The on-going saga of trying to schedule a visit with PD mom

[KD5FUL]

A bit of backstory, to make sense of it all.  PD mom.  This lady abandoned me at 3 and I was forced to live with my PD father and his insanely abusive wife.  PD mom knew what was happening to me and just didn't care.  I have never been her priority.  She has the audacity to refer to herself as my mother.  Over the years, she has made inappropriate comments that really highlight that she thinks of me as a piece of garbage. 

There are many examples of this, here is just one:

(When I found out I was going to have a baby, after almost 4 years of NC)

Me:  I'm going to be a mother
PDmom:  Are you going to be a single mother?
Me:   

She weaseled her way back into my life during my pregnancy.  I thought that she might have actually changed.  Boy was I wrong.

In May I saw PD mother for mother's day.  It was the first time that we had spent a  mother's day together in at least a decade. It was my first mother's day.  The visit went as well as it could have possibly gone.  She only told a few horrific stories about my youth where I was clearly being abused and neglected, but she thought it was funny.  She only said a few other awkward things.  I actually enjoyed seeing her.

So, I invited her to my home for a visit THIS MARCH.  Like, almost a full year in advance.  I have never, ever invited her to my home before so this is HUGE.  She accepted my invitation.

She dropped off the radar from May until December.  I was going to visit my Grandma and Aunt (her mother and sister) for Winter Break and she absolutely blew up my phone for the week leading up to my trip and while I was on the trip.  I got messages from her several times a day, every day.   She couldn't be bothered to respond to the messages that I had sent her for like six months, but let me go to visit my family and the floodgates have opened.

It isn't that I didn't want to speak to her at all, just that I was busy getting ready for my travel and I was spending time with my family members.  I wanted to focus on them. She just wouldn't stop trying to contact me. She even called me at my grandmother's house so that I would HAVE TO talk to her.  I did so, and politely passed the phone to the next person as fast as I could.

When I arrived back home, I reached out to her.  She can't be bothered.  Radio silence. 

I wanted to talk to her about the trip that we had planned for March.  I was going to redo my guest bedroom to make sure that she would be extra comfy.

A few days before New Year's Eve, she finally messaged me back.  It was an incomprehensible mess of a message.  Followed by another, and another.  I tried to have a few people figure them out to no avail.  Finally, I ask her to call me.  She tells me that she will call me in 8 days.  She is busy watching T.V. and she has to go.

Okay? 8 days.  Thanks, PD mom. 

8 days rolls around and she calls me at 9:13 am.  Twice.  She knows I work at 7.  I can't answer and didn't even hear her call because my phone is on silent while I am at work.

I call her back, no answer.  I text her.  Incomprehensible response.  I can sort of make out that she is asking me if I am willing to drive halfway to her house, but I am not sure why she would be asking that because it doesn't make any sense.

I message her back and tell her that I cannot understand her message and I ask her to call me.  She says she will call me the next day.  She didn't call.

I called her out on it and she said she would call me in another week.  WTF?!

I send her a long message saying:
1. I cannot understand her messages
2.  She said that she would call me several times and didn't
3. That I don't want to change the plans for the visit.  We invited her to our house for a reason ( I listed them)
4.  I offered to pay for her round trip ticket to make things easier for her


She sends me back a clear, direct message asking me if I would be willing to drive halfway to her house (in the middle of nowhere) and stay in a roadside motel to save her two hours of driving.  I tell her no, explaining myriad reasons....including baby son.

A few days go by.  She sends me another message asking me if I would meet her halfway.

I forward her the message that I sent her previously, explaining why it wouldn't work, etc.

She says she gets it. 

A few days later.  I get ANOTHER message asking me to meet her halfway. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, I am incredibly frustrated by these messages.  At this point I have a very strong temptation to be rude...so I haven't responded at all.

I don't even want to see her at all now, I am just so over it.  I can't Un-invite her, can I?

This whole situation is WAY more difficult than it needs to be and it reduces me to the emotional, sad, little girl who couldn't understand why her mother always lied about coming to visit her and made everything so difficult.

My husband told me I should just block her and be done with it.  What do you think?

[Thru the Rain]

Yes you CAN uninvite her. In fact, maybe you SHOULD uninvite her.

And it sounds to me like she doesn't want to go through with the visit, but she wants it to be your fault if the plans fall through (just guessing here.)

[WomanInterrupted]

I agree with your DH - block her and be done with it.

She clearly wants to be in *control* at all times - your entire post shows that in glaring detail.  She especially wants to control this visit - and what I'm getting out of meeting her halfway is she probably has no intention of being at that motel.   

It's more likely you'll get there, won't see her car, she won't be registered, so you'll call her, she won't respond, and a few days later (or maybe a week), she'll call to say you *just* missed her.  She saw you pulling away and called after you - oh, how RUDE you were!  If you didn't want her to come, you just should have said so in the first place! 

See how that works? Suddenly, she's the victim and you're the baddie. 

Never mind that if it were true, she could call your cell phone and say, "Here I am!  Don't leave!" - but that's a moot point since her words will most likely be a lie. 

I've been at the receiving end of this tactic more times than I can remember - I JUST missed them!     I must have gone in a different entrance because they WERE there, the entire time, and I didn't show!    They went to the OTHER Golden Gate Bridge!  (That one never fails to shit me to tears because it's never been the other fast food joint on the same street - it's usually a singular landmark  that can't be confused with another!) 

They had a plumbing disaster and didn't think to call.  They forgot.    He/she got SOOOOOOOO SIIIIIIIICK and nearly wound up at the ER - don't you care about THAT!?  Oh, that was LAST Friday?  Another friend invited them out and they didn't want to hurt that friend's feelings.   

But mine don't matter, it seems.   

Or my favorite - dead silence, then acting like nothing happened, and when questioned - even gently - they get ALL bent out of shape and blow everything out of proportion, again, making them the victim and me the baddie. 

My guess is your mother really doesn't want to visit and won't come out and say it because saying it would paint her in a bad light, so she'll just dance around, change things up, so hopefully, you'll call the whole thing off and she can be the victim to *your* "baddie".

I don't even think I'd text to say, "Mom, the visit is off." - I'd just block her number and go dark.  You've already done more than enough and spent enough time figuratively chasing after somebody who doesn't want to be caught.

You deserve FAR better than that - and you deserve to be surrounded by people you love, who love you in return.   

It's sad to say your mother isn't in the latter category.

[scapegoatnumerouno]

Is she using drugs and or alcohol?  Really makes me wonder by the strange messages and silences......

[NumbLotus]

Strange messages could be narcissistic word salad, designed to confuse and keep you off balance.

Silences seem punitive because you didn't call her on her schedule or cave to her weird demands.

[KD5FUL]

Is she using drugs and or alcohol?  Really makes me wonder by the strange messages and silences......

She definitely doesn't do drugs or alcohol.  She has a holier-than-thou attitude and wouldn't even drink a glass of wine with dinner. 

[KD5FUL]

And it sounds to me like she doesn't want to go through with the visit, but she wants it to be your fault if the plans fall through (just guessing here.)

This!  I am definitely starting to get the impression that she doesn't want to come.  Why else would she purposely make it so difficult?

Thank you for the fresh perspective.