A little background. Me and my fiancé are pretty much paying for our wedding ourselves. We are students in our 30’s , who both work fulltime as well. Wedding planning has been stressful at times but also fun, now that we are getting down to the wire for our January nuptials.
He comes from a large family (divorce and remarriage so I have two mother in laws, both are awesome in their own ways) , mine is rather small and dispersed. Many people I haven’t seen in over 15 years or more as they live out of the country, which is my mother’s family. My father passed in 2006, one of nine, there are now just two aunts remaining, and some scattered cousins that due to major age differences I was never close to or even see. My mom is just turned 75, and has been depressed since the death of her husband my father.
Her health is stable, but she is convinced at every ache and pain that she has bone cancer, or some other malady which are always proven wrong after a visit to one of her many doctors. Still she is deeply unhappy, and lives a very stressed out life, at home with my two, frankly, loser adult brothers who do nothing but give her more grief. They try to help, but usually just make things worse.
It falls to me (I don’t live there any more) to make sure the taxes get paid, and that other bills are paid. Sometimes I get overwhelmed and things fall through the cracks. Her taxes are late right now, but will be rectified when I get to the bank on Saturday and make out some certified checks. I don’t trust my brothers with her money, because one is a recovering drug addict who pissed away an inheritance on a few benders. And the other makes very poor financial decisions. We share a joint account, and my bank account is linked to hers as well. She doesn’t know how to write checks. My father always did everything.
She has friends who try to take her out of the house, but not nearly often enough. I see her every Sunday for church, and take her when I can to her Dr’s appointments, and the occasional family function usually by my fiancé’s family. She usually gets bored and tires easily and wants to leave before dessert, because she has to make sure the cats (two , once mine now hers) get fed. It’s now become a joke, when will mom want to leave? 5pm, 6pm, 4pm? I have to laugh, or else I’ll cry.
Suffice to say she is not involved in the wedding. I’m her only daughter, so you would think she’d be excited, telling all her friends and stuff. Nope. I had to tell them I was getting married when we’d run into them. Which I forgave, her memory is getting dodgy and she’s depressed. I can’t expect her to get excited.
She knows nothing about what her “duties” as mother of the bride are, and frankly she isn’t capable of a lot of that stuff. We’re doing it all between ourselves and my matron of honor.
I try talking to her about the wedding, but it kinda falls on deaf ears. She has no input, or real response to anything. The topic always turns to something else, the cats, my lousy niece (her grand daughter who lives with her) and other such things.
She’s a sweet lady, and means well. She just hasn’t been exposed to a lot of weddings in general I guess. Neither have I. I’ve been to two weddings my whole life. One when I was a little kid. And the other three years ago. It was ok. Brother had a shotgun wedding at the judges. (they are no longer together…) SO, very long story short; I suppose I’m just sad and disappointed at times that mom isn’t more involved. I try to instill in fiancé just how lucky he is to have a young mom, who is very active and involved in things.
I feel sad for her, and want her to be happy but I there’s just so much I can do for her on my own. I feel like a failure as a daughter. Because she’s miserable, and I obviously haven’t done enough to get her involved I guess. But on the other hand I want to start my own life with my husband, which is hard when she calls at odd hours expecting me to drop what I’m doing and help her. I love her she’s my mom, but it’s only going to get worse.
Otherwise psyched about the marriage and the celebratory party with friends and family, though the cocktail hour starts at 7:00pm I doubt she’ll make it to dinner without looking for a ride home, so long as she doesn’t ask me I suppose.