everything police

I guess I don't have much to say lately. My endo appointment went well. Well, the actual appointment - the day wasn't so great. It's July and I got a call from my grandmother a couple weeks ago. She wanted me to fly out and surprise my mother who was visiting her the next week. The problem with that (besides the timing) being that I haven't spoken to my mother since July of 2005.

They say she's doing better now, after going to rehab (again) six months ago. She's been trying to contact me pretty much the whole time, but six months ago the 3 am phone calls stopped and more reasonable attempts were made. Still, I don't think people change that much in even six months. I don't know if I'm up for the journey, either. I put a lot of time and effort into helping her before because she managed to keep me alive for 18 years (you can't hear me, but that's kind of a joke because really it was more in spite of her), but it was all for nothing. My family are all mad at me because they seem to think it's my job to keep "helping" someone who refuses to fundamentally change. They think I'm bitter and unfair and it couldn't possibly have been as bad as I say. They don't even know the half of it, actually. I'm not even bitter about it, just pragmatic.

Do I really want someone back in my life who is going to constantly nag me in a completely unhelpful manner? Who judges my life choices and always criticises no matter how I succeed? Someone who's only seen me once in the past ten years and never saw me eat for ten years before that, but thinks it's perfectly acceptable to repeatedly tell me I got Type 1 diabetes because I "eat a lot of junk food?" (For the record, I don't, and never really have). Someone who can't stop herself from commenting on my personal life (or what she thinks it is, which is totally off base) in public, often, and loudly? I mean, intellectually I know that what she says has nothing to do with me or my reality. It's all about her, her insecurities, and her fears. She actually knows what causes Type 1 diabetes, but she can't mentally allow me to be who I am because she feels like it's somehow a judgment of her. Knowing that doesn't make it any easier to actually be around her, though.

Still, there is a family event coming up where I know we would have to be there, and I'm already having trouble picturing her constant nutso criticism and me not just getting up and leaving. With the diabetes, I have kind of a short fuse when someone does it in person, while I'm doing stuff. I am totally willing to talk about diabetes, but not while I'm actually doing it and need to think about what I'm doing. My mother is like the Everything Police. Then, the usual techniques don't work, either and tend to exacerbate things. If you try to shame her about what she's saying (in a Miss Manners style), she just gets more agitated and insistent. Family situations are also a huge trigger for her, and I find them difficult to deal with as well, because I kind of feel like people are trying to force me into a role I never even had. Coming up on three years now, and this is what's on my mind.