Conversation with mother: Zero joy.

Paraphrasing a conversation we just had as we were walking the dogs.

me: "So apparently today is the world's oldest dog's birthday."

mom: "What do you mean?"

me: "... There's a dog... Who they say it's the oldest in the world... And it's his birthday today. 31 years old. It's a portuguese dog."

mom: "From Portugal?"

me: "Yes, he's from Portugal. They say he only eats human food, and he's very fat. The kind of dog that you would call a "turtle dog". He doesn't look all that old either, his snout isn't white. Makes me wonder if they counted his age right (laughter)."

mom: "It's probably fake because he eats human food. It's fake news."

me: "Mom. 'Apparently'."

-- End of conversation --

I really hope I am remembering everything right, because even in written form she sounds unfriendly. But yeah, I'd say at least 6 times out of 10 (I'd say higher, but I'm trying to be fair) I get zero joy from initiating a conversation with her. But at the same time, when I'm in a good mood and want to talk, refraining to do so by remembering it's not worth it and staying in silence is just sad.

What I'm trying to learn is to say things and expect nothing in return. Just say things to the air, or to the dogs, or to her even, but not expect to have a positive return. Very often talking to the dogs feels better than talking to her because... Let's say 4 out of 6 times she doesn't answer and 2 out of 6 she dismisses it. To be fair, she is a little deaf - a lot of dentists go deaf because of the sound of their drill tool - but I have some evidence that while she may not hear half of the time, the other half it looks like she doesn't bother answering. And it's always been like that.

I've seen most of my aunts "ignore" their children, which makes me think it's something they got from my grandmother. My grandmother is going deaf these days too, but whenever she doesn't answer, my mom just repeats herself. I wish I didn't feel upset when she doesn't hear me, but I do. I don't think my older cousin felt hurt by that. My younger cousins though, I can see they appreciate when I make an effort to reply everytime they talk to me.

--

About the "What do you mean?" thing my mom says. She says that often. That or I'm talking about my dogs for example and she'll suddenly ask me who I'm talking about. Reviewing the conversation up above, it really could be that she is hard of hearing, but I strongly suspect she has a delay in information processing and/or some memory lapses during conversations. Her memory is getting spottier these days, so maybe I should just have expectations of someone with those limitations on her. None of those issues impact her daily life though.

It could also be that they're just busy thinking about something and don't have enough brain space to reply to us. Or that we were overwhelming as kids. Kids are a lot, so maybe I got shut out because she could also have been overworked or stressed. Anyway. That's something that I feel shaped me negatively. Both my spoken interactions with my mother and father (different issue, similar results? lol) made me not have a very good experience with talking.

Kids take a lot of things personally so I often thought that I didn't get a reply because I talked the wrong things. I got the habit of trying to calculate what the other person wants to hear in order to fish for a positive interaction. Made me a bit of a fawner, which I realize now today. But then again my troubles with social interactions can be autistic traits, but until I came to that conclusion I admit I blamed it 100% on their dismissive attitude. Of course I'd have trouble socializing if I based my experiences with my interactions with them. And even more so if I already was predisposed to have trouble in that area.

But anyway, the other possibility is that maybe my mother has some sort of emotional block when it comes to me, at least nowadays. Just like how I have an emotional block with her, for example, I've been driving lately with her, and I cannot for the life of me memorize how to get to places. This is something I always had trouble with, my sense of direction is not great, but I know I can memorize things if I'm alone. It's just surprisingly eye opening to see how much brain power it takes me to tune in to what's she going to say and how to react to what she says, while also driving, that I haven't been able to retain any information on where I'm going.

It's true that I can just be losing some brain cells and capacity to learn, but I have always struggled learning anything when she's around me because I'm hyper aware of how she's going to act. I have no space for reasoning if I gotta do what she tells me to do, a reflex I've been trying to cut for a few years but automatic response is a bitch.

I'd call that an emotional block, and sometimes I wonder if she too also doesn't have one with me, which would make her unable to process what I talk about. I honestly feel her tensing up when I talk. I'd say even have a mild panic reaction and then say things by reflex. We've had a number of complete nonsensical conversations which made it clear to me she was not able to process what I was talking about and replied with random things that came to her mind.

Haha that does make me feel somewhat guilty, like it's my fault she reacts to me like that, but that is not enough for me to try for a new path. If they ordered me to do things like get a job, I'd do it, but with their soft approach I'm really not willing to change paths. I really want to get my comics done.