Last Christmas I bought my grandmother a $50 gift certificate from the mall. It was good at any store and I figured she could pick out whatever she wanted because when I ask her what she wants she “already has everything”. A week ago it was returned in the mail with a little letter attached to it telling me how she had no way to get there because no one would take her. It’s typical martyr type behavior that she exhibits all the time. She never asked anyone to take her to the mall – and I know she’s been to one since Christmas. I suppose this was supposed to make me feel guilty, but all it did was make me angry – and sad. How incredibly rude. I also found it interesting that she did not return the $100 one that my mother gave her to the same mall.
This is the same woman who told me that dying horribly from bone cancer was God’s way of punishing my dad for not going to church enough. That’s just one of a long list of things she’s said over the years that have pushed me to the point where I would be happy never to see her again.
On the up side, it looks like I have $50 to spend at the mall now.
My Grandmother was a martyr too. One of the few benefits of extreme old age, she’s 90 now, is that she no longer has those tendancies. Oh man it was so annoying. If you did anything to displease her she got sick. As a real plus though it’s always fun to needle those people.
I’d be tempted to pretend I never read the note and send her a nice thank you note for thinking of me this … drat, there’s no good holidays around. Any special days in your life?
I think martyrdom creates sarcasm in the descendants.
Give me her number. I miss my grandmother every day, and she’s been gone 20 years. The gift certificate was a nice gesture, but I’d have called her and said, “Hey, Grandma, how 'bout you and me going to the mall, and spend a nice afternoon.” That would’ve put a crimp in her martyrdom. Oldsters can get way out there at times, and not always show the best judgement. Reduced blood flow to the brain, ingrained habits, sick of it all, fill in your favorite reason. Be the bigger person, and do the right thing. You’ll thank yourself when you’re older. I didn’t see my grandmother nearly enough, and now I regret it. That remark about your Dad was incredibly ill-thought, but don’t let it eat you up. Won’t the astonished look on her face be enough psychic income as you kill her with kindness? In a nice way, that is.
I had forgotten about that! If we went on vacation without her, she would get all worked up and put herself in the hospital - EVERY SINGLE TIME.
St. Patricks Day is right around the corner. 
My grandmother is obviously not like your grandmother. If you want to spend a couple hours with mine listening to her complain about jews, gays, blacks, and those “damn Chinese/Russians/AY-RABS/insert nationality here” then by all means go for it. Around Christmas she was bitching about the “orientals” in her building taking the candy canes off the trees and gasp EATING THEM! Can you not fathom such a horrible thing??? 
Oh, and did I mention she loves quoting Rush Limbaugh?
Just because grannies are generally portrayed as sweet little old ladies, doesn’t mean they all are.
Kiger you are so right. My grandmother is 90 pounds of bitter malevolence. I love her anyways - but sometimes she makes that really, really difficult.
My favorite exchange, although by no means the nastiest, went something like this…
Grandma: wow - you’re sure getting fat
Me: yeah well - you’re shrinking.
My mother told me later that I “hurt grandma’s feelings” I felt one tiny pang of guilt. But only one.
My grandmother’s a martyr, too. My dad takes her to all her doctor appointments in order to make sure she understands her medications and so that he’s aware of what’s going on. She’ll get a clean bill of health from her doctor then get home and - in front of my father - call her other kids and complain about her “diabetes” (which she doesn’t have), her heart problems (she has a pacemaker, but it works well for her and she isn’t having other heart problems), her “cancer” (again, she doesn’t have it) and all sorts of other imaginary maladies. She’ll actually cry on the phone to them. This, of course, completely exasperates my father.
And I have to agree with you, Kiger - not all grandmothers are sweet and loving. Mine has never been a nice woman. She was a mean young woman who happened to have kids who happened to have kids. When she and my grandfather were just starting out, his family gave them a house to live in that was on the family farm. She caused so many problems, the family kicked them out. She recently had to move to a new assisted living place because she got embroiled in a big ruckus at her old one - she was pissed that the people in the kitchen of the dining hall played a boombox while they were working. She got a little group of residents all worked up and created this huge rebellion. She lasted 3 weeks there. I’m wondering what’s going to happen at the new place. Her favorite hobby is pitting people against each other and she has been gleefully partaking of this for her entire life.
C3: Your grandma is Livia Soprano!
One of my few memories of my grandmother:
My sister, grandmother and I, in a grocery store. I was 10 or 11.
There were people I would describe as gypsies (I don’t know what the politically correct term is nowadays) standing in the produce section. She started verbally taunting these people - gypsies in her grocery store! Oh my god!
All this in front of her impressionable 10 and 7 year-old grandchildren. Never will forget it.
My grandmother-in-law, OTOH, is awesome. She reminds me so much of my husband, I just want to go hang out with her while he’s away.
Mom?
I swear to God C3, that if I ever had children myself, this would be my mother to them and anyone else who’s life she decided to deign with her wonderful presence. :rolleyes:
I honestly can no longer stand the woman (and that’s putting it mildly) and am glad that she’s essentially been cut out of my life. And from my aunt, who is her perpetual ‘yes man’ and constantly stuck up her butt, wanted to know why I hated my mother so. Um, because she wondered if I were truly her child then wanted to beat up out on a playground like some bully? Yeah, that might just be the tip of the iceberg.
They certainly all do not grow up to be nice mothers and fathers or grandparents. Sometimes assholes just get older. My sympathies to us all who have/had to deal with that.
Oooh, can I play?
I had an anti-granny, too, a vicious old harpy who hated just about everybody and everything and didn’t much like us, her grandchildren. Although as she got older and more infirm and needed rides, she suddenly discovered that she loved us. After twenty-plus years of her being as mean as cat litter towards us, however, it was tough for us to suddenly return her affection.
She had an assortment of nasty bigotries toward non-Caucasians and liked to scream at some neighbors of hers: “Goddam Mexicans!”. And I remember she once had a hospital stay lasting a couple of days, and as my dad picked her up and she was leaving her room, she said to her roommate, “I sure am glad to see the last of you, you old piss-pants!”
She also loved to publicly berate service people like waitresses and cashiers for imaginary mistakes - I think mostly because she needed someone to put down.
She passed on in 1992, and because her son (my dad) was no longer living, I’m afraid there were no tears shed. Awful, ain’t it?
My maternal grandmother was a mean-spirited, hyper-critical martyr. She was so hard to live with that my mother got married at 17 so she wouldn’t have to live at home a second longer than necessary.
Once, I had to have somewhere to stay, and I ended up at her house. After a week, I never wanted to see her again. She was master of the vicious putdown, and could make you feel less than worthless in once sentence or less. Nobody in the world had any right to say anything, everything she knew was right and everything you knew was wrong. If you tried to stand up for yourself, god help you.
Once, I was heating up a cup of tea in the microwave. She told me to put on oven mitts to retrieve it, because it was hot. I said, “No, grandma, the glass isn’t hot, just the tea.” “But it’s an oven. It’s hot.” This led me to explain to her how a microwave oven works. Then she berated me for telling her a bunch of bullshit because I thought she was a gullible old lady. :rolleyes:
After staying with her for those few weeks, and having to leave to save my sanity, my mother said, “Now you’ve had a small taste of what I had to put up with. Aren’t you wiser now?”
I don’t miss her much at all.
Ah, Grandmothers! Arn’t they wonderful!
Upon hearing that her married, 23 year old daughter was pregnant, she responded - “Never mind dear, you could always have an abortion.”
Although in her defence, in the last couple of months she has changed dramatically. She is a lovely women.