Am I Self-Indulgent, or Does Mom need to Back Off?

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Hello again, everyone! I am a 28 year old, self-diagnosed aspie female living with her parents... just got this great psychologist who gets this sad puppy face every time I say I might take a break from writing... he thinks I should do something involving writing in a professional way, i. e. write for a living somehow, or do translations or something from home...? My diabetic mother, I have felt very strongly for some time now, is a bit controlling. i do chores around the house because I know I can't work yet, or at least haven't found the way in which I CAN work yet... not very many things around here in my neck of the woods, namely Missouri, US of A... I self-diagnosed last year.. and everything makes much more sense now... mom kept saying all I had was ADHD, yet when I told the psychologist that mom said that she had thought I had something else but... blah blah.? two-faced? Yes? no? she is wily. Or I am a b***h for thinking she is manipulating me. But here's the thing... she always says all she ever wanted was a house, a garden, a home-business... a -nice- house, mind... she won't really let us plan stuff, I feel, unless our ideas are within her scope of acceptability... she supposedly has all these health problems.. i have trouble cleaning because even though I do a lot of chores, I don't do them perfectly and also I do them as quickly as possible because it takes me a long time to relax into doing a thing like that if my focus isn't completely on it, similar to one of our aspie hyper-focuses, like, oh, mine is Doctor Who and writing fanfiction, savvy? I am just wondering.. Do I have a right to be upset with her about her - as I put it- constant whining and nagging about how she might as well give up because life sucks, money isn't coming, the dead people/guides/angels/aliens/whoever aren't listening to her or are screwing around, chores don't get done and she can;t get anything done that she wants and the remodelling isn't done, hasn't been for 30 years or more (this is true except for the little bits we get started or done here and there; the house is mostly a mess, has been FOREVER- disgusting- obviously we have a deficiency in this dept and need help OUTSIDE THE FAMILY- I SAY SAVE MONEY AND HIRE SOMEONE FOR GODSAKES) and blah blah .... all she does all day is either Bills, which dad is the only breadwinner for, watch depressing cop or housing or decorating shows, and -work- at her magickal-and-will-make-everything-better-if-it-succeeds home business website online... that has yet to generate any applicable fundage or get -done- past the oh look I'm working on the html again for the umpteenth time to-day! stage, as far as I can see. I am writing/planning fanfiction or original fiction every day, at my computer for long hours, have been for about ten years, trying to improve my writing skills to their utmost, trying to understand if I really have what it takes to be a person who works, or can write for a living in some way...always been scared crapless of work... mom just made it worse with all her temp jobs... oo you should be a secretary like I wanted to be because my life sucked only it didn't only it did only it ...blah blah! trying to just live day by day because they are older and won't be around forever... SSI and SSDI are a joke, apparently... unsure what to do. And my dad's union at Honeywell is on strike... HA. I think if we have to move to the Really Old Uncle's house in WV it would be good for us, a healthy change that is desperately needed mentally, emotionally, tangibly, what have you... but mom is always freaking out about the bills or the -business-... it's sad. I am uncertain how to think about this, and no decision will come to my mind, despite repeated attempts to consider every angle I can think of... I am a libra, so people think I'm lazy, but I just... I am slightly lazy, but not when I believe in something. And I know when something is bad for me, damn it. I just... wanna know if it's fair for her to jump up and down, despite her - various health problems- and whine because something isn't going her way. She is a big lady... and a beautiful woman (when not whining and crying and stomping like a child), to myself and my father (also an undiagnosed aspie with adhd) and she just.. she can't deal with us like an adult, I feel. She told me once to stop breathing. This year. Does anyone need extra information to help me out with this? I tried to work once.. my parents forced me to help with the bills by working at Dillard's.. I lasted six months.. I was AWESOme... but I ahd to quit becuase I got sick with flu and nearly passed out from work-stress and flu symptoms. ( so many of the women who worked there were psychos... one creepo would come up behind me like a department store! ninja and totally freak me out) I would have burnt out anyway and caused a scene, i just know it. But anyway, what I am saying is ( and I sincerely apologize for the LOOOONG post, but well... I babble) am I wrong for being irritated and ignoring this woman after years of what I feel is nagging? i do chores, not well, but I do them. While I was working, I was happy to help with the bills. no problem. i also had to give most of my money to my parents though, to help with said bills... But she said, before I knew I had asperger's, that that didn't count because it had only been six months... heh. six months of hell. I keep telling this story over and over, and for that I apologize, but my psychologist helped me past some of it, now I need feedback os I can get past more. You guys up for discussion? mom keeps saying how nothing is going her way and how we don't do anything around the house, then turns around with it... I am certain she has some kind of disorder... am never sure whether she is really manipulating us or not, because she is VERY wily about psychology, she studied it sort of... O.o Am I b***h? Or just confused? Or do you need more information? My psychologist, ( I hope I get to see him again once strike is over, he is good for me) is a libra, and not very confrontational, so though he is the best mind I've ever met in the medical profession, i fear he might not be the one ot help me to the ultimate goal... whatever taht may be. I need guidance, here. Sorry if I said -I- too much. i hope I'm not a narcissist. I don't mean to be. I just.. I need space away from her, or I think I do, anyway. Dad, he's like her enabler, and more of a black and white, Jon Elder Robison/ Temple Grandin type aspie than I am. eek. what do you think guys? ( sorry for the repetition) maybe I just don't see something that's staring me in the face...Oh, and my room has... dust bunnies... I think the lemon scented spray is too small for em... O.o. But see, i think that if I had my own place, I would not be this way? This is a psychological clue.. but to what? Am i being an ass? i occasionally sweep in my room... when I feel reallly good nd want to do it, i have no prob. But i rarely feel that good, in my head i mean... urp?

I'm sorry that I can't help you much, but let me state something politically incorrect here. Most parents are as flawed as non-parents. They might be nice to their own spouses and children but mean to outsiders.

um... I don't quite understand... my central processing deficit, if that's what it is, is really pronounced sometimes... Can you say what you just said in another way, please? Thank you for replying!

The deal is that if you live with your parents, you have to put up with their rules, their quirks, their deficiencies, and you should be contributing to the household in some way, at age 28.

Maybe it is time for you to take more charge of your own life. For example: You say that you would keep your own place cleaner, if you had your own place, and yet, you admit that your own room is a mess, right? How about starting with keeping your own room neat and tidy, and making it a wonderful place for you to spend time in?

If you need help with housekeeping skills, I highly recommend that you try FlyLady. There is a website, and she has also published a book called "Sink Reflections". Her method works well for people who have ADD, are depressed, have health issues, or many other challenges. You start with one little task, and do that daily. You just take one baby step at a time.

What do you think of these suggestions?

True, true. I do their laundry, cook their food, take up the disgusting dog paper, clean the bathroom, sweep the floor... do pictures every now and then for mom's.. -business- that isn't generating any fundage... as for the chores, not always when or how they want, because that's impossible, but I DO do them. And yeah, I could do my room more often. It's taken me a long time to be able to... I looked at it for so long, and there were just so many things I couldn't pick a place to start. But I am much better about it now- in some ways- cue the dust bunnies. Yes, baby steps. Totally. LOVe that movie, btw! What About Bob. heh. Very true. I'd plan out the remodeling AND GET IT DONE!! ! if she'd let me. BUT no. Too much in my opinion has to be done -her way-. or no way. Perhaps I'm out of touch with some fact that's staring me in the face. I dunno. Every time I think I got it, it changes shape. Oh, and thank you kindly for the suggestions. I will look that up.

I identify with much of what you have to say, TARDIScompanion. My obsession with Doctor Who in the mid-eighties drove my mother insane. She used to say, "Do you know you've mentioned Doctor Who three times in thirty minutes?" And I used to think, "I know I have."

I desperately wanted to say, "Do you know you have tennis on the TV all day and you aren't even watching it? The pop-pop of the balls being batted back and forth gets on my nerves." But I knew I dare not say a word.

In my late teens I got a part-time cleaning job and, because I found the social interraction draining, I used to come home and drop on the couch, exhausted. Mum used to say, "Hugh! Anyone would have thought you'd done a day's work!"

While she worked hard around the home, any employment she secured outside didn't last, and she would be blase about it. This would infuriate me no end.

My crushing shyness and self-loathing was interpreted as laziness. "You're a leach, like your father!" she would scream.

She once filled in a rent form with "I am getting on my mother's nerves" written in the box for the reason for requesting accomodation, and left it for me to find. I deperately wanted to get my own place, actually, but was crushed by my inhibitions. I had no idea how to go about it.

It wasn't until 2003 (by which time I was married and happy) that I discovered Asperger's syndrome and suddenly everything made a lot more sense. I felt relieved.

My mother's initial response to Asperger's was to make a list of Aspie traits I don't have to prove to me that I don't have the condition.

It was only when I published The Feeling's Unmutual that she started to accept it.

So, you're not on your own with these problems, TARDIScompanion. My heart goes out to you...

Agreed, Will. Thank you for your kind words.

My mother tried to claim i didn;t have it... many times. till I showed her the list, and even afterward, fora while. i showed her something I was interested in becusae it is similar in soem ways, Alexythemia, and she claimed I was - worse than a hypochondriac- for even bringing it up, then proceeded to launch into a sself-important dismissive tone and tell me this story about a kid on her block that had had that. Did your mother do that sort of hting to you? whine all the time about missed birthdays driving everyone to misery about it for years afterward and such and then complain once you finally got to the breaking point and mildly complained that someone had missed yours, then you REALLY break when she gets pissy and you get pissy too and then it
s mommy's fun time with teh yelling and screaming and stomping like a five year old? Dad yells REALLY LOUDLY. he has asperger's too... really loudly. it's not fun, when he has a moment. He's a good man, but.. DUCT TAPE IS THERE FORA REASON, WHEN YOU KNOW YOU ARE HAVING A MOMENT, JUST SAVE TIME BY COMPREHENDING THEFAC TYOU MIGHT BE WRONG, THEN PUTTING SOME OF THE TAPE ON YOUR MOUTH FOR FOUR HOURS. some people don't like yelling! good thing I'm strongerthan both of em.. excepot fo the whole moving out thing. dunno how I an do that, but I know that for my sanity I really want or think I want to.
I need my own dominion, ya know? dunno how to get it, not with ,my allergy to anxiety-cuasing work.

She keeps saying how she has to have everything her way ,then constantly asks us for an opinion or -deep discusion- about things we are burned out on because she won't shut up about them. Even we as aspies can soemtimes take the hint eventually and tone it down, but... not her. oh no.
eek.
I think she must -have something-... I really do. Not sure what though. She SEEMS to love us... truly. Seemsto love the pets, if in a possessive, defensive and stifling way. So, it probably isn't Narcissism. Could be BPD or something similar... when she's nice she's nice.. but usually finds a way to ruin our day anyway because there's usually something attached to the nice. i feel strange whenever I get her presents... because she used to qualify the gift all the time, you know? You were left feeling scooped out without knowing why, until you taught yourself what that was. Sometimes I think she manipulates the living shiznit out of us both.. I admit I can do better. But I have done a lot with myself, and seh just does things that other people don't seem to, and those things are upsetting and annoying. My online friends can say the same thing and do the same thing ( I only have online friends by the way- I trust NO ONE from school and have never MEt any of my online friends - I think we'd mutually annoy each other if we ever met, really) and THey never treat me the way she seems to. But she does try to love on us, if for strange-seeming reasons. At her core, she's a firghtened little girl you know? And all of us are frightened sometimes. And in so many ways, al lof us are children. It's not a bad thing, we must always remember that. The key is to admit as much of the fear as we can, and try to create our own clarity by lettign go of as much mental refuse as possible, no matter how upsetting it might be at first. I have got to the point I am at by working hard mentally... not so much physically, I am very laid back! -hee- But yes, I understand and share your pain. You have my love. I am glad you found soemone! I have yet to find soemone who can tolerate me without being too clingy or too dull or too something. Revere the Lesson of the Porridge, my friend. If it's just right, EAT IT. hee hee. i remember I had this lovely online friend named Jacob who had beautiful red curly hair... I wanted to marry him, tried to love him.. but.. i was in aspie land more than I am, now and vitamin deficient, so I went on wild swings and freaked him out. oh god, how I wanted to touch his hair... his beautiful hair. He claimed to be Victorian, a gentleman... but I couldn't give him a lot of myself and he retreated... plus the cursing was a big no no.. I freaked him uot i think. he insulted my mother and my knowledge of a certain body of information, and kept on doing it. I had to break up with him... tried to g ive him outs, asked him to tell me when I was being too clingy... but he wanted me to talk to him constantly .Oh god I loved his hair. I wish I could have caressed it, and his lovely face, just once. But I think maybe I am a loner type, plus i can't move out right now don;t think it would bea good idea because of the confusion-anxiety issues I have with legal things when my chems or whatevers aren't in perfect alignment, you know, those happy blue moon instances where we can -think striaght?- heehee... i probablty ought ot -marry myself- as the philosophers say! Been workin on it. It would be nice to know I can have/live with the right partner though, whichever sex it might turn out to be. But so far, all i attract are creepos or unchivalrous boys that are very nice and very boring. or sex fiends! Was it like that for you until you found your special person? (sorry for the TMI- I have not yet mastered the art of the "un peu de silence !" hugs and best wishes from a fellow animal!

And, a further addemdum to the person who was talking to me so nicely in that first reply:

Plus, it's not my room alone that will ultimately solve the problem, I think... If I am wrong, well. so be it then. That will smack me inteh face later. I accept that. But It's the WHOLE SITUATION that needs a desperate difference, not just my immediate surroundings, which she makes infinitely clear that I really don't own most if any of, and subsequently this, while true, makes life incredibly frustrating when I know that if I had more control and possession of/in the household in which I have lived my entire life, something i have never had and thought I WOULD have upon adulthood, perhaps mistakenly to some degree, more things might get done better. Including the bills, becaue she really tends to freak a lot about those. I understand that, but i also think that because I think differently , it would affect me differently, therefroe I would handle it differently, and deal with my stress over the fundage and what would happen if we were to lose the hosue differently. PErhaps more positively than I feel she does. But, she's doing some things the best she can. Perhaps I am being preventably hypocritical, or am just inexperienced in the -ways of the world-. as she likes to put it. perhaps so. I don't discount the notion.

Yes, doing my room more often would change things in small ways, but I really feel strongly most days that even if I DId do even more than I already am, and I am not one to kill myself working because that's unhealthy and stupid, but i am not gonna do nopthing either- those people need help...- she would only pretend to be pleased until the next incident. She resents us a lot more then she lets on, and sometimes she DOes let on.

Telling your daughter to stop breathing or your mother to just die is not conducive to a healthy relationship, esp when one ofthem doesn't really mean what they said. i only say things I mean, unless my impulse control adhd problem is running me over right then.And once I realise it has, i own up. not every time, because I ,may not realise it happened yet... anyway, totally, you guys. totally. oh, lots of typos... meh. somtimes I don't correct em. keeps things interesting!
And, I am saying this stuf not because I only want to help myself. I really want to help other people with the things I say, like this. not a narcissist, just wanna help people. When I can.

To TARDIScompanion: Oops, I'm trying to say that every human is flawed, even parents.

To icyfire4w5:

Oh you're okay Icykins! And I agree with you completely! Did I come off as mad? Well, i was a little. Me sorry! hugz and cheesecake! That impulse thing really screws with me during my monthly... ignore any EXTRA weirdness, if you please! hee! --you should have seen me before I went on the B100 vitamins...- I was nutbagz. Mut have had a major deficiency for a LOOOOOONG time, because I am NoTHING like that now.

-chipmunk friendly squeal-

I think it's important to add that my mother did care about me. She just didn't "get" what was driving me.

Asperger's syndrome was only formally acknowledged by the psychology world in 1994 (when I was 24), so it's not surprising that the average person in the street has only come to recognise its traits in recent times.