Chicken cordon bleu with potato and carrot mash

Mum’s sole purpose today, consciously or not, has been punishing me for abandoning her yesterday.

She spent much of the morning in bed, “too ill” to get up. When she realised I was actually enjoying a peaceful morning with Suki

she dragged herself out of bed and into a day of complaining and complaining and complaining some more. I put my earplugs in and ignored her as best I could, which just made her complain louder and more dramatically.

She flounced off to bed because I “don’t care”, but continued to complain until eventually, inevitably, I lost my patience with her. She promptly perked up amazingly: all she wanted was my attention, in any form.

I sent a request to Adult Social Services for a review of my needs, hoping they can fast-track my escape from a situation that is rapidly becoming unbearable.

This afternoon our week’s groceries arrived and I put them away, with mum ‘helping’ as usual by watching me struggle as if I’m a mildly interesting tv programme. I discovered that I forgot to order mum’s favourite chocolate brownie sundaes, an omission I will doubtless pay for over the coming week.

Then came more complaints, delivered looming over me where I was sitting on my bed reading. The “why won’t anyone help me, why won’t you help me, why aren’t you doing anything?” finally, inevitably (again) drove me past snapping point.

I lost it. I told her she was taking the bloody medicine and I’m not a ffff… miracle worker. (Somehow I didn’t actually swear.) She quickly pivoted to sweetness and light, apologising for “being difficult”, hugging me and telling me she loves me.

I couldn’t respond with anything much beyond a tired “thank you”.

Then came whining that she had only two pairs of clean underwear left, and her current pair was damp, and what should she do? I talked mum through how to change her underwear, put the damp pair in the washing machine, and got it started. Mum ‘thanked’ me by walking away with the words “I’m hungry”.

I gritted my teeth and put dinner in to cook, then collapsed down with a glass of water. Mum immediately – immediately – decided she needed the charger for her Kindle, and “you will help me, won’t you?”

I got up and got mum’s charger cable, nearly falling twice in the process. Mum took it back into the living room and casually dropped it on the sofa beside her, as “I don’t really need it at the moment”.

I should, I suppose, be grateful to mum for dealing with any lingering guilt at my plans to leave by drowning it in deep, seething rage at her casual abuse of my tiny remaining reserves of energy.

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Dinner was chicken cordon bleu (breaded chicken stuffed with ham and cheese) with potato and carrot mash. Mum turned her nose up at the mash, which is fine by me as it’s delicious and I can now have the rest of it for lunch tomorrow.

Now mum is eating tiramisu and – you guessed it – complaining. I have given up on saying anything except “mm-hm”, lest my rage escape and trigger another round of syrupy apologies and no change in behaviour.

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And there ends today’s venting session. My apologies, and thanks for letting me rant. I will try to talk about something else tomorrow, I promise.