PsychoPhil, given that your mother is 80 years old, she isn't going to change or see you the way you wish her to see you. Her pattern of living in denial has been how she deals and this goes all the way back for you in your life and became your mother's way of escaping realities in her own life. That being said, her generation was pretty ignorant about a lot of things too. Not only that, but there was a lot of denial in not only her generation but her parent's generation.