Social Isolation

By biggest fear is turning into my mother- being socially isolated with no friends. Like I have explained previously on this blog, I have kind of been depressed and isolated myself for the past few years because I had gotten into some alcohol-related legal  trouble that was depressing and screwed up my life. However, I am happy now and looking forward to improving my life and getting my social life back.

Growing up, my hoarder mother only had one friend. Yes, one friend. My mom was married with two kids so I suppose that took up a lot of her time, but still wouldn't a normal woman want more than one friend? This one friend was rude to her many times. We will call her Susan. I remember numerous times when Susan would "flake out" meaning we would have plans to meet Susan and her daughter somewhere and at the last minute Susan would call my mom and cancel for some stupid reason like "Oh, I just decided to stay in tonight" or "Well, Ted called and asked me out for a drink." She didn't even think it rude at all to just flake out on my mom and accept someone else's request to hang out at the last minute. My mom would complain about Susan all the time behind her back and call her a "flake" but since she was my mom's only friend she had to take the abuse. It's like that saying "beggars can't be choosers." A normal non-hoarder person would have lots of friends so if one friend is rude to them all the time they could speak up and demand that they change and if they don't they could cut ties with them since they have other friends to go out with instead.

I honestly think, though, that even if my mom wanted to get friends she couldn't because she lacks the social skills and social awareness to know how to build and maintain friendships. I think this a result of her growing up in a hoarder's household herself and also her cognitive deficits. For as long as I can remember, whenever we had plans to go somewhere, it would take FOREVER to get my mom out of the house. For example, it would be Christmas and we would be going over to my dad's relatives house. We were supposed to be there at a set time but we would ALWAYS be late. Getting ready to leave was mass chaos because my mom was so chaotically running around the house trying to get ready. My dad would be yelling "Get in the freaking car!!! Let's go! I'm tired of waiting! The party started an hour ago! The food is probably cold!" She would just take forever to get herself ready and out of the door. As the years went on, my dad would just refuse to take a shower until my mother was all dressed and ready to go because he hated waiting for her. He just accepted that we would always be late.

Here is an example of why my mom lacks social awareness and therefore why she can never have friends like a normal person. It was St. Patrick's day and my two aunts (my dad's sisters) called up my mom and asked her if she would like to meet them for lunch an an Irish pub. They said it would be a really fun time as they were going to have green beer and authentic Irish dishes that they had on the menu specifically for St. Patrick's day. My mom agreed to go and asked me to go as well. When she told me about it, she had her hair in curlers and was painting her toe and finger nails and was picking out a festive outfit to wear. I did not ask her what time we were supposed to be there because my mom does not have a concept of time. For example, a normal person would say "Yeah, Kim invited us to lunch. She said to be there at 4 o'clock.". Then, I could plan on that set time. However, with my mom, I know to just wait to leave when she leaves. I figured since she was still in curlers and not even dressed I had time to take a shower and wash my hair and style it and get dressed so I did. My mom also put on these St. Patrick's day necklaces and had a few extra for me to where as well. I recall her getting a call from presumably my aunt and she said to the phone "We're on our way. We'll be right there." I kind of laughed to myself because I knew we are not on our way! We are probably a good twenty behinds behind actually leaving plus it takes 20 minutes to get there. My mom always lies and tells people "I'm on my way. I'll be there in a few minutes." So people actually think she is in her car driving and will be there in like 10 minutes when in reality she is still getting dressed and hasn't even left the house yet.

So we finally pull into the Irish Pub's parking lot. I open the door and get out but my mom says "Wait! Let me get situated first." Yes, she has to get situated. So I wait as she straightens out her outfit and puts lipstick on in the mirror.

Finally, we walk in and see my two aunts sitting there with a bored, tired look on their faces. My aunt says "Did you get lost???" My mom has a confused look on her face and replies "No." I realized then that they were probably waiting for us for like two hours. My aunt politely said "I hope you don't mind but we already ate." The waitress was clearing away their plates. My aunt is a classy woman so I'm sure she had waited a long time to order because she would think it rude to order before guests arrive, even if the guests are late. So it was probably annoying for my aunts to sit there for so long, wondering when my mom was going to get there since they didn't order their food. My mom and I ordered food and my aunts stayed with us until we were done. They talked with us for awhile then after we got our check they left. I realized they were probably anxious to leave as they were in that pub for like three hours by that time. After they left my mom turned to me and said "What is going on? Kim acted like this was going to be so fun, like we were going to drink green beer then I get here and she leaves right after!" I didn't even try to explain to her why. She just wouldn't get it. Explain to her that these two women were bored waiting for you for two hours? "You acted like you were going to be there in a few minutes when in actuality it was going to be an hour and a half. When you arrived, you were so late that they assumed you had gotten lost. But when you said a simple "no" they just assumed you are a really rude person or just plain crazy."

When I was a teen I was brought up on my mom's weird social habits. I think she didn't know or follow basic social etiquette and she was always chronically late and making people wait for her. I absorbed what she did and thought it was normal. For example, I recall being 14 and my friend and her mom came to pick me up to go to the movies (the Mom was driving us since we were only 14). My friend rang my doorbell but I wasn't ready yet. I didn't have a concept of time because my mom never taught be about time. Since my mom is a hoarder, she HATES when people come to the door so she is really rude and cold to my friends when they ring the doorbell. I'm sure it went something like, my mom opening the door barely a crack and coldly telling the girl that I would be out shortly. So the girl went back to wait in the car with her mom. I think it was probably 20 minutes before I went out to the car. It was all I knew-how my mom had raised me-no concept of time or people's feelings about how they have to wait so long for you. I didn't even think to apologize for making them wait. If my mom were a normal mother, she would have opened the door with a big smile on her face and introduced herself to the girl and invited her in and said something like "Oh, I'm sorry but Kelsey is going to be awhile. Why don't you come in and sit down?" If she realized that her mother was in the car waiting, she could have invited her mother in too. Then she could offer them something to drink and chat with them so they aren't bored sitting in a car waiting for me. Also, my mom could have made friends by being friends with my friend's mothers. I think a lot of housewives do this. They may not have many friends in their neighborhood or move to a new town where they don't know anyone and their kids have friends from school so they start chatting with these moms as they are dropping off the kids then the moms strike up a friendship. Not my mom. My mom HATED my classmates moms.

She had a term for mothers that volunteered at their children's schools. She called them "busybodies". Basically any women that were social and went up to and were friendly to other kids' moms or volunteered to run the classroom Christmas party was a "busybody". She acted like they were just "social climbers". Maybe these moms were lonely and desired to have friends and they were just being friendly? I remember the kid across the street from me was like 5 years older than me so I wasn't friends with him but he happened to have a swimming pool. One day my mom began seeing how my next door neighbor lady would walk over there many times with her kids, who were much younger, and go swimming in the pool. My mom peeked out  her window like Mrs. Kravitz and scowled "Oh, look at that busybody! She is such a social climber. She is only talking to that woman to use her pool!" Or the woman could just be lonely and looking for a friend and enjoy socializing with other people-and hey, if they have a pool then that's great. What a great way to socialize, laying by the pool.

My mom hates people that are friendly talkative and social. At my dad's family gathering, a woman was playing in the pool with a 4-year-old girl, joking around with her, splashing around, swimming with her. The little girl seemed to really be having a good time and we were all watching this interaction as we were laying by the pool. After we left my mom said , "Oh Cheryl was just monopolizing the situation! Trying to show off like she is so good with kids when she has no kids of her own and she had her tubes tied. The woman, doesn't even like kids, she's just a busybody." My mom thinks that anyone that is social is not genuine and only acting that way to "show off" or climb the social ranks. Can't woman, even if she doesn't want kids of her own, enjoy splashing around in a pool with a little girl for a few minutes?

My mom always hated the fact that I wanted friends. She acted like wanting friend is some extreme luxury like wanting a bright-red corvette. She acted like having friends over was something you didn't need and only busybodies and social-climbers had friends over to their houses. I think it's because she formed emotional and sentimental attachments to objects and she didn't have a need for people in her life. She liked material things rather than people. She didn't realize that some people actually do become lonely if they are alone and desire to have meaningful relationships and genuinely enjoy the company of other for its own sake, and not what things those people have or their social standing. So she thinks that anyone that is friendly or social is a "social-climber" ie trying to manipulatively gain something from another person.