doing. And it's been tense much of the time.

Maybe that's the issue. I need my own life. And I need to be able to trust Mom with information I give her. And not find out later that she has told all of her friends. That was another issue once. I had been given some information that would affect Mom too and I told her and told her not to say anything to anyone about it. I found out later she told a lady she worked with about it (or maybe danced with, I don't remember – I just knew I didn't know her and mom had betrayed my trust). When I confronted mom she said, “Well she doesn't know you, so it's fine, she won't say anything about you.” But, Mom...it was also about a place I work, which you told her that too and other people work there who are also affected by this. Now they are in jeopardy too.

So I've been finding that I've been avoiding my mother more than I used to, and I get tense when spending time with her. I'm always on guard – with what I say, with what I do, with how I act. That can't be healthy. I'm not sure what to do.

Yeah, I could talk to her, but I don't know that that would help right now. There are defensive tactics that she takes immediately in any conversation and has trouble focusing on conversations (e.g. I'll be explaining something that happened at work that day and she'll be eating supper while reading the paper and occasionally saying “mmmm hmmmm”). So I'm kind of at an impasse right now. So I guess I'll just have to keep going until I can figure out how to talk to my mother. Sheeeit.