Suzy Says

Yet another day destroyed in the early morning hours. This is getting to be the theme of the week.

My mother, who is the source of all pain in my world, called me up early this morning — at work, too! Yay! — and started making unreasonable demands, threatening to write checks that will bounce, etc., etc. For those of you unfamiliar with my remaining parent, here are the Cliff’s Notes:

1. When my parents got divorced, Mom got: the house, the car, the antiques, her jewelry, half of Dad’s pension (including more than $50,000 in cash), and alimony for a year after she married a jerk half her age. Wonder what jerk boy’s motivation was?

2. She was an only child, so she inherited everything from her parents, including a three storey Victorian mansion near Rochester, NY.

3. She is manic-depressive and doesn’t always take her medication. This made her such an interesting mother that only one of her four children has ventured to become a parent. Also, it makes her grasp of reality tenuous and bizarre, so talking to her is much like being in a bad dream.

4. She has the fiscal responsibility of a delinquent 12 year old. I set up a bank account for her in my name and she overdrew it five months in a row, by as much as $200 a time, until I closed it in despair, my credit rating destroyed.

5. The jerk half her age left her and his employer, the US Marines, last year, having spent every nickel of Mom’s money. He is in Canada, and we know where, but apparently he gets away with it. The Marines won’t go after him, and we have thus far been unable to make him give my mother the court-appointed support payments. She is now on welfare. She doesn’t own her apartment, her car, or anything else to show what may have happened to all that money. Nothing.

6. She refuses to take responsibility for anything that has happened to her. She blames my father for her financial situation, and apparently sees no hypocrisy in constantly telling me how difficult his death is for her — far worse than it is for me, you understand.

I finally just lost it with her this morning. I had reached my limit after months of her self-pity and bullshit, and let her have it, telling her that it was her own foolish choices that got her where she is, we all told her this would happen, what happened to all that money, etc., etc. She started telling me how it was all my Dad’s fault, and I said, “No, it’s yours,” and she hung up on me. I am now sitting here with hands shaking, with 6 hours of work left, barely able to concentrate on anything. Woo hoo! Why can’t we divorce our parents? And why is this the parent I have left?

Ack! She just called me again. I’m going to kill myself.