Another "gift" from EF

Hi all,

I'm currently struggling with severe depression and I can hardly go to work everyday, so my posting abilities are lacking. But at least I'm in therapy.

I still don't understand how can I fall for it every.fcking.time. But really this was the last one, EF is like a Trojan Horse when it comes to gift giving.

He knows that I have a cellphone that is nearly 10 years old and it is almost unusable, and that my job would require using a "modern" cellphone, because I'm starting to have difficulties due to not having one. So he started talking about how useful it would be for me to have a new cellphone. Since the one that has all the functions my work requires would cost around $800, I told him that I was planning saving up for it for several months, and then buying it when I could afford it without tossing myself into financial problems.

Then he started constantly talking about how he would like to help me in any way he could and how he realized that they were not paying attention to my genuine interests and needs when giving me "presents" (the usual narc presents - either something THEY would want, or something that I completely hate or it is visibly some cheap junk that they have been using for years and now have bought something better for themselves, or something that shows how little they know about me). After a few weeks of being all nicey-nice to me and describing how sincerely he wants to help me, he started talking really seriously about him buying me the cellphone as a present for a personal event.

I was honestly surprised and told him that it was a really expensive one that I intended to buy for myself and that I know that they don't have the money right now for that kind of thing (they are like some weird poor version of Ebenezer Scrooge anyway). So we sort of agreed on that I will "help" in with a few dollars, and he and DB will team up and will pay for the rest. I still didn't believe him, but in the end, he took me to the cellphone store and even helped me talking to the cashier (I'm having panic attacks when having to talk to strangers nowadays and it is really debilitating). When it came to paying he asked me, whether I could just pay for it and then he would give me the money together with DB during the celebration party. I said sure, it would be easier anyway if we did not have to juggle several credit cards.

The event celebration came, I thought it would be appropriate to take the cellphone with me to "show it to NM" since I figured she would demand to look at it anyway. She was completely surprised, asked me how I decided to suddenly buy a cellphone, and how much I paid for it (this is SO her) and then she was genuinely shocked when she heard how much I spent on it. Then EF arrived as well, and they gave me my present: two plain white $1 coffee mugs "because you said 8 years ago that you don't have any", some herbs from NM's garden, a 3-inch mini toy(!) frying pan and some booze. I was so dumbfounded that I didn't know what to say.

When I got home, I asked DB about whether EF ever contacted him about the cellphone and he said no. (I didn't talk to him about before because I didn't want to ruin his happiness by letting him know that I know about the "surprise"). It has been more than a week now and EF still haven't contacted me. I guess he realized that he doesn't have the guts to tell NM about the plan, so he threw me into the gutter instead to escape her wrath. What hurts me the most is not that now I don't have money to pay my bills for the month (which I have explicitly told EF and to which he reacted that he was really sad that I even brought up this subject since he was so sincere in his intent about paying for the cellphone). What hurts me the most is that I fell for his trap for the fourth time now. And that up until now, he tricked me into paying for things that were far beyond my paygrade with promises of him "helping" and then suddenly withdrawing at the last moment and NEVER talking about it again, or derailing the conversation with "you know we are very poor right now" (this is how I also "accidentally" bought my current apartment) and me struggling with starvation and begging to people for money for years as a result.

I feel so disappointed and tricked and stupid and gullible. How could have I been so stupid again? I wanted to believe so badly that now that he knows how deeply I am in depression he somehow felt sorry for me for the first time, and that he really wanted to help me. I wanted to believe so badly that he cared after all. He even said that "I know that you would not ever buy something so expensive for yourself, but I also know that it would help you greatly with your work, so let me help you please, I want to give you something you wouldn't think you deserve".

Fuck him.

So now, I have a brand new phone that at least I can work with, and no money to pay for electricity or water. Thanks EF. Again.

DB is there, I will not starve (again), but still. My stupidity hurts like hell.

p.s.: I bet he will turn up after a month or two with a $10 bill in his hand to "contribute". Just watch.

Contradictions

I have been talking to NM about some random stuff, like shopping, and she told me that she hates cashiers since they are always grumpy and rude. I told her that I did not share that experience, because they are always seem nice to me. She then commented that "of course they would be kind to such a good-looking little girl like you" and was winking and making all that sort of meta-communication as if she was implying that the cashiers were certainly all male who were only nice to me because they could ogle me or because they hoped for sexual advances from me.

I told her that this comment was extremely sexist and that I do not welcome it. And as a sidenote, I also told her that by the way, those said cashiers were all elderly ladies. Well, I shouldn't have.

She started screaming at me that I had no right to tell her off as sexist, or any other way, since she was, in fact, talking about elderly lady cashiers to begin with, and no one else, and how rude I was to label her nice elderly ladies as sexist. It didn't bother her at all, that I only mentioned elderly ladies after her first comment. Also, EF seemed to notice no logical fallacies in her reasoning.

I was like WTF, if this isn't gaslighting I don't know what is.

These surely are a crazy bunch of people.

I'm back, and about ENGF

Hello again everyone. I missed you all. Good to be back here.

Update, sort of:

ENGF died. At last. I don't miss him at all. He was extremely abusive with me (well, tried to be) and especially my FOO (succeeded) for the past few years. NM has repeatedly exposed herself to his behavior, and tried to drag me into it as well "you are his only granddaughter, you must, you are related, etc etc", but I refused to play this game anymore. NM asked for my advice(!) once and was utterly shocked that I bluntly told her, that she should not accept his behavior and if I was her, I'd let him rot wherever he is with all his cruelty, which I actually did anyway. I had managed NM with at least one abusive relative, and I'm proud of it. Now he is gone and I have crossed out a name from my list of abusive relatives. Yay!

This also means that the last parental abuser of NM is no longer alive. She is still clearly terrified of GCU, but I don't give a damn. He is screaming nonsense at her and she lets him. What is more interesting is that she is now quite confused as of what to do with her life from now on. No one to get her daily abuse from, so now she is afraid and she has no idea what to do.

She is trying to hoover me in.

There were a few days when she seemed normal, and she lured me in. The next thing I know, she is screaming at me about illogical and insane things, and then explaining to me that I should have children even if I don't want to ("you owe it to the family", "you are not religious enough if you don't have children", "you are old already"), since she lives next door, so she will just take them from me and raise them. I was like what.the.hell.

We have talked about this with DB, and we came to the conclusion that if we ever decide to have children, our parents will have one, and only one shot. We will invite all of them to lunch, and tell them the rules. If they do as we say, it's great, if they don't, they have no more access to our children. I'm really happy that he has my back about this as well.

After that, a few years later, NM called me about some random shit involving her being tested as healthy again at the doctor's, and that she knows how anxious I always am about these tests, are you Scatha? And that I will have to send a card to one of my relatives to make her look good. Two days later, I meet EF, and he says: "please call NM, you should really call her sometimes, she claims that you two have not talked for a month, and I know that it is not true since you were at our place a week ago, but still". Oh.My.Goodness.They.Are.Crazy.

(this can be translated as: nothing new happened. lol.)

Still, it is scary how downright insane these people can get. Especially that I'm related to them. Geez.

(yes, as usual, I blacked out during NM screaming at me about my future children so I did not react to anything she said, and therefore I'm taking a long time off again before communicating with them again)

I will read what you all wrote, try to catch up. All in all, good to be back. :)