Sometimes I don't even want to blog about the things she does.  They are so predictable and normal for a narcissist that I find the idea of writing it down tedious.  Sometimes I just want to hide away (and I do) until it blows over and forget it even happened.  Not because I'm like her.  The incident will always be there and become a part of my daily stress.  But mainly because it's exhausting complaining about every damn thing she does.  It's like, duh.  I live with my narcissist mother.  She's going to act up and be a child and act like an asshole more days than not.  What did I expect?  That everyone would be smooth sailing as though she's normal?  Obviously not.  This is our new normal.  This is what it will be like forever until she's in a home or passes away.  So why do I run around sometimes thinking everything is normal when it's not?

The issue is that the opposite sucks big fat butts.  I usually wake up and stay in bed as long as I can do so I don't have to deal with the day (meaning dealing with her).  I know she'll be bitchy.  I know she'll be cruel.  And it will come to a head over a period of days until I get mad enough to say something, and then the cycle restarts with her being as sweet as pie all over again, until she decides to drop the other shoe and start being cruel and mean again.

It's a complete shit show some days.  Others, it's calm.

Take yesterday for example: she was fine all day, in a great mood (other than some jabs at the kids) and then she goes into her room, doesn't shut her door and lights up a cigarette.  She knows she can't smoke in the house (I don't care who's name is on the mortgage).  And even when she tricks me all day into thinking she's doing well, she goes and pulls something that makes me have to confront her about it.

And it's a big deal, confronting her.  She's erratic.  So any time you tell her she's wrong, or more so doing something wrong, she will threaten you or throw a fit.  So I lied to her and told her my son and hubby both have asthma (not exactly a lie, my son does and I think my hubby does, but he's not diagnosed yet).  I've told her a thousand times I'm allergic to smoke.  YET she doesn't give two shits about me.  So I thought I'd take her two golden children and let her know she's hurting THEM.  I am not sure if it worked, but so far, no smoking inside today.  But I am sure this will end with me having to say "DO NOT SMOKE IN THE HOUSE, PERIOD!"  And all hell will either break loose or she will just comply quietly.  You just never know which way it'll go.

So two days ago, my mother got on my case once again for her keys.  I took them away when the quarantine started because she thinks she can do whatever she wants whenever she wants and nobody is going to tell her what to do.  So I am like fuck that, and took her keys.  She wanted them back, promising not to leave, and then she got a really angry look and said "You're not giving them back, are you?"  I said "No.  You're not supposed to be driving."

See, I took her keys away years ago.  She drives so badly I fear not only for her life, but for the lives of those she either hits or causes to hit her.  She take risks, like turning out in front of speeding cars, driving 65 in a 40 quite regularly, swerves around cars without a blinker or without even looking really, and most of all, she can't stay in her lane.  She drifts into the left lane, whether it's oncoming traffic or a four lane and she's in the right lane.  She causes cars to either have to slam on their brakes or causes them to swerve into oncoming traffic.  She's going to kill someone (if not herself).  Years ago, she had a fit, over and over and over again about driving.  She told all our neighbors I stole her car and they all hated me for years (and still do) because of it.  Her doctor refused to take her license away.  They also refused to diagnose her with dementia, even though I knew she had it (turns out, had the docs just looked at her cat scan, it would have shown her vascular dementia).  And it all came to a head one day (you can read about this here) on the day I decided to go no contact.  I was done with it all.  I was going insane from her treatment of me (and of my oldest son), and I had to walk away before I ended up in the hospital.

But here's the deal: I shouldn't have given her keys back.  I washed my hands of it, mostly because I had zero support from her doctors.  But now?  Her neurologist said she's not supposed to drive (after I told her how badly she drives).  But she bothered me and bothered me, until I said fine, she could drive up to a mile away.  We lived on a small area, with WIDE lanes on our streets, so I let her.  To find out, she was going all over town!  So she's wondering why I don't believe her when she said "I just want to hold my keys, I promise I won't leave the house!"  She's like an ODD teenager who will say anything to get mommy and daddy to let her drive.  I said no.  I put my foot down.  I was being irresponsible by letting her drive both times before.  I was putting other people's lives in danger.  But this time, I refused to give into her whining.

She snapped a look at me and said "Do you want to drive my car?"  I said "Look."  She cut me off and repeated.  "I said let's be adults about this."  She said "Answer my question."  I was getting frustrated.  She repeated this line over and over and over until I said "Doesn't matter.  You aren't going to drive it."  She said "I'll stop paying on it."  I said "Okay.  I'll pay it."  She said, "No, they'll take my car back."  I said "Not if someone is paying on it."  I SHOULD have said "Oh, like you stopped paying on your life insurance and car insurance?"  But I didn't think of it.  Opportunity missed!  Oh well.  She started with the water works then and started screaming "EVERYTHING IN MY LIFE IS BEING TAKEN AWAY!  I HAVE NOTHING!  NOOOOTTTHHHIINNNNGGG!" and ran into her room and slammed the door.

Can we say a fourteen-year-old with emotional issues?  

Now, if she were normal in every other way, I'd feel bad for her.  But her reaction was out of pure selfishness and greed.  She doesn't care other people could get hurt (as I explained to her during this conversation).  She doesn't care if she crashes the only car we have right now.  She doesn't care if they take the car back and my hubby has no way to get to work.  She doesn't care about anything other than precious ability to do whatever she wants, whenever she wants.  During this entire quarantine she's been acting like a baby and saying she's a prisoner and begging me to let her go to the store.  She's 73.  Has dementia.  Has a pacemaker and bad heart.  Has breathing issues.  Has diabetes.  Has all sorts of issues and thinks she's invincible.  Not only that, she could care less if she got sick and then got everyone in the house sick.  It's all about HER freedom.

She is the most selfish person I know and acts like a gigantic baby when she can't get what she wants (like literally stomps on the floor).  And this is what I chose to live with.

My apartment is still open with nobody living in it.  Hmmmm LMAO  Just kidding.  I'd never move back there unless we absolutely had to.  I will tough this out.  Because it's either that or ma goes in a home.  And she's not quite "home" material yet.  I want to love my mother and I do love her, but not as a mother.  I love her as a human who needs help.  I need to start seeing this as my job, not as my family, because she's never been my family.  Just my overlord.

*sigh*  Well, time to go get stuff done around the house.  And yell at her for smoking in the house, because god knows she'll try it again to see what she can get away with.  I just need to stop fearing getting into an argument with her.  I am not 17 anymore.  If she hits me again (like she did 15 years ago) for disagreeing with her, she'll go straight into a home and be labeled as violent.  So I don't need to fear her.  Even though deep down, I do.  But eventually I won't.  I just need to work on it.

If you're wondering why we moved in together, it was a necessity.  If our landlord (who's 85 and frail) died, we'd all be out on our asses.  So it was smarter to buy a house now before that happened.  It was her idea (though ours to begin with, but then we decided not to) and now she's acting like she'd being held hostage.

Oh the joys of quarantining with a narcissist.  I feel for you all out there who have to deal with your own narcs during this stay at home order.  I hope you're all finding ways to keep yourselves safe.