"You are family"

So far, the plan for my future was me going to California to study there and, as my girlfriend was going to live there too, move in with her. She has lived there before, with her uncle, and we were going to either be roommates with him or get our own place. Last night, she told me that her mom had decided to go to Cali too and that they wanted to get a big place all together. I have to say that I was really surprised and shocked by that news. My first reaction was to say 'Great, but I'm not moving in with your mom'. My gf living with her mom would/will make it way easier for her to go to college and I'm really supportive of that idea.

BUT, do I really want to move in with my girlfriend and her mother? What they say is that we would be just like roommates and that my gf and I would have our own area. I'm still not sure if I really want to do this. I mean, yeah, I can always look for my own place and move out if it doesn't work out and that will be easier than looking for a place while I still live here. At the same time I know that me moving out when I've already lived there for a while is going to be really hard on my gf and therefore on me. Anyways, this will be a decision I have to take on my own and I'll have to think about it some more, but what I wanted to write about was the conversation that took place last night.

I was on the phone with my baby, talking about all of this, and she got frustrated with me and gave her mom her phone so that she could talk to me. I basically told her that I wasn't opposed to them moving in together AT ALL (not my place to be anyways) and that I thought it was great that my gf could go to college then, but that I just didn't know how I fit into that. What she said in response to that completely shocked me and left me pretty much speechless.

"You are family." When I was out there, my gf's mom and I didn't talk much, she didn't seem particularly interested in me and I tried staying out of her way. Obviously, it's pretty complicated because of my gf's relationship to her mom and I'm not going to go into detail, but all in all I did not expect her to say that. She then also said that my gf loves me and that I make her happy, which I knew, but hearing that from her mom was completely different. She pretty much acknowledged our relationship the way we see it, as a serious one, and not just some internet fling. And she acknowledged me as something good in my gf's life, as opposed to 'the girl who turned her daughter gay' or something along those lines (For the record, she never said anything like that, I didn't turn anyone gay, but there was some uneasiness about me being a girl at the beginning).

I moved out of my parents reach and supervision less than two years ago and it took me a while to get used to the independence and freedom of living on my own (with roommates). I think moving in with my girlfriend will be a big step, one that I'm very happy to take and fairly certain that it will work out well, based on us not wanting to kill each other after spending 2,5 weeks together non-stop, 24/7. But her mom being there is still going to be different, because I know I can't just view her as a roommate. I can't pretend that she's not who she is.