So today I realized not only do have C-PTSD, I am actively displaying more symptoms than usual by living with her.  I forgot C-PTSD existed, actually, until today when I was blogging about it on my other site.  And I realized that I have soooooo many triggers and they are constantly being activated on a daily basis, just by living in the same house with her.  

Take her new behavior, for example.  She now wakes up out of a dead sleep every single time I open her door to let a cat in her room (if you didn't know from my previous posts, I made her room "the cat room" after she went into rehab last year, after I took back my power as "woman of the house"--something she was trying to be and treating my husband like "man of the house", which didn't leave me anywhere) and says "Hello??"  Or "How many cats are you letting in now?" Or "Yes??"  Or "What do you need?"  Or some other random bullshit.  I never answer her, because her tedious noticing something I do triggers the ever-loving shit out of me.  She never once has said anything to me in the past, so why now?  Ugh. 

Back in the day, when we'd eat with her, she'd watch everyone like a hawk and make comments on every little thing you did or said.  It was triggering me so bad when we first moved in here that I started displaying symptoms of anorexia again, something I suffered from when I was a teenager.  I stopped eating.  I could not eat in front of her anymore.  And I actually still can't.  Because every time I get food in front of her she still makes comments on it.  She used to shame me for eating any meal other than dinner.  And that was still in 2021!!  "Oh, it's 12?  Why would you want to eat at 12?"  It's called lunch, you asshole.  But this is what it's bringing up for me.  I stopped eating with her.  Actually, I stopped her eating with anyone at all.  We no longer eat at the table with her, because if we do, it become something very negative very quickly.  So she eats alone while reading her books, which is how she likes it.  

So to have her start commenting again when I do things is really triggering me.  

She didn't just do it with eating either, she did it with my hair, my clothes, everything.  I can't do anything or be myself in my own house around her.  And I wonder why I've been feeling pretty horrible lately.  

So I decided to stop letting the cats in her room.  Let them scratch make her come to the door to let them in.  She's been saying shit to me for days every time I open the door, and I just can't do it.  It sounds stupid, I know, but if you have a mother like that, you get it.  The constant comments, like you can't exist with her noticing every little thing you do or wear or whatever.  It's exhausting and keeps me prisoner in my bedroom.  The sad part is that I will never know what it's like to live in this house without her.  When she was in rehab last year, I was busting my ass changing everything over.  I could not relax.  It was horribly stressful.  But now, I'll never be able to experience this house as my own, because if she goes into a home, they will take the house.  Period.  There is zero way we can keep it.  I lost my chance to know what it was like to live without her here.  But it was worth it.  Because I live in so much more peace than I did before she left for rehab.  Had our lives stayed the same as back then?  I would have moved out long ago and lived on the streets.  Because it was beyond unbearable.  

But yeah, that's her new thing.  And I'm combating it by just choosing not to participate.  I know it sounds very benign, but not to me it's not.  And I do think she knows it.  Or maybe not.  But it doesn't matter.  I just can't participate in something that's going to make my C-PTSD worse.