A conversation with my mother

I am almost certain that a prerequisite skill to to becoming a parent is knowing how to make your kid feel like shit, at all times. My mother has decided that she had finally had enough of my horrible attitude towards everyone and everything these holidays, and decided to talk to me. Oh the dread.

“Is it because you dropped IB?” was her first guess (IB's that diploma program which I decided I had no use for ages ago) Now the correct answer to her question is NO. My school life has only gotten better since, but yes, that was when I started finding Dad particularly irritable, because he continued to prod me with comments like, "XXX managed to finish it. How come you can't? Reckon you can still get a 99 now that you've dropped out?" I must have said "yes" to shut him up.

So her second guess was to ask me whether I had a romantic interest. "Hah, I wish." My sarcasm was lost on her. "Oh, so they don't like you back then?"  OMFG. Thank you for misunderstanding me so completely. So I explained to her in simple terms that no, I wasn't concerned with trivialities such as "love". Then she went into that annoying state which most women tend to enter when they stumble upon an unknown fact: she tried very hard to ask me what I was troubled with. Now the real answer was "YOU", but I didn't want to break the peace I so carefully maintained. So I said something dodgy like "I don't want to tell you." Well that couldn't be more true.

Then she's like "okay, fine if you don't tell me I won't ask, but I want you to completely forget about it". From her tone I gathered that she didn't buy the "I am not in love" explanation, and is now probably assuming that I am playing the role of Juliet (ie about to fake my own death and cause some drama) in some sort of teenage love story.  FML.

I wished I could escape, but noooo, she continued to go on and on and on. Something about how I don't interact with the family enough, how I don't tell them anything and how they have to ask me, and I give rude replies. I know I give rude replies. I wouldn't act that way to anyone else. They just contain some magical power of inciting my inner rudeness which is generally controlled. I guess it's even worse because they are my parents, but FFS I really hate being me right now. Yeah yeah having my kind of parents isn't the worst thing in the world, I could be so much worse off--- you know what? I don't agree with that kind of bullshit view.

Saying that I could be worse off doesn't mean anything. That's not how things are. Yes, it could be worse, and I may be in greater agony than I currently am. Does that mean I should be grateful for my current state? NO. Just because I have not yet sunk to a deeper level of unhappiness does not mean I will accept my current misery.

Back to my conversation with my mother. Apparently the whole reason Dad started "helping" me with UMAT was because she asked him to. Since I had such trouble doing it myself, they'd decided, they'd force me to do some every night by having Dad in my room. OH GEE THANKS, I'M SURE THAT WAS USEFUL. One thing I do not appreciate are these forced acts of kindness, giving me concern when I have no desire for any. I wish I hadn't honestly told her, at that point, that they were the greatest distractions ever, because then she ranted about how she never asked me to help with chores anymore and blah blah blah.

...I sound like an ungrateful jerk, don't I?

See I'd be feeling much more guilty if she didn't say that having me around was like keeping a dog or a pig. Yeah there's my worth, like a dog or a pig. Great choice of words. All because I don't "interact with family". Has she ever thought about why I don't interact with family? I like how she had never considered that she could be someone contributing to my agitated state. You know what? I find it difficult to communicate when people bark at me on the dinner table, asking me repetitiously, day after day, which classes I've had at school. And I'd say something if it didn't erupt into an argument afterwards.

Mum's defense against that was: "well everyone can have their own opinion, you'll just have to convince us through your words." ...When she puts it like that, it's as if we had civilized discussions instead of emotional outbursts where I am once again told what a lucky yet horribly ungrateful, unappreciative and disrespectful child I am.

Then Mum took a turn and delved into how I'm not trying hard enough in school, because everyone, absolutely every fucking one of the people she knew had a kid whose university entrance score was 99+. WELL I'M SORRY THAT MINE'S CURRENTLY AT A PITIFUL 98- OH WAIT, I'M NOT SORRY AT ALL. The conversation inevitably leads to how I play too many games and how if I had spent all that time studying I would have finished by now- true, but I'd kill myself before that happened.

"I'm not saying that you have to study every single waking minute you have," ---oh look, she's trying to sound reasonable here. BULLSHIT. That is what she's saying. "But I just don't want you to play games or talk to your friends when you have time off. You can play the flute, watch the TV, read or something."
"Are you essentially saying that you don't want me to have any social interactions?"
"Yes. I want you to stop talking to your friends, completely."

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...Okay, that was unexpected. I was being a smartass and I thought--- yeah  I thought wrong. Never mind. Why haven't I ingrained it into my head, that my psychological health and emotional stability is none of their concern? I guess you could say that from the way she asked me what was troubling me, she's showing how she cares for me. Yeah, I understand that. From a logical, rational perspective. But my inner voice is crying at me to go throw myself in front of some on-coming vehicle because FUCK LIFE.

Way to grab the moral high-ground- now she's the caring parent who is concerned with her rebellious teenage kid. Because I obviously don't know any better, right, and since I have nothing I want to be I should have an university entrance score of 99+ because I will suddenly want to enter some magical course which only accepts people with a score of 99+. Apparently not only does she want me to go to med school, I'm supposed to go to a good med school. Being able to pick the course isn't enough, I must pick the uni.

I'm now thinking that maybe she should invest all her efforts into my sister- I'm a lost cause. I'm obviously beyond all hope and there's nothing she can do to curb my rebellious tendencies. It's a shame I turned out to be such a disappointment.

...The above paragraph is sarcasm.

Well, at least now I know how inadequate I appear in my parents eyes. I'm soooo glad we had that conversation. SUCH REVELATIONS. Fucking fantastic.

My life is a black void.