nixtress's Diaryland Diary

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Sick mothers and sick sons

Have I mentioned lately that my mother drives me batty?
Made the mistake of calling her today, due to receiving a collect phone call on my machine from some jail. I sort of assumed it must be one of my brothers and that Mom would be the go-to person. BIG mistake. She just absolutely drives me bonkers.
Brother K. is hiding somewhere from the Big Bad Child Support people. He decided he hasn't felt like supporting his daughter (supports his son, though--make THAT make sense for me, would ya?) and so simply hasn't at all. Child Support is now coming after his ass so he's gone underground somewhere in his typical transient, fucked up way. Figured something must be up since he hadn't called in quite some time.
The collect phone call was from a jail about an hour away from here, from my brother B. He apparently had accrued a warrant for criminal damaging that he wasn't aware of and when Mom took him to pay his reinstatement fee for his driver's license, they arrested him. He's sitting in a jail call until facing court Monday and then is going to request they transfer it over here to our county. Dumbshit isn't ever going to learn.
When I called my mother, from the get-go I realized she'd been drinking. She was all slurry and fuzzybrained and that's fairly typical for her most nights. Her bf Michael is still in jail for his getting drunk/stealing her truck/driving away with loaded guns/hitting a semi/driving away again/making a false report claiming hijacking situation and so she's found some male friend to get inebriated with (I heard him in the background until she told him to shush). And realizing she'd been drinking, I should have gotten off the line and called back in the morning when she'd been some semblance of sober. I didn't, though. Stupid me.
My little sister C. will turn 9 on Monday, Valentine's baby that she is. And I forget sometimes that my mother and I don't share the same values and that we're completely opposite people. I firmly believe that everyone deserves to feel special on their birthday. I think that's a given day each year that should be made much of. My mother doesn't share that theory. In fact, my mother said on the phone tonight that she didn't want C to get used to having her birthday be TOO special and that she was hoping to get off with just a card. JUST A CARD!! The girl is going to be NINE, for fuck's sake!! Why shouldn't she expect a big deal to be made? She's just a kid!!!
I had to mute the phone at that point. My mother kept rambling on about how she really wasn't in the mood to celebrate C's birthday and C was just going to have to understand. I, in the meantime, had hit mute and was losing my marbles about the whole situation. Yelling at my mother, giving her a piece of my mind, does no good whatsoever, other than to get it out of my system. She doesn't hear me at all, doesn't listen. And if I alienate her, she won't answer the door when I bring C's birthday presents over. SOMEBODY has to make sure the girl gets a birthday.
I quickly ended the conversation and hung up, to fume a bit. Truly, we have a love/hate thing going. I love to hate her. I hate how she parents. There's very little that I've managed to salvage from her ways. Really. The best things she's taught me were from watching her mistakes. I'm not a perfect parent or person, for that matter. I don't even come close to claiming it. But I put my kids high on my list of priorities and I try to make sure they HAVE a freakin' childhood. I try to make sure I'm teaching them the necessary lessons, values and morals so that they're semi-prepared to be good human beings. I try like crazy to make sure they know they're loved and valued. And my mother does none of the above. She slides through thinking only of herself and her own wants. Sadly, she even admits it. I keep trying to figure out why the hell she had kids to begin with and have to remind myself that none of us was planned and that she did her best to NOT raise any of us. K went to his father's at a very early age, I raised myself and brother B, and C learned really early how to raise herself. It's sad and sick and twisted and wrong.
I've tried calling Children's Services on my mother. How awful does that make me? They call and make an appointment before they show up. Of course my mother's going to make sure the house is picked up and devoid of beer cans and that C is being watched over when they get there. Who wouldn't? They need to just show up, find her sitting in the garage with the music blaring and C inside the house by herself for the tenth hour, eating cheese and crackers because no one bothered to make dinner because they're too drunk/stoned/enmeshed in an argument to care.
GRrrrrr.
***
In other news, poor Trev still has the fever thing going. It's gone down with meds but pops up again as soon as they wear off. It's not high but it's persistent. Poor kiddo. He's all washed out and hollow-eyed. Scared the pants off me today--nearly passed out on me. He hasn't had much of an appetite but I have managed to keep the fluids going. He stood up and almost went back down.
If he's not feeling better in the morning, I'm taking him to the doc. Ry, in the meantime, has acquired the sniffles and I'm hoping like hell he doesn't catch whatever's got Trev down.
Eek. Germs suck.
Happy Saturday. I'm off to wash away the illness germs in a nice, hot shower.
N.

10:30 p.m. - 2005-02-12

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