Communication issues with boss/owner

my boss and I do not communicate well together, or so it feels to me. She tries to be professional when doing damage control with staff, but it’s inconsistent with her regular behavior. I think she causes problems and confusion with her dismal communication, and then scolds you after you’ve tried to fulfill her wishes, and failed to please her. she comes up with different solutions to make things better for her, and gets annoyed when her ideas don’t work perfectly. I do not know how to better this issue other than to ask more clarifying questions...which I need to take initiative to do when she is “communicating” direction to me. Sometimes she starts several sentences without finishing them and thinks she has told you the point. Or she spends a lot of time telling the gossip or boasting, which she is able to communicate loud, clear, and completely.

She sent me an apology email where she expressed her stress level and emotion, and I sent one back where I commiserated and shared my own struggle with stress, etc. I feel like I exposed myself now..at first I felt good about my email, but now I feel shame about it. I don’t feel safe communicating with her I guess.

I think an issue is she speaks in front of me to the other boss about her dissatisfaction with the structure of the company. She wants someone who can take on her work and allow her to rubber stamp things, and allow her to focus time on what she wants to focus her time on. She wants an associate but that is not feasible says the other boss, so naturally I feel like I am not filling the shoes she needs, even though I am not qualified to be an associate of course. Perhaps I am reading into things, but these improperly timed/placed convos in front of me make me uncomfortable. I try to think that they are bringing me into the fold by discussing in front of me, but the keener side of me thinks they are laying a case of why they need to replace me. Especially when they talk about what idiots prior employees and associates were, and how inevitably inept a future associate would be. Damn. Too much.