How can I get it to stop affecting me?

[Guest guest]

Just when I start to feel like I'm living my life, my mom calls and it

sends me in a tail spin. I get physically sick to my stomach and have

a hard time getting through my day. I went to therapy for a while and

it helped but toward the end I felt like I was just saying the same

thing over and over.

I'm a married adult, with my own life. Visiting is painful. She

brings up negative things about my appearance, my education, my job,

she goes on and on about how much she misses me. She cries when we're

there (because she misses me so much when I'm not there), invades my

personal space, asks inappropriate questions, brings up painful things

from my past, talks about their money problems, hints about health and

money issues but avoids any further probing. She keeps me just enough

in the loop to stay worried, but just far enough out that I can't lend

a hand. Dad just enables her. Sometimes he listens to my brother and

I and whole heartedly agrees and other times he backs her up

completely. She gets in way too many car accidents, in fact I don't

think she can drive anymore. She's sick all the time.

Today she left a message pleading how my father needs us right now.

How he just needs to talk to us, but not to let him know she said

anything. Again with a cryptic (I don't know what is wrong), pleading

message which just makes me ill. I feel so bad about admitting this,

but I barely care about them because they won't help themselves. Most

of our issues started when I was in my early teens and grew much worse

into my early adult years.

I'm really hoping that someone out there can give me any advice for

letting go of all the pain and how can I stop letting her manipulation

matter? I just want to be strong. Thanks in advance.