My mother has always been a controlling, angry, selfish person. She will and always has played my sister and myself against each other over the phone. She's controlled us so much that she bought a farm (early 80's) which we subdivided and each of us got a lot to live. Over the years we always knew what she was doing, whether it was guilting us into doing something or just plain being mean. We both married, raised our kids on the farm, all the while she hated mostly my husband, and doesn't like either of the "boy" grandchildren. Nothing is ever good enough for you. My father died of lung cancer in 2000 for which I blame her because he couldn't quit smoking because of her constant nagging, b*tching, and just plane nastyness. Last year her health started decreasing and we told her she needed either care in home or to move into an assisted living facility. Her home expenses were very large and so she chose the assisted living. We found a great place about an hour away from us. She started on her same ole crap not liking anything, ets. She'd come and go with the nasty calls to either my sister or myself. Or she'd be nice to us and constantly complaining about the other sister. mostly to my sister she'd complain about my husband....did I say she hated him?....things that are total lies. Oh did I mention he passed away last Oct? She knows and remembers that and chooses to still b*tch about how ungrateful he was, etc. Her house has sold and my sister and I have split the funds and help take care of her living expenses. Of course she wanted a third. Note: she's dangerous on the computer and we were not going to let her have any of it. The house has always been something that when sold would be my sister and I's inheritance as well as the remaining acreage. Recently she has become so nasty that she's telling me to my face how bad my husband is/was. I told her not to do this and its terrible that she is saying this about my husband. She does not care. Will never care. Oh and she blames my sister for stealing all her money. The most recent incident has escalated so badly she is calling the realtors that sold the house screaming at them that they had no right to sell the house without her there. In fact they could because my sister as the power of attorney. She knows how to push all my buttons and I really don't want to have anything to do with her any more. I wouldn't care but she's involved the Realtors. My sister is trying to calm her down but she won't. She's always held the farm/our inheritance over our head our entire lives. My sister wants to get an appointment with a doctor and get her on some anti depressants. I'm not sure if that's going to help. I've lived 35 years on the farm and my sister and I have worked all our lives on this farm and want our inheritance but I am to the point I just want to walk away and vanish. My sister is renovating her house and is a little mad at me because of this. She wouldn't have spent the money on her house and would have just left as well.
Bottom line is she's out of control and we are at our wits end. I can not live like this any more.
From a great distance. Detach as much as you need to to keep your own mental health.
At least you are not doing direct hands-on care. Be her advocate but minimize personal contact.
That is very easy for me to say since I have never been in that situation. But I've learned a lot from other people on this forum who have been/are in that situation, and I'm sure some of them will speak to you from experience.
A solution I haven't got, but what is working for me now to a limp degree is to let all of her guilting fall unnoticed. I used to try so hard to please her and dance around her making everything just perfect the way she liked it. That as my father discovered only made her more of a tyrant. He gave up and died leaving only me to prop her up.
I am sick of all that. Whatever I do or set up for her, she undoes then complains of neglect. But back to you, dgettel. Don't cut contact and run away. Just cut contact to maybe once a week and grow a good, hard shell. Do the right thing but from a distance.
Narcissism is a disease, not a personality trait. I am very sorry for people who have it and for the loss of interpersonal connections it causes them. I understand that little can be done for narcissists, in part because they never feel they need improvement.
So I am very sorry for your mother, dgettel. She did not ask to be this way and she cannot help her wicked ways. BUT you did not ask for her to be this way either, and you don't have to put up with her wickedness. Detach. See her less. Acknowledge to yourself that you have a mentally ill mother. Love her, but don't let her harm your mental health. Seeing her less and reducing the things you do for her, getting off the phone when she bad mouths your sister, generally detaching is not intended as a punishment for her mental illness, but as a way to protect yourself from her disease.
While I understand that there may not be much hope for treating narcissism, I think that some counseling might be very helpful for you and your sister. You deserve all the help you can get to deal with this very unfortunate situation.