I (36M) fight constantly with my mom (65F) but I feel guilty breaking contact, what should I do?

For context: I’m married with my beautiful wife (35F), we have been together for 14 years, and we have two kids: (A. who is 8M and B. who is 5M)

My mom is retired, and a widow. She had been with my father for more than 35 years when he died 5 years ago. She has since met John (70M) 2 years later, and they have moved in together a few months later. I think John is nice and I’m happy that my mom is happy with him. We live in the city center of a European city and my mom and John live around one hour away in the countryside. The kids go there 2-3 days every couple of months because my mom asks to see her grandsons more often, and we appreciate having a couple days of quiet in the house.

My mom and I see each other once a month and I feel like we fight like every other month. Not big, unforgivable fights, but still. After what we usually cool off without speaking for 2-3 weeks and she calls me back like nothing happened, and I don’t want to bring it up because I want to put the conflict behind me (yeah, maybe a bad strategy). 

Some recent examples:

She doesn’t get along with my eldest son. Never really have. She loves him, but he doesn’t want to hug her, and she complains about it and they sometimes go to her place for a few days and she constantly says that he is not nice to her and “has a problem”. As a toddler, he had a lot of tantrum and he sure did have a lot of energy to the point where we did ask his pediatrician if it could be ADHD, but growing up, he quieted down and both his pediatrician and successive teachers said that he was a very nice boy with more energy that the average kid, but like a lot of other kids.

But my mother is convinced that he has a problem. He does not have any problem with us, (I mean, he’s just a 7yo who inherited a bit of his mother’s fiery temper), and he does not have any problems at school, he has lots of friends and his teacher tells us he is really nice. 

But then comes the point when my mother asks when the grandkids will stay to her place, and when they stay there I am stressed, and occasionally I will get a call during the day because “We are at the park and A. is throwing a tantrum for nothing, he is not nice with me”, and hear the kid crying in the background, and then she gives the phone to my son, and he tells me that he doesn’t want to be there, and I tell him that I’m at work but will pick him up tomorrow. Usually I don’t understand what happened during these moments because neither my mom nor my son have a clear explanation for what happened, but to the best of my understanding, it is that A. really misbehaved, and my mom scolds him, and then it… blows out of proportion? 

For a while, I consider never sending the kids back there, but then a couple of months pass, and my mom will say that she misses having them at her place and that I don’t want to deprive her of her grandkids nor my sons of their grandmother (This kind of guilt talk is typical of our conversations). And then it’s the holidays at school, we struggle with childcare while we work, my mom does have a pool that the kids love to play in… I talk to my son, explaining that we need to work during the day, and if he’d rather go to camp or to grandma’s and he answers that he doesn’t want to go to camp, he’d still rather go to grandma. And we send them back. And I am a bit stressed about receiving a call because they don’t get along.

That’s already a long example, I’ll only add one more, but I have plenty that all happened during the last few months, and I can give more examples in the comments if needed.

I got married last April.

We had already been together for 14 years, but we just wanted to celebrate with a few friends and family so we organized a small wedding. It was very casual, just as we liked. A civil ceremony, go to a restaurant, and then have a few drinks, all of it in the city center we live in. I have a brother who is living abroad and who was of course planning to come to the wedding. 

I know that picking a place to stay when he comes to visit us is stressing to him because he’d love to stay a bit in the city (like at my place), stay a bit at her place in the countryside and maybe spend the weekend at my aunt’s (who my mother doesn’t speak to anymore, another story…), but if he says that my mom will BLOW UP because he’s his son, and she loves him and he already lives so far away that she almost never sees him so if for once he plans to visit he should just stay at her place because she loves him so much.

So after we planned the wedding, the next time I saw my mum was during B.’s 5th birthday, so I told her something like “By the way, I asked [my brother] to take an Airbnb or hotel in the city” because I knew that if he slept at my mom’s place he would rent a car, not drink and leave early, and I wanted to have a few drinks with him until late in the night because it was my friggin wedding!

Now that I see it written in a row I should have anticipated this but this was over a few months and humans are complicated so I didn’t. She started blowing up “What?? But he’s my son, and he’s living abroad and I almost never see him!” I said that I understand, but it’s my wedding so please for once don’t gilt talk him into sleeping in the countryside. We then changed the subject finished the birthday with no more trouble and she left.

She called me the morning after and how dare did I embarrass her during B.’s birthday, and everything she does it’s because she loves me, my brother and my kids so much and I should never speak to her when there are other people around again. 

We hung up, didn’t speak until my wedding, who went well (my brother stayed in the city center), and she called me back as usual like no fight had ever happened between us.

And it’s like this all the time.

I have many other examples from the last 2-3 years. After some bigger fights, I want to stop talking to her and she will sometimes call me back crying that we can’t stay mad because she’s my mom an she loves me so much and she’s sorry if what she has said when we fought was clumsy. I know it's not a real apology, but then she calls me two weeks later and tell me

But now it’s getting to the point that when the phone rings and I see her number I am instantly getting stressed. I would like to avoid drama for some time, but it implies not seeing her for some time and if I tell her that I need some time without seeing her, that will create way more drama. But then I feel like I’m getting bullied into this relationship by fear of confrontation instead of having a relationship with my mom because I want to. 

And then I think about the fact that there’s A.’s birthday coming up, then hers, and she will be crying that she loves us so much, and even if I pretend everything’s ok, next month she will ask when she can keep the kids for a few days and I don’t want the kids to go there anymore and she will cry because why do I want to prevent a grandmother to keep her grandkids that she loves so much and my heart’s suddenly racing and I don’t know how to handle this. 

Of course we fought again recently, (about me being not grateful enough when I go pick up the kids). And I know that she will call me back one of these days and pretend like nothing happened like all the other times, but I am honestly fed up. It's the smallest thing but it's the straw that broke the camel's back. I can’t do this anymore. I don’t know what to do.

I feel a bit guilty posting here because I read plenty of legit abusive relationships and I do not think it’s the case here. It’s the kind of conflict you can probably find in many many families, it’s just that these days I can’t take it anymore. I am trying to go to therapy but the next available appointment I see is in a few weeks, and that seems forever to me.

TL;DR: We fight a lot with my mom, and these days I can’t take it anymore. I think we should stop seeing each other for a while and that will be another fight so I don’t know how to handle this.