Manipulative Grandma

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Anyone got one?

My granny could be in a soap opera. She is very sharp and still 100 percent sound of mind, and has had some problems with sight, though you can never be sure how bad she is because she uses every problem to have people wait on her.

Last night she asked my mum, who is having enough probs of her own, to move a desk into the room she's in, claiming there used to be a desk there. Then when that argument was over, she asked my dad if she could hang up her clothes, then said she couldn't see the hangers and would he do it.

Then she came into my room, and asked when I'd be up today, because if she fell she was afraid there'd be nobody to get her. Now this may sound sad, however she lives alone and would fight tooth and nail if anyone ever wanted her in a home or something. I said I'd be up, and that my room is beside the bathroom, so it's no problem.

So just now, about 9 o clock, she shouts "Ronan!" and there's this ridiculous banging which has been going on for 20 mins or so before she called. She says she's fallen and can't get up, and is in her room sitting up on the ground, facing the wall.

There's a chair placed nearby, it wouldn't take Sherlock Holmes to see what a load of shit this is. Anyway she's then like "get your mum, you'll both have to help me".

So I refused to get my mum because she's sick at the moment herself, not that granny gives a fuck about anyone else, but of course suddenly being fallen wasn't half as important as "get your mum, WE'LL NEED TWO PEOPLE". So I had to help her up, then it was "maybe we should call the doctor" and all this bullshit.

Honestly just makes me want to laugh my head off except that I have to deal with it. I also resent her trying to emotionally blackmail everyone, and the fact that my parents invite her up here with my mum not well and she makes a point of never enjoying anything and fabricating all this kind of shit just to get attention. It's so devious and mean.

Anyone got elderly relatives like this?

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 08:53 (eighteen years ago)

No, but I have some relatives who are going to be like that when they're elderly. I feel for you, Ronan.

― accentmonkey, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 08:55 (eighteen years ago)

The sad thing is, it means her discourse with everyone is this constant bullshit mindgames, and so nobody has any sympathy for her, it's a serious boy who cries wolf thing. Just now again "Ronan, do you think I need a doctor". I sometimes wonder does she think everyone else is actually so stupid that they don't realise what she's up to.

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 08:57 (eighteen years ago)

I hope she doesn't google and find this

― RJG, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:00 (eighteen years ago)

the thing is, i'm just thinking about some of the girls i know....and, god they're going to be like this when they're pensioners

― 600, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:05 (eighteen years ago)

all my grandparents are dead. my dad's mum was always nicer to me and my brother than my mum's mum was. well, I don't know. sometimes my mum's mum, when she was looking after us, would say "your cousins never give me any of this trouble", when we weren't giving her any particular trouble, which I always thought was a rubbish thing to say. maybe I should have told her! my cousins on my dad's side all lived in england, though, so maybe my dad's mum never got a regular opportunity to see what not having any trouble was like. in their old-age, though, neither of them were particularly manipulative. my dad's mum came to live w/ us for a little while, before she died, and, after she had a stroke, she had a couple of scary, mental episodes where she got all paranoid and forgot who everyone was. not on purpose, though! from things my dad has told me (in a completely unbitter way) she was a bit manipulative and would, now and then, take peculiar stands on inconsequential family stuff, when he was growing up. maybe old-age made her less manipulative

― RJG, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:14 (eighteen years ago)

my dad once told me a story of how, at some point 10 years ago or more, when she used to be about as bad as she is seeming again these days (there was a time recently where she was great again and could enjoy things) he was on the way to her house in Limerick, a 4 hour drive or so, and she kept giving out about how she had been bossed around or something, and basically nothing was right. then eventually she said "I'M GOING TO THROW MYSELF ONTO THE ROAD, I'LL OPEN THE DOOR AND THROW MYSELF ONTO THE ROAD"

And he said "go on then...."

And there was a silence and she said "no".

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:17 (eighteen years ago)

ha, i have one of these, but i bear the brunt only of my parents complaining about her! (geographically far from her, never see her in person apart from xmas etc, have told her i don't have a mobile phone - this is also what i tell PRs.) family politics suck.

― lex pretend, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:32 (eighteen years ago)

also, i really do want to die when i'm 60 or so, way before i inevitably become like this

― lex pretend, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:33 (eighteen years ago)

well, not all elderly people are like this. my other grandma was never like this, in fact she was the opposite, she probably wouldn't have told you if something was wrong.

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:39 (eighteen years ago)

all my PRs are dead

― RJG, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 09:44 (eighteen years ago)

Show her this article?

― StanM, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:14 (eighteen years ago)

it would appear that you and i are siblings ronan as we have the exact same grandmothers

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:26 (eighteen years ago)

we could be cousins!

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:33 (eighteen years ago)

oh wait, both grandmas!

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:34 (eighteen years ago)

yeah i thought of that too... but it'd be a bit weird if we were cousins and still shared both grandmas though. close family!!

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:34 (eighteen years ago)

errr xpost

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:35 (eighteen years ago)

you were right the first time I think, heh.

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:37 (eighteen years ago)

do you feel guilty for getting really crapped off at her behaviour? even though i totally recognise all the cry wolf stuff and try to keep a distance from it and don't encourage it, i can't help but feel that she's a lonely old lady and i'm her only relative in this city so i should suck it up and have a bit of patience. and then i go to visit her (entirely out of a sense of duty, i don't get a scrap of enjoyment out of it) and she makes me want to SCREAM. then i go home feeling guilty. repeat ad nauseam.

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:39 (eighteen years ago)

I do a little, but when I speak to my Dad about it and my Mum, whom I know really care for her and are patient with her, and they too are stressed out or also are disbelieving about her behaviour, then I feel a bit less guilty. the sad thing is for a lady her age she's pretty healthy, if she used the brain power she has to have chats or just enjoy herself she'd have a much better time.

I get really annoyed cos my own mother has problems that relative to age are far scarier and more stressful.

― Ronan, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:50 (eighteen years ago)

i'm looking after my grandmother. she has, almost literally, no memory. barely able to leave the house without getting lost.

― That one guy that quit, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 10:54 (eighteen years ago)

that's the same with my grandma ronan. she lives on her own, but in a masonic retirement village. she flatly refuses to go to the recreational events put on by the village management folk because of dubious excuses like she 'can't get down the stairs' (manages fine going to movies and shops on her trips out and about) or sitting at a table playing cards hurts her bad neck (i don't believe she has a bad neck). then complains for hours about how lonely she is with heavy tones of martyrdom. it's torture. it is probably one of the only things about my life that i really don't like, which makes me feel pretty awful actually. also i'm so scared i'll end up like that!

my mum and dad totally tell me not to worry about any of it, but they live a fair way away so i think they don't really have any sense of perspective.

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:28 (eighteen years ago)

and she makes me want to SCREAM. then i go home feeling guilty. repeat ad nauseam.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh thats what my mother does to me.

― Trayce, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:33 (eighteen years ago)

i keep reading this thread title and thinking 'Lovematic Grandpa'

― blueski, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:34 (eighteen years ago)

i dunno, i kind of have sympathy with not wanting to attend excruciatingly dull social events put on by local do-gooders (and having to make up excuses for it) but still being lonely.

xps

― lex pretend, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:35 (eighteen years ago)

"Manipulative Grandma" sounds like one of the song titles off the Donnie Darko soundtrack album.

― Trayce, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:38 (eighteen years ago)

I once received a letter in reply to a picture I had sent. I was 13 years old (around that age anyway).

"Your acne will disappear in time." was the only thing in reference to my picture.

My mum asked if she should buy the shop we rented at the time. The reply? "You lying bastards, you won't get a penny from us!" repeated a few times in a different way.

My gran used to pretend she was my sister when I was 10 years old. She would also try on my training suit saying it fitted perfectly.

She once came in saying people had advised her to squander all her money so we wouldn't inherit anything. She's now doing okay financially but she has no *extras* if something *happens*.

Numerous times she comments on what a bastard my grandfather was. Hmm, I can't remember any asshole letting his wife stay in bed and run to her side when she rang the copper bell she had at her bedside. No, she wasn't sick, so needed her beauty rest (for a couple of weeks).

She put my mum in a boarding school after my greatgrandfather died. She said she didn't have time (for my mum). She was a housewife.

What else? Oh shit, too much. Last quote at dinner table to my family in law: "Nathalie's a sweetie. Her parents were just so so so so naughty."

She's not really manupilative. She's just a bitch.

― nathalie, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:42 (eighteen years ago)

My other gran was an alcoholic (even during her pregnancy) who emotionally abused (only) my father.

― nathalie, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:43 (eighteen years ago)

This thread makes me sad. I never knew my grandparents on my Dad's side, but my Mam's parents were the greatest people in the world and I miss them very much.

― accentmonkey, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:45 (eighteen years ago)

I wish I could say the same. But alas no, they are horrible... horrible persons. I mean, ffs, my gran only abused my dad! She (sort of) loved my aunt and uncle. My other gran, well, she's... I do feel a bit sorry for her cause she's a widow now, but when I think about all the horrendous things she's done to us... It's hard to muster up a (positive) emotion.

― nathalie, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 11:48 (eighteen years ago)

dunno, i kind of have sympathy with not wanting to attend excruciatingly dull social events put on by local do-gooders (and having to make up excuses for it) but still being lonely.

i guess. i probably don't have enough perspective myself. to me it is her way of putting a guilt trip on me that i don't spend more time with her. she has lots of friends and is still involved in her church so no need to be lonely really. it's really the martyred monologues i object to, not her reluctance to go to the 'dull' social events. everyone else there seems to enjoy them so i dunno how dull they are. but as you say, horses for courses.

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 12:00 (eighteen years ago)

Is Manipulative Grandmother a relative of Omnipotent Baby?

― Matt DC, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 12:36 (eighteen years ago)

yep. they save each other seats on the bus

― gem, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 12:45 (eighteen years ago)

what trish said in the first reply.

If I'm lucky maybe my mother and I will be completely not speaking by the time she gets this way.

― Ms Misery, Tuesday, 10 April 2007 13:23 (eighteen years ago)

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