I’ve been thinking a lot about how I’m going to handle the situation with my mom. For those of you who have been following me for a while, you know that my mom’s got an extensive history of drug abuse. While she hasn’t used street drugs in over 5 years, she’s now dependent on Morphine and Oxycodone. 30mg, 4 times a day. Snorted. My mother is an addict and has been an addict my entire life.
I keep getting mixed stories, mostly from her and my grandmother (her mother) that she’s doing better. She’s off the pills. She relapsed. She’s cut back. She’s slowly tapering off of them. In the background, my father is stuck in the middle. Stuck between keeping the peace and being honest. And in the center of all of that is my pregnancy and my baby.
I have explained to my mother NUMEROUS times that if I have the slightest inclination that my mother is still using, she will NOT be left alone with the baby. I’m getting to the point now where the idea of her being around my child at all is absolutely terrifying but it CAN’T be avoided because my father and my grandmother are going to be our #1 source of daycare. Tim and I cannot afford to put our child in daycare, so we’re very fortunate to both have family that are unemployed… but it’s a double edged sword.
I can’t stomach the idea of my child growing up in the environment that I did. It breaks my heart that my mother spends most of her days high and oblivious to the world, but what penetrates deeper is the idea of my baby one day asking me, “Mommy, what’s wrong with Grandma?” I just… I can’t.
So my husband and I have already agreed that we’ve got to sit down with my mother, my father, and my grandmother and have “the talk.” I’ve got to make it perfectly clear, to all of them, that I’m not an idiot. I know that my mother is using and I know that no pleas that come from me are going to change that. They need to understand that if I EVER find out that my child has been left alone with my mother, even for a minute, it will be the last time my family watches him/her. I will find another way because I WILL NOT allow my child to be subject to her. She can barely keep herself standing half of the time and I just wont. I wont do it.
Also, my grandmother needs to understand boundaries. I don’t know how I’m going to have that conversation with her. She is sneaky and has a way of doing things the way she wants and I need to make it perfectly clear to her that when she watches MY baby, she is to follow MY guidelines for caring for the baby.
Also, side note, it is REALLY annoying how my mother and grandmother talk about the baby like it’s theirs. EXCUSE ME. You HAVE your children, you can’t have mine too. -_-;;
I’m scared to have this conversation. Because I’ve had it before and it doesn’t ever change anything. I’ve also got a wicked temper (thanks, dad) when it comes to my mother so I’ve got to make sure I keep a level head during the whole thing. I think I might do it at Easter. I’ll have Tim there with me and I can squeeze his hand under the table if I have to. sigh
I really wish all of this crap had stayed in the past where it belongs.
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