Echo, I'm so sorry. I figured he'd call more than ever now because you are his link to sanity and, more importantly, money if something goes terribly wrong (and he know it could).
When 36 catches me off guard or I decide to pick up the phone and he is talking about some dilemma he got himself into and could get himself out of, I don't say anything. I just listen and add a few "Uhmmm...hummmmms" every so often while sometimes putting down the phone. Some of what he tells me is very upsetting and then somebody is at the door and I have to go. Sometimes he wants me to talk his father into giving him a big bag of money and suddenly I have a headache. I get off very fast. Of course, if he breaks my "respect" rules, I gently hang up...as I told him many times before I started doing it that I was going to no longer tolerate.
If you are caught offguard in a phone call that you both hope will say, "Mom, I see the light! I want to stop using drugs!" and know will be more like, " Ummmm, yeah. So...why are you angry at me?" I really think the best response is none and to just listen or pretend to listen and get off quickly because (white lie) your dog pooped on the floor or your dinner is burning.
In time you will learn how to disregard the phone/texts when you are not up to hearing from him at all. Put the ball in YOUR court. After all, it is YOUR life. You can choose to fill it up with as many positive folks as you like and to tolerate very little toxicity.
Until I learned how to do this, my life was constant drama and worry and I hated both.
You are doing as good a job as one can expect. I have gone the letter route with both 36 (only one time) and with Scott (many times). What it told me is that although moms here, who feel your pain, cry over the heartfelt words, our adult kids sometimes barely read those words and, if they do, they don't really get the depth and feeling and love put into those words. They miss the message. I'm sure this does not apply to all difficult children, but most difficult children have little empathy and insight so our pain doesn't register with them nor perhaps does it even matter. And they do not respect our wishes. They didn't while they lived with us. Why start now?
I decided not to commit my thoughts to paper anymore when dealing with my difficult children. They just dont seem to care about how others really feel. Scott would never answer my letters, but he archived them into his computer, calling them "crazy" and still reads them to remind him to be angry at me. So to me it is not a safe thing to do...commit to paper. The misinterpreted words could be thrown in our faces, as so much else is, by our difficult child(s).
Here's a cold-hearted example from 36: His younger sister graduated Sunday. He was annoyed with that because I couldn't talk to him that day. He also never sent a card or a text congratulating her. This isn't because he doesn't like her. It's because it didn't cross his mind. He didn't care. If it's not about him, by God, it doesn't matter.
Our difficult children tend to be all about their own needs and nobody else's so if we request something of them, they don't pay attention. What we want doesn't matter. Just what they want. Contrary to what some trolls have said here, our adult kids were not thrown out of our homes for just having mental illness. They were thrown out, after we tried everything and it failed, for illegal activities, disrespect, sometimes verbal/physical violence, and other very serious matters that nobody could live with in any healthy manner and that we can not change.
It has made me sad many times to think about what 36 is missing by being so unable to connect with others and he's too self-absorbed to even know what he is missing. I feel bad for Scott too, probably mired in attachment issues. Both do not take the feelings of other people seriously. Neither thinks anything is wrong with him and are both 36, they will not change.
You did a good job. Do something nice for yourself tomorrow. Find some serenity tonight!!!!
