When you want to go NC but you can't

[Adrianna]

Uuugghhh my MIL does VERY similar stuff. That woman would be miserable were she Queen and lived in a palace. And her son (updh) is right behind her. "the walls are closing in" omg I cringed, except with him it's "I'm trapped, I'm trapped".
They read out of the same playbook.
You see her however often it's comfortable for YOU. SHE sure won't be happy about it.
For fun things to do, I like kayaking, hiking with or without dogs and friends, and knitting (hush). You can hike responsibly even in a pandemic. Or even just walk on local little trails. At least, they let us do it here. 'Course, everybody and their cat went outside, so you needed to be careful, but...

Amazes me the similarities!

Grandmother used to whine that her house was a prison. She needed to get out of there! I too thought she could live with the Queen and still be miserable. Wherever she goes, there she is. It's not the physical place that is the problem, it's her.

She's in a nursing home, out of necessity,  and miserable as ever.

[Sneezy]

No more returning SOS calls on the day I get them unless I feel like it.

Oh boy, this one is tough.  I am working on it, though.  Mom thinks everything is an emergency.  She has told me that I need to have a phone number that she can call that I will promise to ALWAYS answer, even if I am in the shower (yes, she specifically said she wants to be able to reach me in the shower).  I told her no.

[Psuedonym]

Good for you, Sneezy! This one is much harder to do than it is to say, but again, thinking of her as expecting to be treated like a small child might help you. Your mother doesn't need you to do anything really, she lives in AL for crying out loud. She has decided that she deserves to be treated like a three year old and it's your job to soothe her feelings whenever she feels upset. In short, she wants you to be her mommy.  (Mine used to actually say that: I need a mother, will you be my mother?) I don't know about you, but that filled me with loathing and disgust. You're not a %$#@ing child, stop acting like one. It's actually one of the few things that sent me over the edge and she looked half afraid of me when I finally snapped and said  'don't you ever, EVER, say that to me again'. Interestingly, I didn't raise my voice, but I think the look I gave her was close to her patented rage/contempt expression – and she never said it again. Think of it this way, if you never taught a child that eventually they need to deal with their own emotions themselves, you'd royally screw that kid up. So you're actually doing your mother a favor when you refuse to treat her a toddler, whether she accepts that or not.

[Lookin 2 B Free]

My mom's recently in AL, too.  Hey, Sneezy, re: not returning SOS calls, this has made it much easier for me.  I don't listen to the VM's until right before I was going to call her anyway, maybe a day or three later.  I figure if there were a real emergency I'd get a call from the AL.  I make my call schedule, always leaving at least one day off in between.  When I call she asks "Did you get my messages?"  I tell her (without making any excuses or acknowledging that this might be unusual) that I just now heard them, which is true. 

I've found I can't stomach daily duty or feeling on call at all times.  It doesn't give me a chance to relax and connect with the essence of me and with my life, which is soooo important.  Not that I have that much going on.  But my relationship with myself is paramount for my own recovery.  I have been doing silent meditation retreats for some years, sometimes from home.  So sometimes I just inform her that i will be in silent retreat for the next so many days and I will call her when it's over.  And then I just schedule them whenever I want, especially if I feel I need more of a break.  It's great!  It also allows me to be more refreshed so that I actually feel like stepping it up a bit when her mental or physical health take a nosedive (which is happening right now.)

[Sneezy]

I make my call schedule, always leaving at least one day off in between. 

I've found I can't stomach daily duty or feeling on call at all times. 

Same here, the daily calls just put my stomach in knots.  I'm trying to work on a schedule, where we see each other once a week and I call her a couple times in between visits.  It is difficult, because in mom's mind everything is an emergency and she expects an instantaneous response to every call.  But I've gotten to the point where the guilt of not calling her is easier for me to handle than the angst of daily calls.  So I suppose that is progress.

Also, I have noticed that other people don't necessarily return my calls right away.  So that appears to be the norm.  Most adults don't expect an instantaneous response.