I finally texted mum to say that I won't be getting involved in any more "calendar day gift exchange / sending" apart from Xmas and Birthdays.
Feeling obligated to do so has been a *major* source of stress for me over the last 25 or more years. "Having to" choose a card with a verse that I don't agree with (and eventually selecting the one I disagree with least). Or pointlessly choosing a blank card e.g. on Moonpig and trying to find yet another unique and novel combination of the minimum acceptable number of words. Having to remember the date is coming up and do something about it. Nope, nope, nope.
If you're reading this thinking "how selfish" I'm sorry, I *needed* to do this as it was almost literally killing me. Also you don't know my mother.
In the run-up to this Mothers day I had three possible ways ahead:
1) Go to Amazon and 'just click a few buttons" & hence play along - but the stress of doing this because I felt forced was high
2) Do nothing, and wait for mum's reaction - this was also stressful as I feared the eventual and inevitable "I'm so sad what have I done you mean so much to me" conversation.
3) Send her a text as above - also stressful, because it led inevitably to a conversation about it, but I decided it was the least stressful of the three options
As it turned out, mum *said* she understood and was OK about it as she doesn't want to cause me stress. I'm trying to take her words at face value & move on, job done.
As I said to my mum, if I can't be true to myself having reached 50 or more years old, what is the actual point?
But this isn't just about Mothers, it's about wanting to send gifts that I believe communicate something heartfelt rather than have the gift dragged out of me by a tradition and an expectation.
