AIBU to think my DM is making work for me or am an ungrateful sod

[grumpydaughter]

DM has always behaved like this but it's starting to grate me since having a baby before Christmas.

We are currently doing some building work and are without a kitchen (using utility and garage, have a camping stove, etc). Mum, trying to be helpful, made us a soup but didn't have time to blend it, so had to find my blender out of the chaos and blend it as she kept asking if we'd ate it and enjoyed it. I was annoyed as I'd rather she didn't do things like this that makes extra work for us, I would have just done something from a tin or got takeaway. Instead had the faff of washing and putting away food processor.
I've been surviving on 4 hours sleep, am at the end of my tether with everything.
Went to meet her for coffee on her lunchbreak, she had bought me a coat off the market (she is constantly buying me clothes even though I ask her not to as she rarely buys me anything I like) on her way to work. She showed it to me and I said I didn't like them, but instead of her saying she would return them she asked that I went myself. I had again had 4 hours sleep, I had already told her this before the coat thing came up, I must have looked like shite and it was tipping it down.
So I had to walk down the other end of town in the rain, baby in the pram, to return this bastard coat. I told the bloke half joking to not sell her anything else if it's for me.
She is constantly buying me any old shite from charity shops, this has been my whole life, and I now tell her to not do it. She ignores me and does it anyway. I have 2 bin bags full of charity shop stuff from her, for me and baby. I used to take it back to charity shops to donate but don't have time anymore, so now I am saving it to take to a women's refuge, as a lot of it is fine, just either not my style or wrong size, or I don't want it for my baby.
AIBU and ungrateful? I just feel like she has forgotten what it's like to have a baby and feel exhausted and not want extra hassle.

[TheFlis12345]

Why didn’t you just say you didn’t have time and hand her the coat back?

[BeanBag7]

For the soup I would've just chucked it and told her it was delicious, or eaten it chunky.
If she buys you clothes you dont like just stick them in the clothes bank or in a bag in the loft. I don't think it's worth the hassle of explaining why you don't want it and then making the effort to return it.

[Treaclesweet]

Stop taking things off her. Physically hand them straight back and say "no thank you, I've asked you not to buy me things". Rinse repeat until she gets the message. This would annoy me also.

[BinaryStar]

Why on earth did you agree to return the coat?

I would tell her that from now on neither you nor the baby need any more things bought and if she tries to give you stuff outside Christmas and birthday presents you will not be accepting it. When she tries to turn up with stuff refuse to let it over the threshold. She will strop a few times but will get there in the end.

[grumpydaughter]

Yes I should have been firmer about not returning the coat, but I didn't have anything to do other than go home and look after baby, so to her I had time and she didn't as she had to go back to work.
I didn't bother insisting as she would have just pulled a face at me like I was being lazy and ungrateful.
I never physically accept things of her, quite often she will bring things in carrier bags and just leave them at my house, followed by a phone call along the lines of 'did you find the 'load of shite' I bought you, I left it in the kitchen'...

[Singlenotsingle]

I think you're scared of offending her, aren't you 0P? If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you always got. You should have told her you didn't have time to take the coat back, and handed it back to her.

[grumpydaughter]

Ok so next step, if it happens again and she pulls her usual face what do I say? She has always been like this so generally I ignore her and get on with it as I feel like at her age she will never change!

[grumpydaughter]

Yes @Singlenotsingle I don't like to offend her, or anyone really.

[MarthasGinYard]

'For the soup I would've just chucked it and told her it was delicious, or eaten it chunky. '

Absolutely

And

"Dm please stop buying stuff we are in middle of alterations, have no where to put anything"

[redwoodmazza]

God !!! This sounds just like my late mother!!!!!

Our son was born in 1992. My parents lived about 8 miles away and so to 'help' me she suggested I had lunch with them each Wednesday. My husband was working away all week.

So each Wednesday [her suggestion], I had to feed baby, pack car with baby stuff [bag, rocker, buggy etc etc], go to baby clinic for weighing [also on a Wednesday] etc, then drive to parents. By this time baby had fallen asleep and when I arrived, their cocker spaniel would bark incessantly and wake baby up! I then had to unpack car of all paraphernalia and feed baby.

After lunch mother insisted we took baby for a walk so she could boast about him to anyone she met that she knew.

Then I had to pack car up again, drive home and unpack it all again. Then bath baby, feed him and get him ready for bed. It was all so bloody exhausting. And she thought she was doing me a favour.
All I ever wanted her to do was to come to my house!!!

And as for the charity shop stuff - just the same!!! Everything she got me was crap. She seemed to want to portray herself as Mrs Bountiful at the charity shops. It was sickening.

Are you my long lost sister? LOL

[FookMeFookYou]

You didn't have to eat the soup and you didn't have to take the coat back. You obvs need to have a firmer word with her and if she carries on just politely decline until she gets it. Don't pander to her.

[Singlenotsingle]

Well, grumpydaughter, why don't you ask her to store this stuff for you at her house?

[MrsTerryPratchett]

Just ignore the 'face', smile and change the subject.

The older I get, the less I give a crap. I've actually got better at being kind to people, but much better at not lying down and letting people roll over me.

Or do a face back.

[Orangecookie]

You can still insist you know! Even with faces pulled. You could even pull your own face.

[grumpydaughter]

@redwoodmazza haha, yeah she sounds similar, although to be fair to her she does come over to me as much as I go there.
It's been 20 years of 'no I don't like it, you need to stop buying me things Mum'...
I don't know what the next thing is...
'Stop fucking buying me all this shit I don't need'?
It's like talking to a brick wall. I have literally put things in the bin in front of her to try and get message across that I didn't want it and didn't have time to go the charity shop to redonate it.
I didn't do it again as felt wasteful, also it made no difference and she brought me something else next time I saw her.

[Mitzimaybe]

"Sorry, Mum, I'm not going out of my way in the rain with the pram to return a coat I never wanted in the first place. Please stop buying things for me and baby; we don't need them and don't have room to keep them."

Next time she does it, "Are you having problems with your memory? I told you not to buy anything else for us, remember? Perhaps you should make an appointment with your GP to test for early onset dementia?"

Guaranteed that will make her pull a face but I bet it will stop her doing it.

[QueenOfCatan]

Take it back to hers or give it back when you see her if she leaves it. My dad does this. Then acts as though we think we're too good for second hand things which pisses me off royally as half our fucking clothes and most of our furniture is second hand, it's just that he buys any old tat (he also expects us to be eternally grateful for stained baby clothes and thermals for us in the summer ffs). I refuse to take anything and now either drop things back to him or charity bag them and tell him that's what I've done.

I'd suggest asking for specific things but that didn't help us either, asked for him to keep an eye out for a wooden train set, he comes back with one that's got black mould all over it. For a toddler.

Fil does the same but thankfully we don't see him often as he cba with seeing us, so that's easier to manage.

[gamerchick]

Well, grumpydaughter, why don't you ask her to store this stuff for you at her house

Because it's obvious. Something you don't see when you have a new baby. Like putting on odd shoes and not noticing when in that sleep deprived hell.

[pasturesgreen]

OP, I appreciate you're tired and fed up, but you're coming across as a bit of a martyr.

Why did you traipse around town in the rain to return the coat? Your DM had bought it, not you, she could have returned it herself if she was that bothered about getting her money back.

The soup was a total non issue. Personally I'd have just poured it away and told her it was delicious voice of bitter experience here, as my own DM is a terrible cook, or if you didn't want to throw it away you could just have eaten it as it was.

You can't change your mother's behaviour, but you can change how you react to it.

[shiningstar2]

What Pasture green said in her last sentence. Took me years to learn this with both mother and mil. Still learning.

[Motoko]

I don't know what the next thing is...'Stop fucking buying me all this shit I don't need'?

If that's what it takes, then yes, go nuclear. After she's had a few minutes to get over the shock, then you can gently explain that you're exasperated, that you've asked her hundreds of times to stop buying you stuff, but as she's ignored it, you needed to make sure that she now realises how serious you are, and that it's affecting your relationship with her.

[ssd]

Op, you need to start pulling a face with her instead

[ssd]

And your not grumpy or ungrateful your just knackered and need your mum to stop being a pain

[RaspberryBubblegum]

Could you not keep it all in bags and then leave them at hers? maybe if she had bags of crap left at her house she would get the message? 😂

[Namelessinseattle]

Honesty is your best policy. “Thanks so much for the soup you’re so good, but I have no idea where my blender is so it would only go to waste in my house, you keep it.”
“Thanks so much for the coat you’re so good but.... insert reason why you don’t want it.”
Then, “I’d return it only it’s raining and I only have the pram- maybe donate it if you don’t want to keep it and can’t return it?”

Finally when she does the face and smile wait her out. It’s difficult it’s awful but you will get there. Do not break. Do not give in. DO NOT ACCEPT THE JUNK. Be like a statue in your silence. You can do it.