My Boyfriend's Mother Scares Me

After my last encounter with my boyfriend's Mom, I have decided to really rethink our relationship. But I really don't know. I love him so much.

Let me describe what has been going on.

This latest incident started like many other wonderful evenings we have been spending together.

"I love you baby" I murmured to my lover, in a flush of post-coital happiness, and nestled my glowing face against his sweet-smelling neck.

Ali held me close, "I love you too", and we both giggled, delirious with joy.

So far, everything in this year-long relationship has been wonderful, amazing, incredible. There are a few, tiny, baby red flags, more pink than red, and weren't those just family quirks? Let me tell you about them, and maybe you can tell me what you think?

The fact that his Mom has a key to his apartment and pops in and out is surely normal, as is the frequency with which he mentioned her. After all Mom does most of his housework, right down changing his sheets and doing his laundry. If anything, I envy him and wish my mother, very much of the hands-off school of parenting, was half as engaged and helpful as his Mom. That was precisely why I find it so odd, I tell myself as I thirstily drank in his love and attention- my parents had been distant, and my dad has been dead for more than 10 years now, so really I don't have a good barometer of what healthy parental relations looked like. Maybe you do, and you can tell me. Perhaps it is completely normal for mothers to have full knowledge of their forty-two-year-old, fully functioning, self-sufficient son's eating habits and sleeping schedule, not to mention arranging his car check-ups, medical and bank appointments. She actually walked in on us a couple of times, then Ali told me he had asked her to text before popping over, so that stopped, thank god. No more shrinking desperately under the cover while his bright-eyed mom made chirpy small talk.

"But what about this?" I gestured at our "sex drawer".

"Oh sweetheart stop worrying about. She won't look in there!"

"But –" I stopped myself. After all, it's his space, and if he's so unconcerned, why should I be? I noticed some of the stuff I had started keeping there moved around, my make-up and creams rearranged. And then I found a small knife placed between my bottles of nail polish. Should I bring it up with him? I decided not to, and returned the knife to the kitchen drawer, where I assumed it belonged.

I also kept some washcloths in a drawer. These too were moved around, and then the next time I was there, I picked up a clean washcloth to go shower and there was the knife, lying between the washcloths. "Look at this!" I pointed to the knife. Ali shrugged, he seemed completely disinterested, and wanted to pull me back to bed. I returned the knife.

It must be a silly mistake or something. Yet during our weekly meetings with my girlfriends where relationships were analysed and action items issued, I somehow forgot to mention these silly quirks. After all, I reason with myself, I have to respect his privacy. However, nothing else was out of bounds in those crucial meetings- minutiae of their conversations and sexual life was enthusiastically placed under a microscope. Just not his relationship with his Mom. I tried to focus on us enjoying our time together- I could never imagine being so happy in a relationship.

Anyway, back to this night. I'll describe exactly what happened, and you can decide the flag colour.

Eventually we rolled away from each other. It was still early, although getting dark outside- a beautifully mild fall evening. "Wanna go grab a drink?" Ali asked. "Sure!" I replied, "A beer would go down nicely, after all… this…" and we both laughed again in fond memory of our recent romps.

The local watering-hole is a barely a ten-minute walk away. We held hands like those disgusting couples doing PDA all the time- hell, I thought happily, we ARE a disgusting PDA couple now, the kind other people rolled their eyes at and muttered "get a room already". The twilight autumn sky was a deep navy-blue, and the smell of damp orange leaves filled the air. Ali lives in a quiet neighbourhood and there weren't many people out.

A woman was walking towards us on the pavement, her face shadowed. She was backlit by the streetlights, and her short grey fluffy hair shone like a halo around her darkly shadowed face. For a minute I thought, but how could it be? His Mom didn't live close by and there was no reason for her to be out on a damp fall evening a street away from Ali's place- anyway she could be mistaken- I had only met his Mom a few times during the past year- a perfectly cordial, lovely woman, and babbling under the sheets being caught "doing the deed" hardly counts.

The haloed woman was drawing closer to us, and I could swear it was his Mom. I glanced at Ali, but he was babbling something about neo-colonialism and US politics, and he betrayed no interest or recognition in the approaching woman. A wave of fear broke over me, as I realised I would have to pass the woman, and I had a sudden, irrational urge to move to Ali's other side, but he was gripping my hand very tightly and striding along, and I didn't see how could move around like that in a normal-seeming manner. I didn't like to interrupt him as he was talking so enthusiastically, and anyway sometimes he doesn't hear me when I talk.

The street lamps were now glinting on the older woman's eyes barely two steps away from her, and I was sure it was his Mom, bearing down on me. My heart was beating so fast I felt it would burst out of my chest. The woman smiled at me, her teeth shining.

"There you two are! I figured it's such a nice evening that you're bound to go out and I thought I'd pop in and do the bed while you're gone! Lisa's not going back with you, are you my dear?" and her teeth gleamed at me.

Ali bent down and kissed his Mom, "You don't have to, Mom!" he grumbled. I stood by, unable to speak. This is normal, I keep repeating to myself frantically in a vain attempt to steady my galloping heart. This is completely normal. Right? I don't need to break this off? Tell me!