Taking a Stand

My mother stopped talking to me after I told her I was in love and wanted to get married.

It's easy to assume I was a dumb kid acting on my emotions, but we dated for years before I told my mom. I had to know that what we had was the real deal before growing a pair and telling her I was dead serious. Why were my panties in a bundle over this? Well, here are some reasons...

1. My significant other does not come from a family that practices the same sect of Islam as my mother does. This matters because my mother has grown extremely conservative since moving to the United States. I suppose it might have a little to do with her friends and her missing home in Pakistan.
   
2. She blames marrying an alcoholic (Hi Dad!) on the premise of, "I was young and in love, so I didn't know any better." As a result, "You won't get married to anyone unless I approve" was something I heard on a daily basis.
   
3. All sons have close relationships with their mothers, especially the oldest son. She has dreaded a "young girl" taking me away from her since I was born. This explains why I wasn't allowed to be friends with members of the opposite sex during high school. Kind of rough, I know, but there were many ways around that.
   
4. Her many years of using me as an emotional crutch to gain some strength of her own in a troubled marriage and foreign country led to her having unrealistic expectations of me as a son and as a human being in general. 

Back to the point: I haven't talked to my mom in almost a year and a half. Yet, I've been paying for her phone bill this entire time. That's fucked up - she never calls me nor has she made any attempt to reconcile her differences with me. When we first started fighting, I tried my best to fix everything, I really did. Eventually I gave up, there was no point in arguing against a wall. I thought maybe she would see the error in her ways on her own. Is refusing to speak to your oldest son worth proving a point? And if so, what exactly is the point to prove anyway?

I called T-Mobile yesterday and told them to drop my mom's line from my plan. Then I called my dad and told him he can pay for her line if he wants, but that I wasn't going to pay for a phone that isn't used to call me. I was done pussyfooting around the issue - I told him it was about time I did something about it because God knows he doesn't do shit (Why argue with my mom when she conveniently provides him with three meals a day and a clean house?).

About time I grew a pair, right? I thought I was going to feel a lot better. And I did in the immediate short-term, but I still feel like nothing has changed... It really hasn't.