Help! My Mom Is Buying a House I Physically Cannot Enter. Her Excuse Is Maddening.

Dear Prudence is Slate’s advice column. Submit questions here.

Dear Prudence,

I have an issue with my mother that I feel is maybe a bit over dramatic but is still bothering me. My parents divorced almost 15 years ago. My father screwed my mother over in the divorce and it was really hard for her for a couple of years. I had a strained relationship with my father because of it. About 10 years ago, my father died unexpectedly. His estate was a mess. Basically, my sister and I had a good claim to most of his money and we, along with my mother, all had some legal claim to the house. Because of the money we got, as well as the way my father treated my mother in the divorce, my sister and I decided to let my mother have the house to make the legal proceedings easier. I don’t regret this. What is making me upset, though is that my mom doesn’t seem to be very grateful about it. It’s like she felt entitled to the house. I understand that, but it was still a sacrifice my sister and I made.

Well, she sold the house to move closer to both me and my sister. That doesn’t bother me, the house wasn’t special to us. What bothers me is that my mother claims to want to maintain a relationship with me, but is buying a house that will make that extremely difficult. I got a job offer and was able to pick a city close to where my sister lives. My sister is pregnant and my mom decided to move closer to her as I don’t expect to have kids. That’s all fine. But now my mother expects me to come up regularly, yet won’t buy a house I can stay in. I live about 2.5 hours away. It’s not impossible to do a day trip to see my mother, but it is difficult and not something I want to do regularly. The problem is I am very sensitive to mold due to a chronic illness. I cannot stay overnight in a home with mold. After getting very sick in a home with a lot of mold, it took me two years to recover. I then bought a crappy house, tore it down, and built something new to make sure it didn’t have any. After seeing how sick I got, my sister did the same thing.

My mom is not willing to do that. It is the cheaper option for my mother and my sister even found a good house through some local connections. My sister told my mom she could stay with her while it was being done. My mother is refusing. I get that building a house is difficult, but I literally won’t be able to visit my mom in her own home and won’t be able to visit that much at all (my sister has her mother-in-law living with her, so I only have a couch to sleep on there, which I am not comfortable with). I can afford to pay for a hotel every so often and my mom can come to visit me, but she is being incredibly stubborn about both of those options, saying, “They don’t work” for her. I’m feeling very resentful about the sacrifices I made when I was young and how little my mother is willing to sacrifice now. I know that once I gave her the house, it was hers to do with what she wanted, but I can’t help feeling like my mother took advantage of me when it was convenient and is now throwing me away when it’s not. At first, it seemed like this was out of the blue, but now I’ve realized my mother has a pattern of prioritizing small conveniences for herself over things that are big issues for me. I don’t really know what to do. She used to be such a good mother. A part of me feels like I might be blowing it out of proportion, though. What do you think?

—Moving Mother

Dear Moving Mother,

For what it’s worth, you seem very reasonable, generous, and fair about this whole thing, and I don’t think you’re blowing things out of proportion at all. Especially not the underlying feeling that your mother took advantage of you and is choosing convenience for herself over your needs. That hurts, especially coming from someone who used to take great care of you, and especially as you’re probably still struggling with losing your father after also being let down by him in a different way.

Let’s give your mom a little bit of grace, though. I really do mean just a little bit. Not so much that you do whatever she wants or sacrifice your own needs for her. Just enough so that you can see her choices as those of someone who’s had a tough time over the past 15 years, with heartbreak followed by financial challenges. She’s getting older and may have less emotional and cognitive bandwidth to make fantastic decisions as you might hope. She truly might not be processing the length of the drive to her new home, the implications of your illness, and the burden on you of staying at your sister’s house. Building a new, mold-free house may feel overwhelming. (But also, have you all looked into hiring a professional to test the house she is purchasing for mold? That could be a cost-effective compromise.) She may simply be thinking “I want to be settled and see my kids and grandkids” and failing to analyze the situation any more than that. I suggest this way of looking at it only so you can potentially see her choice as a reflection of her moving toward a phase of life in which she’s going to need care, and out of one where she has the capacity to care for others, rather than a sign of a lack of regard for you. Because I think that makes it less painful.

With all that said, she did make a choice about the nature of her relationship with you when she purchased this home. In the same way she can say, “That doesn’t work for me” when you offer a plan to occasionally stay in a hotel and invite her to visit you, you can (and should say), “That doesn’t work for me” when she asks you to get sick by staying at her house. Her decision is based on a preference, and yours is based on your physical health, so it’s a boundary that no one could ever fault you for enforcing. Give her a bit to get settled and then explain that she’s made her choice and she should know she’s welcome to pack her bag and stay in her guest room if she misses you between visits. Something tells me she will.

Sometimes even Prudence needs a little help. This week’s tricky situation is below. Submit your comments about how to approach the situation here to Jenée, and then look back for the final answer here on Friday.

Dear Prudence,

I am currently experiencing a minor 15 minutes of fame in the city I’m living in. My life is pretty much the same and I’m not quite famous, but I’m definitely getting a bit more attention than normal. Overall, it’s fine, except for one thing.

I had a friend I considered a kindred spirit, named “Anna.” Anna and I had a lot in common and a ton of inside jokes. We hadn’t been friends for a long time, just a few years, but I thought we were really close. She was always so thoughtful, which I appreciated. Anna and I have the same chronic illness too, which is how we became so close in the first place. Mine is very manageable on a regular basis. I have to put some time into managing it every day and have the occasional flare, otherwise, I lead a fairly normal life, with a full-time job and some time for hobbies. Anna, however, has another health condition that makes her health issues much less manageable. She is on disability and works a little, but has to take a lot of time to manage her illness. I’ve always known her illness was more difficult on her, but I never really saw it affect her. Then, one day a couple of years ago, we were talking about something I considered completely benign (animal migration in our area), and Anna blew up on me. She misheard what I said and would not accept that I had said something different. She said some nasty things and told me she didn’t want to be friends anymore. I cried on and off for days. Finally, I moved past it.

Now, after I’ve become almost famous in my city, Anna has come back. She said that when she had started a new medication (which I remember being true) her flairs had different symptoms that she didn’t recognize at first, one of them being mood swings. She said she has gotten on a new medication and has gone back to how she was before. She said that she had wanted to reach out to me for months, but was too ashamed after her, in her words, “completely erratic behavior” and took seeing me online as a sign that she should reach out. Everything she says sounds genuine, like the person I knew, but I just can’t get over the timing. All of a sudden, in my 15 minutes of fame, she reaches out. I’m not getting any money, which I’m pretty sure is clear based on what happened. A part of me remembers how I felt when she stopped our friendship like I had done something horribly wrong and deserved what happened, even though I sort of knew I didn’t. At the same time, I really miss Anna. I haven’t found a relationship as satisfying as the one I had with her. I’ve always had trouble finding good friends and I really miss Anna. I just feel like there’s a lot going on right now and I can’t seem to figure out what is fear and what is true concern. Can you give me any advice?

—Friendly Foe

Dear Friendly Foe,

Let her back in. Give her the benefit of the doubt. She apologized. Moreover, you really like and miss her! You say yourself that she doesn’t have a lot to gain by proximity to you during your mini-celebrity moment, so don’t overthink this and talk yourself out of reconnecting with a great friend who will probably be there long after your 15 minutes of fame are over.

Dear Prudence,

My girlfriend has the most stressful best friend of all time. I like this woman, she’s always been kind to me, and I genuinely believe she’s doing her best. Thank God she is in therapy. Her professional life is impressive but her family and personal life have carved some big scars. And they feel constantly really close to the surface, like nearly anything can send her into an emotional downward spiral. She really does seem to be trying to keep it together the best she can and isn’t manipulative, but it’s a constant string of psychiatric holds and tearful promises. We’re in our 30s!

I try to keep our interactions minimal but be friendly and light when I do see her. She’s never been pushy or jealous about how my girlfriend spends her time but at the same time, it feels like she is a black hole of sadness and distress. Since we’re all women, my girlfriend initially pushed hard for us to become friends. I privately told her that I couldn’t handle it and now we’re just acquaintances. But also, this woman stresses me out and makes me worry basically whenever her name is mentioned. How do I chill about this?

—Can’t Handle It

Dear Can’t Handle It,

To start, just one gentle note that people don’t generally outgrow mental illness, so it’s not really fair to judge this woman for psychiatric holds in her 30s! That said, I can see how having a “black hole of sadness and distress” in your life could be legitimately stressful, in a lot of different ways. Before you decide how to deal with it, try to articulate to yourself exactly what’s going on that’s so upsetting to you:

If it’s the first option, I’d encourage you to work on trusting that your girlfriend knows what kind of friendships she can handle. It’s worth noting that you don’t say in your letter that she’s at all upset by her best friend’s ups and downs.

If it’s the second one—something to do with anxiety about the attention and energy she demands—that’s a valid thing to bring up to your girlfriend in a conversation about your relationship. I’d suggest making some notes about concrete examples (“We were trying to enjoy a weekend at the beach and you had her on speakerphone crying about how her life was spiraling out of control for most of the afternoon, and it really took away from my experience.”)

If it’s one of the last three, this could be an opportunity to reframe your own thinking about the chaotic best friend, challenging yourself to remember that she’s not your responsibility and that she has others supporting her. Or you might even dig deeper to reflect on what her behavior reminds you of, what about it scares you, and how you can heal the parts of you that make someone else’s sadness and distress feel so overwhelming.

My lovely purchase after my divorce was a beautiful loft condo in the heart of a very desirable city. It is open concept, so the only enclosed room is the bathroom. I have two pull-out sofas and love company for a limited time. My sister, Jenny, has told me she is hurt that she and her husband haven’t been invited while a distant relative (a lovely girl who made me breakfast in bed) has been invited twice. Jenny and her husband snore. Like chainsaws or trains colliding…