Now where did that come from???

So I went to a gold party at a colleagues house. For those of you not in the know, ladies will come to your house and buy your gold jewelry from you! Another woman on my staff had a party and made a TON of cash for herself, so another colleague decided to throw another one (one woman got $600 for a few bits!).

Anyhow, I mentioned to my crazy mother that I was going to this party and if she had anything for me to sell for her. I had a few things (because any gold jewelry that I ever had or received from my mother was quickly taken back for "safe keeping") in my own jewelry box, but I did have some pieces that I could get rid of. My mother gave me this ring she had made for my dad, one earring and a bracelet. Turns out the bracelet wasn't real and the ring didn't have real diamonds in it.

So while I was leaving the party I called my mother to tell her that I had gotten $90 for her two items and I said, "Well since you owe me money for those bills that I paid for you while you were away, I can just keep the money and you can give me the difference later."

Then she said, "Well what about all of the money that you owe me?"

And I didn't know how to respond.

Last I checked I'm not in debt to my parents. I've been working as a teacher for almost nine years and I've been on my own ever since. My parents did pay for my university education and they did pay for the bulk of our wedding, but we were never, ever told that we had to repay them. Her comment totally caught me off guard and I called Mr. JB right away to tell him. He got quite upset since he doesn't want to be secretly in debt to anyone.

Now, my mother is crazy and I honestly don't know why she says a lot of what she says, but I do know that my father never, ever expected for me to repay them for my education or our wedding expenses. When we went out for dinner last week my dad wouldn't even let us pay! I offered, but my aunt said that he had taken care of it. I'm not about to argue with my father in a public place about settling a cheque!

So now I'm all upset and confused.

My mother does have a history of being completely irrational and she often says hurtful things. She's completely oblivious to our IF and she announces pregnancies to me like there's nothing hurtful about it. We've also had a history of having a very difficult relationship, but money has never entered the picture.

My parents lead a very frugal life, which is completely unnecessary. They've been mortgage-free for years and they both have well-paying jobs. They want for nothing and I know that they have a very, very healthy retirement fund. Why my mother would be mentioning my debt to them, I have no idea!

Now, if I knew what the debt was when it was incurred, I would've paid them back. I do earn a good wage and we are capable of paying them back, but can she really mention paying back my university education when I graduated TEN YEARS AGO? Can she really collect on my wedding expenses from FIVE YEARS AGO?

I shouldn't let her get to me, but she is the one person on this planet that can push all of my buttons all at once. I've wished that we could have a better relationship, but she can be so needlessly mean to me! I knew that she was really pushing it today when Mr. JB got angry. He's very patient with her, but playing dirty like she is, makes it very hard for him to be sympathetic.

I don't know girls. I'm so tired of being angry with her. I'm even a bit upset with myself for being so angry. What I do know is that I'm going to her house tomorrow with her $90 since it seems like it's so important to her.

Grrrr.