I come from a long line of worriers. Or rather, one great big worrier–my mother. She is a champion worrier who can turn anything into a chance to fret. It doesn’t matter how big or small a problem is–she can inflate it into a catastrophe. For example. She and my father were at Fresh and Natural, a nearby co-op that has mostly local/organic food. They also have a variety of gluten-free/dairy-free food, which is good for me. Anyway, she called me to ask if there was anything I wanted. I said if she could find some gf/hf backed goods in the same place she got salmon and chicken, I’d be happy. Cupcakes and/or brownies. She called back saying she couldn’t find them and she sounded stress. I said it was no big deal and not to worry about it. But, of course, she had to continue to worry about it. More to the point, she had to voice her worry to me. Now I w as stressed over something that previously had no meaning to me. I told her to forget about it, but she kept ruminating over it.
The incident in and of itself is no big deal. The problem comes because she does this with every decision, big or small. K once marveled as she was taking me to the airport that I had packed for every occasion. I apparently had a roll of quarters and an umbrella and a bunch of other things I probably wouldn’t need for a short trip. I said it was the legacy of my mother. We compared our mothers’ attitudes towards life. Her mother believes that whatever you chose to do, you would be fine. My mother believes that whatever you chose to do, you’ll be fucked. There are pros and cons to both viewpoints, obviously, but growing up with a mother like mine means I’m constantly second-guessing myself. Especially around her.
She can’t just relax and take things as they come. I know it’s in part because of my father. He’s very judgmental and rigid in his view of how things should be. If you don’t follow his unspoken expectations, well , there will be hell to pay. Most of the time. Once in a while, he’ll not care, but that’s very rare. An example. One time, he was mad at my mother and wouldn’t tell her why. I think that’s bullshit in general, but especially when the reason can be as capricious as you didn’t say hi in the right tone of voice. Or more to the point, he didn’t hear you say hi because he refuses to wear his expensive hearing aids. In case he loses one. But, they run out if you don’t use them (just the same as you do) and it’s a waste, anyway. He can’t see that.
I’ll never forget the time I told my then-girlfriend that I was going dancing that night with my bestie. i don’t know why it came up–maybe because I had promised to take my girlfriend to Target that afternoon (she didn’t drive) and I casually mentioned it. Anyway, I received a message on my answering machine from my clearly-pissed girlfriend saying not to bother taking her to Target that afternoon. She was mad at me, but I wasn’t sure why. I had a hunch, but I wasn’t going to play her game. I did not call her back. I don’t recall how we reconnected, but she confessed that she was mad at me for not inviting her to go dancing with me and my bestie, even though she did not want to go. I was instantly filled with rage and I suddenly realized how fucking annoying that was. I had done it myself to my boyfriend in college, but in that instant, I immediately vowed never to do it again. She was Japanese and said it was part of her culture, which, fine, but I did not want anything to do with it. That’s the thing. I didn’t have to deal with it because I didn’t have to date her. And that is on my list of “hell to the fuck no” on my list of qualities I’m looking for in anyone I date.
Back to my father. He refused to go on our morning constitutional together and when my mother pushed him on it, he refused to say why he was mad. He told her that I would know because I had witnessed it. I looked at my mother blankly because I had no idea what he was talking about. I knew he was mad–my mother interrupted and said, “Oh, so you do know?” I sighed loudly because that was her through and through. She got things wrong because she didn’t listen; she let the anxieties in her head overtake her. I said loudly that I knew he was mad, but I didn’t know why. It was clear by the way he stomped off from the table that he was mad. It turned out that he was mad because my mother wiped the table when he had done it fifteen minutes earlier. It was clear (to him) that she didn’t respect him and that he was just a slave. Which, I mean….leave it for another post, Hong.
Yes, I had been there when this happened, but, no, I did not see it for the travesty it so clearly was. The killer part is that his way of ‘cleaning’ the table is to wave a tablecloth over a certain spot, which is mostly just his dining area. He rarely does my mother’s and he even more rarely does mine. Also, pushing crumbs around the table is not cleaning. More to the point, it was such a trivial matter, the fact that he blew up over it and would not talk to my mother for an hour is complete and utter bullshit.
So, I can see where some of her anxiety comes from. But, on the other hand, she feeds into it by making little things into big things as well. Such as….well, look. We get food from Origin–prepackaged meals. Most of them include sauces. My mother is obsessed with telling my father what to put the sauce on. Which, fine. Tell him once. But she’ll prod him until he does it, even though he clearly doesn’t care. When I point it out or tell her to let him sauce the way he wants to sauce, she says that he likes it when she puts the sauce on the proper item. Which, true, but he was also enjoying it beforehand. Oh, he has low-level dementia, which complicates matters even further.
I know that part of the reason she agonizes over every little thing is because there are so many bigger things that are out of control. It gives her the illusion that she can control, well, everything. Especially my father’s behavior. Which she most emphatically cannot. So she worries about the things around the edges in the vain attempt to think she’s doing something about–well, anything.
One thing that is really difficult for me to deal with is that she constantly narrates the thoughts in her brain. Funnily enough, she only does this when my father is around. When it’s just the two of us, she is perfectly capable of being in the same room and not talking. But the second my father is there, her eyes are fastened on him and her mouth won’t stop talking.
Side Note: This is a family flaw. My father, my brother, my mother, and I all have the habit of chattering on forever about one topic. I am aware I do it. I’m not so sure about the others. Or rather, I know my father isn’t aware that he can drone on about nothing for half an hour. My brother and my mother have both commented to me about the other one going on and on. It’s pretty funny–except when you’re on the receiving end of a long lecture.
The other thing that my mother will do (as does my father) is just start talking when she enters a room. She has a constant discussion going on in her head that only she is privy to. I am somewhat sympathetic because I have the same chatter in my head, but the difference is that I’m aware that I don’t need to voice all the random thoughts in my head out loud.
It all came a head this morning when my mother told me that she had everything ready for her trip back to Taiwan. Fine, thought I. That’s that and there’s nothing I need to say about that. Wrong. She started maundering about how she’ll miss me and all the good times we have together. Which, uh, awkward. But more to the point, we have three-and-a-half weeks until they go. That’s plenty of time to do anything she wants to do. But, no, that would defeat the purpose of her moaning about it out loud–which is her moaning about it out loud. She’s so busy worried about missing out that she’s actually missing out.
It’s exhausting, frankly, to be with her over a long length of time because of all this is front and center no matter what. It just exacerbates the noise in my own head, which is hard enough to deal with. That’s the problem with family dysfunction–it’s the gift that just keeps on giving.