I am 28, when I was 16 I was forced to leave the family home due to my step father intimidating me, due to him having an affair. I told my mum about this and he was very angry that I told his secret. She stayed with him for a while but then things got worse and he was still seeing the other woman so she told him to leave, he became violent and abused drugs and has now been in prison for many years, he is also on the sex offenders register for violence against a woman he beat later on and attempts to hurt my mum. So she has been through a lot of trauma too and I understand that.
So going forward I managed to find a partner and I ended up living with his parents for years but we did eventually split in my early 20’s. I am married now and I have had cbt therapy for my anxiety and I take sertraline. My mother is and has always been a functioning alcoholic. Some of the falling outs we have had and the awful things she has said and done to me while drunk are shocking. We have stopped speaking a few times but I always give in and forgive her.
This time it’s been 3 years that I haven’t seen her but we have started to communicate via text in the last year. I am made to feel guilty by people who say you only have one mum etc.. my issue is what kind of mum have I had? An alcoholic who allowed me to become homeless at 16, never bothered to phone or text me only I would ring her, if I didn’t ring we didn’t speak. Threw me out in a drunken rage one night at 1am (I was sleeping over for the night). We had nowhere to go and had to sleep in the car. Watched her barely drag up my little brother and sister and I had to be a babysitter since I was a teenager for them, so that they could both go to the pub every day. She never really showed much interest in me once I moved out. I don’t actually want to see her again but my anxiety is making me feel guilty, what if she dies? She drinks and smokes heavily. My brother and sister are more used to her and try to make sure that they are out of the house or upstairs when she’s drunk. She’s ruined every family wedding or party because she’s got so drunk. I feel so abandoned I don’t have a mother or father or any grandparents. I kind of wish at age 28 someone would adopt me. I want to be a good daughter/friend to someone but just not her. I don’t know where it all went wrong but I will add that im a totally normal woman, I’m quite shy, not a trouble maker and would never have argued back to her growing up, I was brought up with respect. I am not sure how to let go of the trauma and the memories of what I went through in those couple of months when I was alone, sleeping at my friends house in secret because she rented a room and wasn’t allowed anyone to stay over, I went through some awfully traumatic things at 16, I am lucky to be alive today. I just don’t think my mother even knows... I would never tell anyone how bad things really were but I think she is naive to think that she is completely blameless. This is the issue with her, she never takes responsibility for anything. My sister told me that years ago when I was younger I found some strange photos on our shared computer (step dads work computer) my mum told her this story I had actually totally forgot until she mentioned it. Anyway I won’t say what the images were but it looked like porn, I was so young that I didn’t really understand, so I didn’t tell anyone. Then at some point after he left I must have told her. She told my sister last year that if I had of told her sooner she would have kicked him out years ago... I must have only been 11 at the time, I wasn’t even sure of what I saw until I got older and realised what sex was. Im pretty sure that comment is an example of her trying to put her inner guilt onto someone else, does that mean she accepts that she didn’t do her best by me? Or do you think she thinks I’m the one in the wrong for not having a relationship with her? I just can’t forget the past. Please give me some advice? x
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AIBU?
AIBU to not have a relationship with my mother?
18 replies
Pizzaalover · 19/11/2020 13:47
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