I just need to get this out

[jul-els]

Hi, and thank you in advance for reading my long-winded diatribe. This is the story of the ridiculous and stupid things I did when my mother passed away and the abuse I received because of it. 
 

Long story long, my mother fell in her house in February of 2020 and broke her hip. She called me and I came over and we both agreed she should go to the ER. Once there, she was admitted and the first thing that happened was the nurse asked me to leave the room so he could talk to my mother. It seemed slightly odd, but I did as I was asked. When I came back in the room, I asked my mother what the nurse said. She told me, “he told me I have a tumor on (the outside of) my breast. But that’s not what it is. It’s an infection. I know because I’ve had it for years”. I thought it was perhaps unwise to ignore the medical knowledge and experience of the nurses, but it was her body and her life and I respected her opinion. 
 

She is admitted for surgery and they put a pin in her hip and discharged her within a couple days. At this point, I become her caretaker and lived in her house, as I had no other pressing responsibilities other than my full time job and neither my half brother or half sister were interested in being involved. 
 

As you know, about a month later the pandemic began and it wasn’t long before I was placed on furlough at work. Staying home while still receiving full pay. This worked out well in terms of taking care of my mother, as I could now be with her full time and not suffer financially. She lived in a large 5 bedroom home, which was the home I grew up in, and she rented all the rooms out to create income for herself. 
 

She spent 5 weeks in a nursing facility after surgery and then came home. The verbal abuse that the universe would insist on hurling at me from this point forward began at this time. Once my mother returned home, one of her tenants went to go stay with his kids for an indefinite period, which was both wise imo and appreciated by me, because it helped to protect my 84 year old mother who was recovering from her surgery.

The other tenant was a bit more problematic. He was coming and going multiple times a day. This coincided with the very beginning stages of the lockdown, when we were sent home from work and told not to socialize. And here was this person going out to visit his friends and family every day and coming back home to share a house with an 84 year old woman who was fresh out of five weeks in the hospital and couldn’t walk, dress or feed herself.

I was concerned about this, so I called him one day while he was out and tried to determine where he was going all the time. He told me he was visiting his family, that he was “being safe” and that it was going to continue. I told my mom that he was putting her at risk and she didn’t care. She was more concerned with keeping the rent money coming in, and told me I was not to mention anything to him about it. I was not ok with this, and I asked him one day when he was home if him and I and my mom could sit down and talk about it. He then proceeded to fly off the handle and yell at me for the next 10 minutes. I did not react to his hostility, not wishing to amplify the drama. I just stood there and let him yell until he was done. 
 

That evening, I called my half sister for moral support, explaining to her what happened that afternoon. She then had an emotional outburst, she went on for a good half hour, explaining all the ways in which she thought our mother was a terrible person, and that I should leave that house and leave my mother alone to fend for herself, as she deserved. 
 

I was in disbelief at this, and called my brother for moral support. He just told me the problem was “between you and her” and he just wanted to get off the phone with me. He wasn’t interested. 
 

So, I ignored both of them and carried on taking care of my mother. As the months went on, my mother started to regain some of her strength, enough to the point that I felt I could go back to work, so I went out and found a new job and went back to work in October. 
 

A couple months went by and things seemed to be going okay. My mother still needed a lot of help from me, but she could now cook for herself and get around with a walker. Then in December, I unexpectedly met a woman I was attracted to and we started talking and went out a couple times at which time we became physically intimate, which seemed fine at the time, she was aware that I was taking care of my mother and was okay with it and I felt that I was okay with it too, as she seemed to be understanding of my situation. However there were big red flags she was openly displaying at this time that I willfully ignored. She repeatedly stated to me that she was “five kinds of crazy” (which is uncanny, because although she did have several mental illnesses going on at once, she was highly, accurately self-aware of it) that she was a “bundle of nerves”. That she would “run you over with your own car” and she would “hurt me and make me cry”. And a more ominous threat a little later on, “I’ll kill you”, which is something she re-emphasized on more than one occasion. 
 

Then in mid-January my mother started to decline very rapidly. I told the woman I was seeing that I would need to step away from dating for a little while and focus my energy on my mother’s care. She told me she wanted to stay with me through it. That she would be there with me, and that I “didn’t have to be alone” and that she would “support all of my decisions”. 
 

I didn’t feel good about her offer, it didn’t feel right or appropriate to me, but then on the other hand, I liked hearing all the things she said, as I was completely alone in this, and a weaker, more vulnerable part of myself wanted someone to come along and be there for me, which was wrong, because what I was going through wasn’t about me, it was about my mother and her best interests. 
 

Ultimately, I succumbed to the weaker part of myself and accepted her offer to be with me through this. I knew it was wrong, because how could someone I’d only known a little less than two months possibly support me in a time that was so significant to me on a personal level? I ignored that question and let the weaker, more selfish part of myself make the choice to let her in and let her be there with me. 
 

She would come and visit me daily over the next month as my mother continued to decline. On the night my mother passed, she was there in the room with me. On that night, I stepped out of the room momentarily and came back. After we both left the room together, she told me she said the Hail Mary to my mother. My mother was not catholic and was actually opposed to Catholicism. I couldn’t understand how someone could be so callously insensitive to someone on their death bed. 
 

A few days after my mother had passed, she called me and told me her daughter had contracted covid. She lived with her three daughters and the company she worked for required her not to have contact with her daughter if she wanted to continue coming in to work for the next two weeks. So I offered to let her stay with me for the next two weeks so she could continue going to work while her daughter got through her illness. It was a terrible choice. I should have let her go stay with her parents. As soon as she moved in, her hostile rage continued to be directed at me. 
 

The first night she came over, I told her I was going to take a shower and she waited for me in my room and read. Once I got out of the shower, I went back into my room and she was visibly highly distraught. She was in a state of panic. “Oh my god”, she said “ where were you?” “What time is it?” “You were in there for a half hour I can’t believe you left me here for so long.”  I thought it was strange, but I tried to quell the situation by telling her we should go to the kitchen and make something for dinner. 
 

She could not be soothed. She had reached the point of no return. As I attempted to prepare a meal, she hovered over my every move, keeping her face inches from mine yelling in my face and telling me “ What are you doing?” Hurry up!” “Move! Move!” etc. This was nine days after my mother had passed away. 
 

I later tried to tell her I didn’t like her yelling at me like that. This caused her to yell horrible abusive hostilities in my face. As far as what the words were she used, I don’t know what they were. They were so unfathomably harsh and abusive, that my mind blocked them out. I don’t know what they were, I only know they were horribly sharp and abusive. 
 

Anyway, to wrap it up, this dynamic continued on between her and I for five months as I cleaned out my mother’s house and put it on the market. She would abuse me, I would repeatedly break up with her, she would beg me to take her back, and I would. During all of this, I had quit my job to focus on closing out all of my mother’s affairs 100% on my own. Once the house closed escrow and I found a new job, I texted her to tell her I got hired, as we said we would try to remain friends. She congratulated me and told me she had had been working and her hand had been doing okay, (she had carpal tunnel surgery as a result of her desk job). I asked her  if work was going alright and if her hand was okay, and I also expressed my excitement about my new job. To which she replied, “I’m good”. I said “Good, glad to hear it”. And that was the last we ever spoke. The strangest thing about this whole story is that for all of garbage I was going through at the time, the one thing that hurt me the most out of all it was her. She cut me deep into my soul in a way that no one else ever has and thankfully never will again. It was a hard lesson, but I’m such a far stronger person for it now than I was. I now have boundaries where formerly none existed. It was an extremely difficult way to learn. But I can now say I am grateful to be through the other side of it. I can only benefit from it now. I loved her and I know she loved me in her own twisted way. And I loved my family, but she and they were toxic for me and I have left them behind (except for my mother, who I will always love) and I continue to move forward. I’m not really looking for any specific advice, I just needed to get it out. If you’ve read all the way through this train wreck, thank you for reading this. Never forget that you are great, you are loved and you are love. 

[Capricorn3]

Please please tell me that you are rid of this extremely toxic woman and will never go back to her again.

I'm sorry for your loss.

[jul-els]

1 minute ago, Capricorn3 said:

Please please tell me that you are rid of this extremely toxic woman and will never go back to her again.

I'm sorry for your loss.

Thank you. Of course. I walked away from her and never looked back.

[Capricorn3]

Just now, jul-els said:

Thank you. Of course. I walked away from her and never looked back.

Excellent! 👍

[jul-els]

1 minute ago, Capricorn3 said:

Excellent! 👍

It hurt unlike anything I could have imagined up to that point. But I needed to go through that naive kind of stupidity in order to gain some much needed wisdom and inner strength. What I wrote in the op is just the cliff notes version. There were lots of other horrible things that went on with both that woman and my family. But I don’t need to revisit all of them again. It’s all over now and I made it through.

[Capricorn3]

1 minute ago, jul-els said:

It hurt unlike anything I could have imagined up to that point. But I needed to go through that naive kind of stupidity in order to gain some much needed wisdom and inner strength. What I wrote in the op is just the cliff notes version. There were lots of other horrible things that went on with both that woman and my family. But I don’t need to revisit all of them again. It’s all over now and I made it through.

No doubt it was a very awful and distressing time.  Glad you got through it and with it, lessons learned.  You're always stronger than you think you are.

[DarkCh0c0]

You are very strong and have come out to the other side by yourself. You should be proud.

For the woman, absolutely block her everywhere. Only pursue women who are emotionally available and who support you and bring out the best of you. Know your worth... Add considering the last sentence, it seems like you're starting to. Keep it up!

[jul-els]

16 minutes ago, DarkCh0c0 said:

You are very strong and have come out to the other side by yourself. You should be proud.

For the woman, absolutely block her everywhere. Only pursue women who are emotionally available and who support you and bring out the best of you. Know your worth... Add considering the last sentence, it seems like you're starting to. Keep it up!

Thank you. She’s a distant memory now, as she should be. The oddest thing about all of it to me is how deeply I was hurt by my relationship with her. It cut to the depths of my soul unlike anything I could have imagined. Of all the things I went through at the time, losing my mother, discovering my family were jerks, being left alone, the thing that hurt me the most was that woman. As silly as it seems now, it’s also strange. 

[Kwothe28]

I think its understandable from psychological side. You were dealing with a lot and let yourself vulnerable. Which made you ignore glaring red flags and letting somebody very bad into your life. In the future when somebody tells you they are something like crazy, you believe them. Because its most likely the truth, not overexageration like "Oh I am just crazy sometimes". So, give yourself a break a bit. Things like that happen, its important that its over now.

Also, sorry about the mom. 

Edited June 17 by Kwothe28

[Batya33]

4 hours ago, Kwothe28 said:

I think its understandable from psychological side. You were dealing with a lot and let yourself vulnerable. Which made you ignore glaring red flags and letting somebody very bad into your life. In the future when somebody tells you they are something like crazy, you believe them. Because its most likely the truth, not overexageration like "Oh I am just crazy sometimes". So, give yourself a break a bit. Things like that happen, its important that its over now.

Also, sorry about the mom. 

Exactly the same.  May your mother's memory be for a blessing.

[reinventmyself]

Some of the most valuable lessons are unfortunately the most difficult.   Can't help but wonder if things were different, you mother's illness, her passing, furloughed, covid, etc if you would have let her into your life to the degree you did.  You were super vulnerable and no doubt her companionship seemed comforting, or at the least the idea of it.

I am sorry you went through this and my condolences for the loss of your mother.

[jul-els]

1 hour ago, reinventmyself said:

Some of the most valuable lessons are unfortunately the most difficult.   Can't help but wonder if things were different, you mother's illness, her passing, furloughed, covid, etc if you would have let her into your life to the degree you did.  You were super vulnerable and no doubt her companionship seemed comforting, or at the least the idea of it.

I am sorry you went through this and my condolences for the loss of your mother.

It’s a good question, and one that I’ve pondered myself. I don’t know. The timing of it all was kind of like the universe was putting it all in front of me at once. To be dealt with. It seems to me as there were a lot of lessons I had needed to learn in life that I had avoided until they all came to me at once. The way I was living and saw life in general needed to change. And outside events put me in a spot where I really had no choice other than to acknowledge it. And react accordingly. 

[Lambert]

I'm sorry about your mom.

Glad you're in a better place. Good luck to you. 

Edited June 17 by Lambert

[Cherylyn]

Your bad experience was not all in vain.  You've learned from it. 

In the future, be with mentally stable people.  You'll be grateful to have a normal rapport with mentally normal people. 

I'm sorry for your loss.  Take care.

[catfeeder]

My heart goes out to you for your loss of your Mom.

I'm glad you're in a healthier place, and I think you've earned the right to take pride your resilience and your ability to learn from your pain.

Head high.