Home Again!

Actually I got home on Saturday, but I'm just now getting around to blogging.

The trip wasn't so bad. I got to spend a lot of time with my niece and nephew, so that was fun. My mom kind of started getting on my nerves almost immediately, but I did a pretty good job of not yelling. I think I only snapped twice.

It's just that everything she says to or about my cousin is hateful or negative and I get so sick of it. It's almost like she tries to prove to everyone that Kathy is stupid and a nuisance--all of it in front of Kathy, no less, and Kathy's not so stupid that she doesn't get what my mom is insinuating.

Snapping incidence #1:

We're all sitting in the living room. My sister walks in and says, "we're going to go eat early this evening, so be ready to leave at 4:00" My cousin says, "4:00? OK!" My mom says, "She doesn't even know what time 4:00 is! What time is 4:00, Kathy?!" and I said, "4:00 is 4:00! How's she supposed to answer that question?" Then she said, "What time is it now?" and my cousin looked at her watch and answered her correctly. So then my mom said, "so how long is 4:00 from now?" and then I think is when I snapped. I said, "I can't even figure that out! What are you trying to prove?!!" She said, "well, time means nothing to her, it's just a word, but she's so time obsessed!" Who freakin' cares? She's got Down's syndrome for goodness sakes, she's got limitations. Accept it and move on, it's not going to change. Arg!

Snapping incidence #2

We're getting ready to leave to come back home. My dad has just finished snapping at my cousin because she was taking too long to wash her hands after she used the bathroom and he's ready to get on the road. I, my BIL and niece and nephew are sitting in the living room, my dad and sister and in the hallway ajacent the living room. When my cousin dries her hands, my mom says, "She's got this thing about washing her hands a hundred times a day and she takes forever to do it!" (and launches into the same story everyone who comes in contact with her has already heard at least 10 times). So my sister says, "I noticed her hands are kind of red, I guess they're dried out from her washing them. I'll go get some lotion for her." Then my mom says, "OH, well she hates lotion!" But my sister just says, "Come here Kathy, we need to put some lotion on your hands because they're getting dry and they'll crack and bleed if we don't."

Kathy was born with a hole in her heart which has never been repaired. She's aware of it and very frightened of it causing her to die somehow. Any time she hears something on TV about a food helping keep hearts healthy, she's all over it.

So, my mom says, "If you let them get that dry and it cracks, you can get an infection, and that infection will go straight to your heart! And do you know what happens when an infection goes to your heart?" to which my cousin replied, "I die."

I looked around the living room with my mouth agape to see if anyone else in the room could identify crazy or if it was just me. I saw quickly that I was not the only one with the special gift of crazy identification and again, I snapped. I yelled, "Oh my gosh! Could you be any more alarmist in there???" My mom said, "Well, you just have to tell it like it is to get the point across with her!"

So now the next time Kathy actually does have some kind of infection, she's going to be scared to death that she's about to die. Good call on the "telling it like it is" alarmism, Mom!

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This is long! Anyway, really it wasn't too bad of a trip mostly. My parents stayed in a hotel and me and my cousin stayed at my sister's. One night, we were going through old pictures and there was a picture of my BIL when he was little. I think my nephew found it first and said, "What's this picture all about?" to which he replied, "OH, that's when my dad tied me up to a pole and let the weenie dog bite me!" It was the funniest explanation of a picture I had ever heard.