Yesterday I spoke with my mom again about the baby shower. I guess I shouldn’t have told her I understood the first time, ’cause she had brushed it off and wasn’t thinking I would be bothered. Glad I said something yesterday, to let her know.

She told me it wasn’t anything about me. ARGH! Of course, it’s about me! It’s my shower, dammit. I told her that of course I’m taking it personal, ’cause not only is this my baby shower, but since I’m not planning on have any other children, this is going to be my only shower. She really didn’t have much to say, and then I said I was quite offended she was thinking more about her and not about the chance to share a moment with her daughter.

I’m just so irritated with her lately. I know all Jehovah’s Witnesses around the world (or at least the US) had a “special meeting” they attended recently, and I can’t help but wonder what in the hell they said there. Mom seems so different since then. My sister mentioned her friend’s cousin all of a sudden turning on her after attending that meeting, and now I feel like my mom is doing the same thing. Maybe I’m just jumping to conclusions, but really, I know what type of things they say at these meetings, especially the “special” ones. It’s not like I didn’t plod to the Kingdom Hall three times a week for 18 years to sit on my ass and count the ceiling tiles and listen to their preachy, flapping mouths. I don’t know how many times I came away from some meetings feeling so low, so pathetic, for befriending someone “outside the Truth” as they called it. They specialize in guilt trips.

It just pisses me off that my mom cares more about how she feels than about how I feel. I didn’t get much of a chance to tell her something else, ’cause she found some reason to get off the phone. What I wanted to say, and will next time we talk, is if she doesn’t come to my baby shower, I’m hurt. That of all the times growing up I thought I felt pain when she was just being a parent, I’ll really be hurt this time. You don’t just turn your back on your child. Plain and simple. And that’s what she’d be doing.

I can’t really tell her she won’t get to see my kid as often because of this, ’cause I’d hate to punish my child for my mom’s ridiculous views, but it’s tempting. Either she supports me or she doesn’t. To use one of the JW’s favorite analogies…it’s either one or the other, there’s no sitting on the fence in the middle. Back at you mom.