Today I was thinking of something my narcissist mother did for the sole purpose of upsetting me. A couple years ago, in the middle of winter, I was pregnant and stressed…and my toilet clogged up and backed up in my bathroom. I only have one bathroom. I called a plumber and arranged an appointment, but all they had was a time when I needed to be at an appointment during a work day. I asked my narcissist mother to be at my house for the plumber. She agreed.
That day, I went to work and my mother was baby-sitting my son. I had a doctor’s appointment that day, so I’d need to leave work, run to it, and go back to work. She’d watched my son since he was six weeks old, so she was well-aware of how to use his car seat, zip his coat and all those other normal things. However, when I was at work and about to leave for my appointment, she called me and said she could not go to my house for the plumber because she couldn’t put my son in his car seat. What?!?! She did it daily. Why not that day? She insisted that she would not go wait for the plumber unless I left work and drove to her house to put my son in his car seat. Well, I wanted my bathroom back, so I gave in to this nonsense. I drove half an hour to her house, and I was stressed out and angry over this drama. When I got there, I needed to hurry because I had to get to my doctor’s appointment. That’s when she announced that she didn’t feel like going to my house after all, so I needed to go myself.
I wanted to scream! I’d just left work and driven half an hour to do this very simple chore that my mother did daily. I needed to hurry on and get to the doctor’s, (which was half an hour back in the other direction,) and she dropped this bomb on me. My house was ten minutes from hers, and it would have been so simple for her to just put my son in the car seat herself and drive over there. She wasn’t working. She wasn’t sick. She wasn’t busy. She was watching TV. I couldn’t cancel my doctor appointment at the last minute, so I canceled the plumber. My son and I ended up having to stay at my mother’s house a few more days until I could have the plumber come out on my day off–a Saturday–which by the way, costs far more.
I wish my mom could be normal and just help me out in a bind–and having a clogged toilet is quite a bind. But she’s not normal. She insisted I come home from work, miss some pay, nearly miss my doctor’s appointment, and waste my time to do something she could do…all so she could hit me with the information that she wasn’t going to help anyway.
When narcissists pull these games, I often feel helpless. I know it’s a game to run me around and frustrate me, but I’m also all by myself in life and really needed someone to wait for the plumber. When you don’t have anyone to rely on, it makes it far easier for narcissists to run you ragged playing their games. They know you are desperate. It is really not fun to not be able to go home or use the toilet in your home for nearly a week. My narc mom probably loved my frustration. Too bad stories like this were repeated on a regular basis with equal insanity and stress!