The rot goes further than we'd thought
So, my mother. Likes to make drama and play the victim on every possible occasion. We know.
I called my grandparents to invite myself around, because I haven't seen them for years since they reacted badly to me being in a same-sex relationship, but recently they've been coming round a little, and they've been very lonely, so I thought a reconciliatory visit was worth a try.
They had some news for me - they told me how earlier they'd been speaking to my mother in India, and were worried sick about her, because due to my father's death her Barclaycard had been cancelled, or something, and she was stuck out there penniless, and she had asked them to call the bank and try and sort something out, but despite being on the phone all day, the bank refused to help and were rude to my grandfather. They were wondering if they should cash in their life savings and send a few thousand pounds of their own money, but Barclaycard told them that the only way they could send money to India was to use one of those international money transfer people like Western Union, and they weren't sure if it was safe.
So I composed a pretty cross email to my mother asking what on earth was going on, because she hadn't mentioned imminent financial doom to me, and if there was a sudden emergency it would be better to ask me to help with it than her parents who are 98 and 96 and are both deaf enough to really struggle when talking to call centres.
My mother's email did include the S-word (as in "Sorry, didn't meant to upset them"), which is very unusual for her. She said that the problem was merely that her debit card had been rejected as they'd sent her a new one out early, so she was having to get cash advances on her Barclaycard, which was costing her 3%, and she was going to phone the bank to complain, but she knew my grandfather was going past the bank and thought he might enjoy having a go at them himself!
At this point I shook my head and muttered something foul about my mother, but after the weekend I think I now have a little sympathy for her. I told my grandparents I'd be visiting them on Saturday, and to avoid the usual awkward silences when Sarah was mentioned I didn't say whether Sarah would be accompanying me or not. In the worst case, Sarah would have to stay in the car, which would make my visit rather short, but that would be their decision.
It's a five to six hour drive to my grandparents', and we were almost there when my mother called me from India to say that they were going spare because we hadn't turned up for lunch, and they were worried that an accident had befallen us on the road. We arrived, and after they welcomed us both in (phew!), they showed us the dinner table set for four and two plates with food in cling-film! Apparently they'd held out for two hours before their hunger compelled them to start without us. I was rather frustrated to be told off about this, when I hadn't given them an arrival time (or even a number of guests!), nor had they asked. In fact, to arrive in time for the lunch they made us, we'd have had to get up at the crack of dawn, given the distance involved. They then started to assume we'd be staying the night, and got upset when we said we'd booked and paid for a Travelodge by the services that was convenient for our journey home the next day. (Of course, the real reason we'd booked the Travelodge was that we weren't certain how welcome we'd be made to feel in their house, and didn't want to give them extra housework at their age either.)
We ate our late lunch while they sat around us complaining of their aches and pains, telling racist jokes, moaning about the poor service they've had from company X Y and Z, explaining that everyone in the world was out to con them, apart from their neighbours who were saints, and trying to ply us with half a dozen different types of alcoholic drink. The atmosphere was really uncomfortable, although it's hard to work out exactly why. My grandfather was doing a nice line in always being right, and my grandmother was doing a nice line in being a long-suffering victim.
After a few hours with the atmosphere getting worse and worse, we started dropping hints about how tired they must be. Unfortunately my grandmother had conveniently "forgotten" that we were going to a hotel, and babbled on about how we could adjust the bedroom radiator so that we couldn't get a word in edgeways. I mouthed "Help!" to Sarah, and we did our best to present a united front by insisting that we had to go, whereupon my grandmother said something along the lines of "Absolutely Not! There's no hotel that's better than my house! I won't allow it!" and burst into tears. I felt pretty awful about upsetting her, but she stopped crying a moment later when I promised we'd come and see her again some time.
But hey, I can now understand why my mother's screwed up. The one consolation is that my grandparents obviously don't have any issues around Sarah's gender - the "ask the girls if they want some coffee" kind of talk came quite naturally - but they obviously have some issues. Big ones. It was obvious that there was some kind of game being played throughout our visit, but nobody had explained the rules to us. Sarah especially came away from the visit very shaken and upset, and we both felt the best thing to do was to curl up in bed at the Travelodge with a bottle of wine between us.
I suppose it's evidence of a toxic family when, in the same week, my father dies and I make a social trip to my grandparents, and only the latter makes me (and my partner) feel in need of anti-anxiety drugs.
I called my grandparents to invite myself around, because I haven't seen them for years since they reacted badly to me being in a same-sex relationship, but recently they've been coming round a little, and they've been very lonely, so I thought a reconciliatory visit was worth a try.
They had some news for me - they told me how earlier they'd been speaking to my mother in India, and were worried sick about her, because due to my father's death her Barclaycard had been cancelled, or something, and she was stuck out there penniless, and she had asked them to call the bank and try and sort something out, but despite being on the phone all day, the bank refused to help and were rude to my grandfather. They were wondering if they should cash in their life savings and send a few thousand pounds of their own money, but Barclaycard told them that the only way they could send money to India was to use one of those international money transfer people like Western Union, and they weren't sure if it was safe.
So I composed a pretty cross email to my mother asking what on earth was going on, because she hadn't mentioned imminent financial doom to me, and if there was a sudden emergency it would be better to ask me to help with it than her parents who are 98 and 96 and are both deaf enough to really struggle when talking to call centres.
My mother's email did include the S-word (as in "Sorry, didn't meant to upset them"), which is very unusual for her. She said that the problem was merely that her debit card had been rejected as they'd sent her a new one out early, so she was having to get cash advances on her Barclaycard, which was costing her 3%, and she was going to phone the bank to complain, but she knew my grandfather was going past the bank and thought he might enjoy having a go at them himself!
At this point I shook my head and muttered something foul about my mother, but after the weekend I think I now have a little sympathy for her. I told my grandparents I'd be visiting them on Saturday, and to avoid the usual awkward silences when Sarah was mentioned I didn't say whether Sarah would be accompanying me or not. In the worst case, Sarah would have to stay in the car, which would make my visit rather short, but that would be their decision.
It's a five to six hour drive to my grandparents', and we were almost there when my mother called me from India to say that they were going spare because we hadn't turned up for lunch, and they were worried that an accident had befallen us on the road. We arrived, and after they welcomed us both in (phew!), they showed us the dinner table set for four and two plates with food in cling-film! Apparently they'd held out for two hours before their hunger compelled them to start without us. I was rather frustrated to be told off about this, when I hadn't given them an arrival time (or even a number of guests!), nor had they asked. In fact, to arrive in time for the lunch they made us, we'd have had to get up at the crack of dawn, given the distance involved. They then started to assume we'd be staying the night, and got upset when we said we'd booked and paid for a Travelodge by the services that was convenient for our journey home the next day. (Of course, the real reason we'd booked the Travelodge was that we weren't certain how welcome we'd be made to feel in their house, and didn't want to give them extra housework at their age either.)
We ate our late lunch while they sat around us complaining of their aches and pains, telling racist jokes, moaning about the poor service they've had from company X Y and Z, explaining that everyone in the world was out to con them, apart from their neighbours who were saints, and trying to ply us with half a dozen different types of alcoholic drink. The atmosphere was really uncomfortable, although it's hard to work out exactly why. My grandfather was doing a nice line in always being right, and my grandmother was doing a nice line in being a long-suffering victim.
After a few hours with the atmosphere getting worse and worse, we started dropping hints about how tired they must be. Unfortunately my grandmother had conveniently "forgotten" that we were going to a hotel, and babbled on about how we could adjust the bedroom radiator so that we couldn't get a word in edgeways. I mouthed "Help!" to Sarah, and we did our best to present a united front by insisting that we had to go, whereupon my grandmother said something along the lines of "Absolutely Not! There's no hotel that's better than my house! I won't allow it!" and burst into tears. I felt pretty awful about upsetting her, but she stopped crying a moment later when I promised we'd come and see her again some time.
But hey, I can now understand why my mother's screwed up. The one consolation is that my grandparents obviously don't have any issues around Sarah's gender - the "ask the girls if they want some coffee" kind of talk came quite naturally - but they obviously have some issues. Big ones. It was obvious that there was some kind of game being played throughout our visit, but nobody had explained the rules to us. Sarah especially came away from the visit very shaken and upset, and we both felt the best thing to do was to curl up in bed at the Travelodge with a bottle of wine between us.
I suppose it's evidence of a toxic family when, in the same week, my father dies and I make a social trip to my grandparents, and only the latter makes me (and my partner) feel in need of anti-anxiety drugs.