MRW I'm home alone for a few weeks and my mother won't leave me alone because she refuses to accept that I'm adult who can take care of herself

My SO's off to do fieldwork abroad for 3.5 weeks, so I'll be on my own for a while. This is the first time I've been alone since moving in with him about a year ago, though, and I've never lived on my own. So yeah, I miss him a lot and it's weird to be alone all the time.

But I also live in another country than my parents, and my mother's never really been alright with that, but she was managing. Now that my SO's gone, though, she sends me at least an e-mail a day (whereas usually, we don't get nearly in touch that often, other than skyping once a week). She's asked me to come home during the time that he's gone, and she's offered to come stay. Several times, despite the fact that I keep telling her I need to have a paper finished by the end of the month so I can't afford to take several weeks off. And she keeps writing to me saying how she's worried now that I'm all alone (despite the fact that some of my SO's family and our friends are all living in town and they can be here within ten minutes if something happens). She keeps asking how I'm coping, and if I need anything. Telling me how I shouldn't go out after dark, despite the fact that it's October and it's getting dark here around 7-7:30pm. Telling me not to open the door for anyone I don't know.

I could kind of understand that she was worried at first but honestly, it's really, really bugging me by now, and he's not even gone a week. I'm 24, and I'm perfectly capable of fending for myself. Sure, it's hard not having my SO with my every day, but that doesn't mean I'm a helpless little girl who's going to break down as soon as I no longer have someone to take care of me. What makes it even worse is that my older sisters were all living on their own when they were several years younger than me, but for some reason because they didn't live abroad, that's "completely different". I replied to one of her e-mails a bit more strongly than I usually do, but it didn't help. She just keeps sending the same kinds of messages but just puts "I don't want to be patronizing, but..." or "I don't want to sound like I'm smothering you, but..." in there and thinks that makes it fine.

/rant

Ugh, I really needed to get that out of my system, what with my SO not being here to complain to...

/r/TrollXChromosomes Thread Link - i.imgur.com