There’s a dude sitting on the floor, catatonically staring ahead, arms wrapped around his raised knees, rocking his upper body back & forth. What’s he look like, you ask? Extremely sunburned, goatee two bumps on his head, & a long, whispy thing sticking out of the back of his pants.
Almost inaudibly he keeps repeating, “Ohshitohshitoshit”; occasionally throwing in a "What happened?"
He’s had some setbacks over the years, like when he went a fiddlin’ in GA but he’s always been in charge…until today. He was unceremoniously booted out of corner office on 7 overnight so fast that it’s amazing his head has stopped spinning. No doubt the decorators are already there giving it a new look, one more to her liking.
There’s not a bit of doubt that’s where the abusive bitch who birthed me is right now. Yup, she didn’t just go to Hell, she took it over.
I won’t be haunted in her death, because that’s what she did to me when she was alive. So join me, fellow Dopers, for a drink tonight (Fireball??? It seems oh so appropriate!) in toasting my freedom
Before you ask, I tried to cut the toxicity out of my life, but she persisted. At least until I eventually wised up & had the po-po explain to her what a no-contact order was. Even then I lived in fear that she’d get Alzheimer’s / dementia as it’s my understanding that those people tend to forget more recent things while retaining more of older memory
Congratulations and sorry for your loss. It is acceptable and human to simultaneously have multiple conflicting emotions.
My mother felt very similar to you when my grandmother died. I only knew my grandmother when she was “old and trying to get into heaven” as the joke goes, so I never saw the bad side, but from what I understand she was emotionally abusive to my mother for her entire childhood.
My mother, who fortunately did not inherit those tendencies, both hated her and talked to her multiple times per week, and visited a few times per year. When my grandmother died, the sense of relief in my mother was palpable.
I have been estranged from Mommy Dearest for over twenty years now. Thankfully, she has not tried to contact me. That would be her sister, Auntie Mame, who cannot take a hint. She did manage to friend my son on Facebook, which is fine. He’s an adult and can tell a hawk from a handsaw.
I know my mother is getting up there (90 as of November) but I don’t know that I want to make the rapprochement, for reasons that I articulated on this board (or its predecessor) long ago.
@Spiderman, I think the best perspective you can have on this is to make it a new chapter (or new volume) of your life story. Everything before now is prologue,
Go back & carefully reread who was in a catatonic state, but thanks!
Last Thurs was a fun day. SO & her daughter were on the way home from an unplanned multi-state drive to visit mom/grandma when they got the up (down?) graded diagnosis - “Terminal” (last I heard they still haven’t figured out what specific type of cancer it is, other than, ‘Stage 4’ & ‘malignant’)
Daughter decides she needs a hug from her bestie/college roommate, who lives not that far from me. I just happen to be standing there when they pull up; amazing how that works . SO gets out of the car & kind of melts into my arms, sobbing away. Now I’m one who can always shock & surprise her, & this day was no exception!
SO - “She’s terminal”
Me - “Gotcha beat”
SO - ::gives me strange look:: “Whatcha mean?”
Me - “I’m an orphan”
SO - “What?!?!?” followed by her best Bluto impersonation. “I was not expecting that!”
Although we’ve talked numerous times, we’ve spent the past week states apart, dealing with our respective families in different states so we couldn’t even lean on each other; quite literally & nearly as figuratively as we should have been able to.
Well that went fast. SO’s mom was admitted to the horse pistol late last week. Family was told she wouldn’t leave alive. SO came down Friday. We were talking yesterday. I explicitly told her to go ask the nurse what she thought as hospice nurses have a much better pulse (no pin intended) on the situation since they deal with it everyday. She stated a week or so.
This morning I got a call, “Get here, NOW!”. Southwest was quickest, but not quick enough; she passed before the connecting flight landed.
He’ll of a start to the year, 65 days in & we’re both now motherless
. SO gets out of the car & kind of melts into my arms, sobbing away. Now I’m one who can always shock & surprise her, & this day was no exception!