So, the other day, we're eating lunch and I say to my son "Hey, we're going to go sit out here with the door open to eat wanna join us?" (meaning in the garage).  I stupidly said it loud enough for her to hear.  So five minutes later, I can hear her in the kitchen saying something to my son and she knocks on the garage door, and comes in and proceeds to muck about for a bit, never once telling me what she wanted.  I said "What can I get you?"  So she ignores me and looks around some more.  And finds some toilet paper, which I could have easily gotten for her.  And she gets something else, too.  So I take my empty plate and go inside.  And she says "Oh, I am almost done, you don't have to leave!"  Bullshit.  She came in there on purpose, knowing we were in there, just to interrupt us, per usual.  She sees the chairs I bought from FB Marketplace and starts telling me what to do with them.  Per usual.  I said "Well, for one, they need new cushions, and for two, I have plans for them."  Actually, I don't have plans for them until I get new cushions for them.  But they are mine, and I paid for them and she can shove off about taking control of my stuff, like she always does.  

So yesterday, she knocks on my door and asks to have my chairs.  Not both, just one.  I said "Ma, they are super low to the ground (and they are), you will not be able to get out of them."  So she says her usual stupid thing of "I going to say the exact opposite of the truth just to further my agenda!" with "Oh, those are easier for me to get out of!"  No.  They.  Are.  Not.  She can barely get out of the stupid car she bought in 2019 that I kept telling her was too low to the ground for her.  With her bad knees, everything is hard for her to get out of.  So I just ignored her and said "I have plans for MY chairs, ma.  They need new cushions, as I told you, and after that, I have plans for them."  So she gets super annoyed with me and puts on her horribly disappointed voice.  "Oh.  I guess I don't get anything then.  It was just an idea.  Okay.  Whatever."  Sigh.  

Also yesterday, she busts into the room while I am making dinner, gets in my way, and starts to make coffee.  I said "I will finish when you're done."  I said it in a nice tone and she got super angry and said "I WILL BE DONE IN A MINUTE, GOD!"  So I leave the room to go feed the dogs and to get away from her.  Then she notices I left and says super shitty "I guess so."  Then she yells "YOU CAN HAVE THE KITCHEN NOW, IT'S ALL YOURS!"  Yet, she's still in there.  And doesn't leave for five more minutes.  I come out as she's leaving and she says in her super shitty voice again "I guess I will just get out of your way."  So I reply with a big smile on my face "Oh, you're never in my way!"  She was very confused by that one.  Yes, I left the room because she has these little defiant/manic episodes where she has to get something done right now and will just cram herself into whatever space you're in.  But the bigger reason I left the room was because she just came in from smoking and she smelled like a 1,000 year old ashtray that's been accumulating used cigarette butts for a thousand years.  Which is because she picks her cherries off with her fingers (for non-smokers, that means the lit tobacco at the end of the cigarette).  Which makes her smell HORRIBLE.  On a good day, this is disgusting.  But yesterday was a really bad day for me.  I was dizzy as fuck all day, and super nauseous (I have POTS and some days are just bad days).  Standing made me feel horrible, and I was trying to make dinner, and then this old stinky ass woman busts in to make me even sicker, and she gets angry for leaving when she does.  Oh well.  I've told her a billion times how much she stinks after she smokes, yet it doesn't stick (nor does she care--though sometimes she may forget due to her dementia). 

Earlier in the day she starts screaming after seeing my son make a microwave meal "WHY DOES HE GET ALL THE GOOD FOOD?"  So I laughed and said "If you don't like the food you get, you get eat elsewhere."  She kept making me repeat myself, pretending not to hear what I said.  So I just quit and said never mind.  

Something I realized this week (well, two things) is that back when I used to live with her after leaving my ex-husband when she'd tell me when she'd go visit our next door neighbor, who I knew almost all my life, "Now, you stay home.  This is MY time to relax.  I need a break!"  I was always confused by it because a break from what?  I watched my kids 24/7, what on earth did she need a break from?  We were gone a lot of the time or outside.  Then I realized something: she was telling me to stay home so she could talk shit about me.  See, back then, I had ZERO idea she would talk shit about me so much behind my back.  I had no idea she even did it at all.  And recently, when I found out just how much she was talking shit about me, it kind of broke me even more than I already was knowing my mom is a narc.  There were just things I never assumed she did.  I mean, I knew she talked about me, but to the extent she did it, I never in a million years would have thought she did that to me.  And it wasn't new.  She was talking shit about me from childhood on.  It just feels like, I had no idea she hated me that much.  Sure, I talk shit about her, but that's because I hate her and think she's a horrible human being (now, I love her like a human being...there is a base love for all living things in my heart, even if the person or animals is dangerous or awful, a base love that wants that person safe, fed, clothed, etc., but that's all the love I have for her).  And I talk shit about her because she does awful things.  I don't talk shit about her just for fun or make fun of her, as she does me.  And yet, she expects me not to put her in a home.  Ha!  

So to know that all her friends and all my family have always heard these horrible stories about me?  To wonder what they must think of me?  It's fucked.  I don't like those people anyways, because any moron who listens to an idiot and doesn't seek out answers for themselves isn't worth my time or money.  But still.  I was never safe from her.  Never.  And I thought school was mean.  To think, I was living with my biggest bully for my entire childhood and beyond.  It makes me feel so exposed and humiliated and ashamed.  Not for what she said, but that I didn't know.  That I went around thinking people liked me for me, when in reality, they were busy with my mom, talking shit behind my back and probably spreading it others (the way my entire family did everyone else).  I feel so stupid.  

But the funny part of all that is that at the same time, my mother was also talking about them.  So they are in the same boat as me.  They just don't know it.  Though, I do.  And that makes me feel quite a bit better. 

Also, my mother's been doing some dementia-related activities.  Recently, she sits out back and talks to herself.  Like for the entire time she's out there.  It's so weird.  I always think she's on the phone, but alas, she's not.  

She forgot how to use her CD player.  She had no idea how to find where to hit "play".

I know there's been more things, I just can't keep them all in my head.  But I will say the biggest thing I've noticed since the beginning of summer, is that she no longer cleans much of anything anymore.  Which for me is a good thing, because she used to be so anal about cleaning and tidying, she'd always hide my stuff or be moving everything around.  But that's the thing, she used to be anal about it.  And now she just quit.  I think she's getting more and more confused as the days go by.  Again, this makes more agreeable most of the time, but I know how my mother is.  And I know the irritability and anger will come next.  Though, she did already go through that, so maybe it won't?  I don't know.  I guess I have no idea what will come next, as with a narc with dementia, anything is possible.  

It's cold today.  I like it.  And tomorrow is my youngest son's birthday.  So I have to go get stuff to celebrate and get some stuff planned out.  Though it's been rainy as fuck here all week, so that sucks.  We wanted to go to the botanical gardens, but I don't think that's happening.  Sigh.  We'll just watch scary movies instead all day.  Which sounds like loads of fun, too :)  Then take out from somewhere of his choosing (unlike all those previous years of my mother being charge of where we ate for our birthdays).  It's nice, being able to be in charge of our own lives again.  And our birthdays can be what we want.  Let's just hope she plays nice.