How to deal with an [not-sure-what-the-word-should-be] mother?

I need help.. I’m just not sure what kind. My mother is a selfish excuse of a human being who cares for no one but herself.

Three weeks ago, she tried to take her own life by overdosing on her blood-pressure medication. While she was in the hospital, she refused to see me, and only me, despite allowing the rest of our family to visit with her; that includes aunts and uncles she hadn’t bothered to get in touch with for years. My little sister, who is 10, is the one who found her lying on the floor, but I was the one who called the ambulance; I was the one who fked everything up for her again. [She told me herself, when I was much younger, that I was a mistake and should not have been born. She was going to be a model. Right. But it’s my fault that she decided to have unprotected sex with some guy she now proclaims to be a ‘loser’ and a ‘bum’.] No one else seemed to notice this rejection, however, and they assured me that she was simply tired and needed to rest. They even started defending her, saying that she had not tried to kill herself at all, but had accidentally taken more than the prescribed amount. Never mind that she had swallowed two bottles worth of pills, of which are not the least bit tiny or easy to accidentally swallow; never mind that she had left a note for my stepfather that read along the lines of ‘Don’t blame yourself. Take care of our baby.’ The people in this family aren’t stupid, no, for they’re obviously hip to the knowledge that so long as they kiss her a, they won’t have to feel her wrath. They’re not stupid; they’re just liars and fakes, which sickens me. I’m a lot of things, including weak-willed and shy to a fault, but I’m not and hope to never be like them.

When she came home almost a week later [she went into the hospital Tuesday evening and was home Monday morning], my stepfather decided that what we all needed was some time away from everything and everyone, a time for us all to recover as a family. You see, when she went into the hospital Tuesday, we had sent my little sister off to stay with relatives out of state, for fear that the police [or whoever] would come to take her away on account of my mother being unfit. And what with my stepfather working so many hours a week, it’s not like he’s ever really home, so we thought it might be safer to simply hide my sister away. I don’t necessarily think that was the smartest thing we’ve ever done, but that’s what we did. I didn’t have to be sent away, though, as I’m 19 and therefore an ‘adult’ [I don’t feel like one], so I stayed behind. Anyway, we drove down to West Virginia where my sister was reunited with us, and the original plan was to stay down there for a week or two. It was.. awkward, to say the very least, as my bch-of-a-mother still had not said a single word to me. My stepfather must have finally noticed that something wasn’t right, and he took me aside and asked what was wrong. I told him exactly what I’m telling you now, and he seemed to understand. He said that she was still in denial of what she did, but that in time things would be better. He then suggested that I talk to her, tell her exactly what I felt and how what she had done had affected me. I’m not sure how to describe the feeling of pure relief that swept through me at that moment; it was like, even though he and I don’t typically get along, we were actually seeing eye-to-eye for once.. like, we both put aside our differences to lean on and support each other. I don’t know.. but after talking to him, I felt like the world’s largest weight had been lifted off my shoulders, and with him right behind me, I went out to find my mother. I told her everything, I told her that I loved her and always would, I asked her why she would do something like that, and if there was anything we could have done to help her. The entire time she sat there, never saying anything at all until I finished, at which point she said that I was dumber than she thought if I honestly believed she would try to take her own life. That this conversation was “fking bulls**t”. Yeah. She walked away after that, and I can’t recall her speaking to me since then. It seriously irks me that my stepfather stood in the background like some sort of mindless, speechless imbecile. He didn’t say a single word in my defense. Not one.

The following morning, however, he did tell me something: the previous evening, she had finally broke down, in a sense, and confessed to him that she did indeed try to take her own life. But because she had told this to him in confidence, he made me promise not to tell anyone. He said that she would tell me on her own, when she was ready, but until then I couldn’t say a word of it. Well, we’ve been back home for quite some time now, and she still has not said a word to me. She refuses to be in the same room with me, walking out the moment I walk in, regardless of whatever she was doing only moments before. I honestly don’t think she’s ever going to “tell me on her own”. I believe she’s perfectly content living her life without me in it. She and my sister are as close as ever, because my sister never knew that our mother tried to take her own life, and I’m not about to tell her. She’s just a child, and incredibly sweet – I would never do that to her. But it does hurt to see my mother so affectionate with her, and to know that she’ll never look at me that way again, she’ll never say those things or do those things with/for me again. I don’t know if she hates for me for ruining her attempt to end her life, or if she hates me for not believing her silly lies and calling her out on them. I don’t hate her, even now, which I think is my problem. Maybe I should hate her? Being angry would be much better than being sad, right? Or not? Although this has happened semi-recently, my mother and I have been having problems since I was fifteen. And she’s never wanted to talk to me, never wanted to just sit down and work things out, which is why nothing ever gets resolved in this family. She just pretends that everything is okay, as if that’s really going to fix anything.

No one has listened so far. My stepfather is back to being his same old self; uncommunicative. My aunts and uncles have obviously taken her side, as they have from the start. They can’t possibly understand that she is an entirely different person when they’re not around. They’re all so quick to sweep this whole situation under the rug; so quick to turn a blind eye and continue on as if nothing at all happened. I wish my grandfather and grandmother were still alive; I would go stay with them.

I’m sorry for the long message, and I’m sorry for swearing, but I haven’t been able to talk to anyone about anything for a long while. I can’t just write someone out of my life the way she seems to, and I’m really at a loss as to what I could or should do to fix my situation. I’m scared because I’ve been contemplating taking my own life as of late, however hypocritical that may be.