Torn

I am furious right now.  Hysterically furious.  I was home alone, after my daughter left for kindergarten and my husband left for work, when she called.  The bitch.  The one person in this world who can turn my eternally cheery disposition into a hateful bitchy one in ten seconds flat. One sentence is all it takes. The mother in law.

First, some background.  I am that annoyingly cheerful person, that peeves others with my eternal sunshiny-ness. I am also a cry baby and cry at everything.  To quote Bette Midler in Beaches," I feel deeply." Yep, that's me. Miss Cheerful with a heart of gold, but I also have that don't fuck with me or mine side to me as well. Well Mine were just threatened. 

I have been having a hard time with my only biological daughter starting Kindergarten.  I cried through the first couple of days, have taken her to school and picked her up everyday, got to be the first to hear about her day, and I am OK now.  Sort of.  I have made the decision to go back to work , because my family needs me to. We are not in the same position we were in, when the decision was made for me to stay at home. So I have sucked it up and dealt with the fact that someone else will be picking my child up after school.  Someone else will be hearing all about her day first.  I am still crying over that one, but I am actively seeking employment. 

Tonight is the first night of my baby's first ever dance class.  I am sentimental over it because she has begged to start taking dance lessons for a couple of years now, and I took dancing for ten years.  SO big day today.  That has been planned for three weeks.

I am also a mother of heart to my husband's two children from his two previous marriages.  I have loved our(his) kids like they were my own.  I have treated the big kids like they were my own.  All kids that come from broken homes generally have some issues.  Well my two big kids(twenty one and nineteen)are no different. Today were going to talk about the oldest one.

The female twenty one year old has had a lot going on in her life.  She has a history of obsessive compulsive, anxiety, manic-depressive and bi-polar disorders, that she gets from a combination of both my husband, and her Grandmother.  Said woman helped raise the child when the child was in the middle of the divorces, helped when my husband got sole custody from the bio-mom due to new spouse beating baby to within several inches of her life, and always looked at her as the daughter she never had.  To a fault.  She spoiled her horribly(to a fault), always played favorites with her over her brother, and acts as if a crime has been committed if you don't do exactly what she thinks you should do, where the daughter(ours not hers) is concerned. This multiple personality mother in law refused to leave my home, started hitting me(I made it a point not to hit my so's mother back, just this once) and I had to call the cops on her to have her removed because she was so hysterical, one time when I told her she could not take the child because she was angry. I was afraid she would have a wreck with the daughter in the car.  She was battering me with a barrage of questions about discipline for "her" baby, and I answered wrong, which infuriated her. She had just dropped off the child after school, and was so pissed she was determined to take the child back with her.  Mind you she lived with us, but MPMIL(read all about my MPMIL here-  The Multiple Personality Mother In Law)way overstepped her boundaries, and it was time to let her know that her behavior was not acceptable! She had and has a horrible habit of pointing out what a shitty dad my husband was, although he was not the monster she made him out to be. Every parent makes mistakes, but to have your own mother point out how horrible you are in front of your own kids, in order to make herself look like the perfect grandparent, in my book was unacceptable.  So I called her on it, and made the mistake of pointing out that we didn't want her to end up like her deadbeat mom who never made an effort to call, write, visit, etc, and was soley dependant on some man in an abusive marriage to support her. Totally wrong thing to say, but she had started talking crap about the dad.  Not in my house. It was one of two times I ever opened my mouth regarding the ex wives.  I think the MPMIL down's her sons parenting in an attempt to feel better about her own shitty parenting example.  She had five marriages, which were always more important than her kid, moved in with her new husband and left her son in a house to pay a mortgage at fifteen, saying there was not room in their apartment for him.(The step dad also moved in with his girlfriend, leaving hub alone) She blew pot smoke in his face, almost accidentally killed him several times, etc. You get the picture.  My husband got divorced twice.  He was not there sometimes, he was young and trying to make a living.  Now when I came along at age 8, he instantly became a much more attentive parent. Anyway, now you have the history.

So my oldest was hospitalized on a few days ago with suicidal thoughts. She is single for the first time, living on her own, doing well in her job, but she is not making very much money and cannot pay her bills.  She also sold her car to the ex-boyfriend.  She has also been trying to deal with her illnesses without her medications.  She is very smart, and has been seeing a therapist.  She knew enough to get help when she was in over her head.  She can  only have two visitors at a time, where she is staying, and she asked for me to come, last night when my husband was visiting. I was so excited she wanted to see me. 

Then I realized, it was my baby daughter's first day of dance class. Man, why me universe? We have recently gotten a little bit closer, after a short period of distance.  Her inner psyche I think, will only let her be "ok" and on good terms with one "mom" type figure at a time.  I have been the one lately.  She always has to have anger with and disassociate with the others to a point, while she is in good with whichever one she chooses at a particular moment in time.

How do I choose? It's tearing me up.  I desperately want to be both places at once. My husband advised me to go tomorrow.  Well when the MPMIL(multiple personality  mother in law) called to ask me if I was going with her, I advised her of my baby's first dance class.  And of the fact that my husband advised me to go tomorrow, because he is working late, due to vacations and could not take the baby. Her response was," Well how are you paying for that? Alright, I guess I'll just tell her you had other plans!"

Speechless, right? Yeah, me too.  This woman is so jealous that she wants to see anyone but her, she would sabotage my oldest's already precarious well being.  I could just scream at her, and smack her! And all the other useless things I could think of to do to her. But instead(being the calm non-confrontational person that I am), I calmly replied, your son was suppose to talk to you about it, but he did not think you would be out of bed yet! He suggested that I come tomorrow. She replied,"Well we'll see." Fucking bitch right there.

See she always has to be the center of attention, at everyone else's expense. I absolutely cannot believe the nerve of her! The problem is that there is only one visiting hour, the exact same hour as Monday dance class. Gggrrr.

So I am torn.  Which daughter do I choose? I can honestly say I have never been at this particular mothering crossroads before. I cannot stop crying about it.  Either way I am letting somebody down. One appointment is at 5:30, twenty minutes from my house in one direction, and the other is twenty minutes from my house in the opposite direction at the exact same time.  The first ever first dance class, or the first time my oldest asked for me to visit her in the hospital? The oldest may not ask again, if I do not go tonight, and especially if MPMIL puts a sinister spin on it.  That could take months to repair, if she ever forgives me. Or if I visit tomorrow, it may all be fine, she will be there for at least a week, if not longer. The first dance class my baby has been looking forward to, where all the mommies take pictures, and can watch the first class, and not having her mommy there taking pictures too, when I take pictures of her every day?

So who do I choose? I am so very torn...alternately crying and angry at my MPMIL I could spit nails.