[Update]Nmom is getting desperate

As some of you may remember, my brother died at the end of December and Nmother proceeded to ruin the funeral, make everything about her, constantly post about my brother, and has generally been acting ridiculous.

Thankfully, my Nmom is more of the apathetic type. Rather than futilely trying to control every aspect of my life, she completely ignores me unless she wants something from me. In the past, I would always react to this by calling her all the time, practically begging her to love me and pay attention to me because I was so starved for love and affection, and now I realize that I was just giving her exactly what she wanted - a devoted daughter without actually having to work at our relationship. Sometimes I would go NC for a few weeks, but I always went back.

But since the funeral? I've given up. I'm completely done. I've been ignoring her completely unless I absolutely had to talk to her. I don't comment on or like her posts. I don't call or text her. I don't acknowledge her publicly. I don't talk about her. I don't ask her for anything. I don't involve her in anything. I give her absolutely no information about me or my life. I give her absolutely nothing that she can use.

It's driving her crazy. I think it's hilarious, to be honest. She keeps posting more and more ridiculous things about my brother in order to get a response out of me or my dad, but no matter what she does, we just don't react. We don't give her that drama she craves. We don't dispute her crazy claims that my brother loved her best or that getting his driver's license was the proudest moment of his life (it wasn't, but whatever). We don't even call her out on her behavior. There's no point. We're just ignoring her.

For the first time since he died, my nmother actually reached out to me the other day. She called me, I didn't answer, so she texted me that she loved me, that she needed me, that she missed me, and to "be careful driving, I would DIE if anything happened to you!". I knew it was a trap, it reeked of that sugary sweet narc bullshit. The only reason she wants to talk to me is because she knows that Dad and I have been making plans for the headstone, and she probably realized that we could get the headstone made and placed on his grave without her input, because my aunt, my dad's sister (who is very wise to my nmother's behavior) is the one who actually owns the plot where my brother is buried. My mother wants to cover the headstone with crosses and bible verses and has been talking about how she wants to put pictures of cats and dogs on it, because according to her my brother was a secret Catholic and an animal lover, which isn't even remotely true (he was an atheist and he liked animals, but he didn't even have any pets). And she can't do that because my Dad gets to pick the headstone, not her. She knows he values my input, so she's trying to butter me up so I'll let her manipulate me into being her little flying monkey. NOPE AIN'T HAPPENING, SORRY LADY.

I've got her pegged, now. I didn't respond, which has obviously been driving her crazy because she's been posting about my brother even more than usual, even crazier stuff than usual. My dad thinks the reason she's been trying to contact me is because somebody must have asked her about the headstone and asked her how I'm doing.

If I knew that this is how she would react, I would've started ignoring her years ago. I feel so powerful. For the first time, the power in our relationship belongs to me, not her. For the first time, I'm the one not giving her what she wants, not begging her. And I'm protecting myself and my family and my brother in the process.

I can't wait until the headstone business is done, and I get married this month. I'm gonna post the wedding day pictures on facebook and let her realize that I really did get married without her. No worries about her throwing a fit - she won't want to admit to anyone that our relationship is so bad that she wasn't invited to my wedding. Her entire identity revolves around looking like a good mother, she won't do anything to jeopardize that image. Then my dad and I are going to inform her of what we pick for the headstone, give her the opportunity to pay for her half of it, and then proceed to never speak to her again until she needs me to pick out her nursing home or plan her funeral. I am her only child left and her only heir, after all. But I owe her absolutely nothing else.