Weddingbee boards

I am a 23 year old married woman. I am in college and I have been living away from home for over 2 years. My 49 year old mother constantly worries about me and "What if..?"'s CONSTANTLY. Example: I run out of toilet paper and have to go to the grocery store after dark (like 7 or 8 pm), she finds out and freaks out "Couldn't your husband have taken you? Girls are kidnapped and raped and murdered all the time. You shouldn't go places alone or after dark!" Etc. ad nauseum. I am in the midst of finals, and I am very VERY busy, sometimes I only get 3-4 hours of sleep a night and don't have time to call. If I go one day without calling her, rather than just call me herself she is icy cold when I call the next day and chews me out for not calling. This makes calling her become a chore rather than fun, and it hurts my relationship with her. We have always been very close, but her behavior is making me want to keep my distance. I have tried to tell her this constantly, and constructively, but rather than acknowledge it and try to do something to improve the situation, she gets angry and takes it as an attack against her. She also calls constantly to "just check up" on me, which makes my husband feel like she doesn't think he can take care of my well being, and causes arguments between us with me trying to defend her. Let me state that I do not mind calling her everyday, I love talking to my mom, but if I do not call, and she freaks out and gets angry, that hardly seems fair. I have tried to explain that her phone makes *outgoing* calls too, but she seems to think that I should be the one to constantly call her. I have pointed out that she does not call her OWN mother but every 3-4 days and she claims that that's different. My mother also has Ulcerative Collitis, which is a bowel disease brought on by stress, that can cause colon cancer. I have tried to explain to her that allowing herself to worry constantly is leading to her flare-ups, which don't happen when she's not worried all the time. What can I do?? She is damaging our relationship. I cannot stand having her have to be in constant contact 24/7 with me or she gets angry, and I cannot stand her constant worrying that is beyond the scope of reality (You could be sold into human trafficking! Men look at you wherever you go, one could follow you to your car and you could never be seen again!!) What do I do?!?

Bumping this because I really need some advice on how to handle this! She just emailed me and called me ungrateful after I emailed her and explained in a very constructive and uncriticizing way the issues I was having with this and how it was hurting me, her, and our relationship, and what could be done differently. I am so frustrated by this...She gets so offended if someone says she's wrong, and she says they think THEY can do no wrong... ugh.. it's like fighting with a child.

I had the exact same issue. The only thing is I finally just pissed my mom off, and went a week without talking to her. I told her she was smothering and exactly what she was doing. From then on she was so greatful to even have me call or answer, it wasn't really a problem. I know this sounds really immature and mean, but it worked.