My apologies to those who don't frequent BT and don't know the history that I have with my mom, for any confusion there might be. Those from BT will know things can be a little interesting between us.

I have a therapy appointment this afternoon. Since my mom is out of town and my dad is in town, he was slated to take me to my appointment.

Well, she called me a little while ago and told me there was a change of plans about my appointment. For those of you who know that I can be quite anxiety prone, this did not bode too well. I calmed down a bit when she said "you're still going".

One dog is ready for breeding, and has to be taken to the kennel they work with out of state. So he's taking her and switching for another dog. My mom prefers another dog that's down there to one of the dogs that's in her kennels, so my dad's making that dog switch as well. So two dogs going down, two different dogs returning. I'll get to that in a bit.

Anyway, my mom told me who would be taking me to my appointment. But you know, I got to thinking what if that person pulls out like my dad. Things may 'come up' for her too. I asked my mom then what. Well she wasn't liking that. Finally after some back and forth she said she'd deal with it if she had to (hopefully it wouldn't then be too late). Anyway, at one point, I said to her: "You know Mom, it would be nice if you would validate my concerns once in a while for once in my life." Her response? "Lauren, your concerns are unfounded." What, it's impossible for this person to have something come up as well?

Obviously, I didn't exactly appreciate telling her I feel like my concerns are not being validated and have her instantly tell me they're not valid, and I should probably thank her for giving me a therapy topic. lol But I wonder if that just gave me an insight into her perspective -- if she doesn't think my concerns are founded, no wonder she gets upset when I air said concerns. Still, I think my concerns are founded because if something comes up with this person, it's only a short step for this person not being able to take me for whatever reason and then I'm stranded.

Okay, the dog situation. Every time my mom goes away and has me come help take care of dogs, she types up a roster with which dog gets what food. This is the same roster as last time, a couple changes were make, one dog on the main level of the house is now in a basement whelping room, and one dog that was in the kennel is now in the main part of the house. So now I have one dog showing under the house dog heading that I have to remember is in the basement, and vice versa. Also there were a couple food changes which means my mom scribbled out what was typed and wrote it with a pen. At least it was a nice dark pen and she made it legible (she's famous for chicken scratching). Anyway, I don't know if this is an aspie thing or if some NT's have ths problem too, but scribbling and writing changes in is something my brain has a hard time trying to sift through. It takes a conscious effort to do so. So now, there are two dogs leaving (and would be scribbled out), and two dogs with their feeding instructions written in. So this is yet more, on top of the scribbles/changes to the roster that are already there, that I have to consciously sort out that I'm guessing my mom would do automatically. She didn't really like hearing that this made me anxious. Frankly at this point I really need a whole new roster typed up, which isn't going to happen. I can't even have her give me instructions over the phone to make a new roster because their printer is out of ink. So I'm dreading having to sift through more changes. She says my dad can make those changes but I don't think she understands (and I don't think I was in a mind to verbalize at the time) that the more scribbles/changes there are on a roster, the more taxing it is for me, and I'll have to consciously sift through it.

I realize when a dog's ready for breeding, she must be gotten to the stud, but it doesn't sound like the other planned dog switch is really necessary, just that she prefers one over the other. I may call and ask that the not-required dog switch be made at a different time.

Anyone have any ideas about how to deal with the issue of her never or almost never validating my concerns? Easy for her to say they're unfounded.