When does mother's day become your day and not your mother's?

it becomes about you, when you have children imo

im working this Sunday, we are fully over booked & I we will do roast dinners for lots of mothers . I enjoy the manic day as it goes in a flash

my daughter will be treated by her dh he will take his mum out for dinner as well

Then the following weekend my daughter and granddaughter will go and spend a lively day/afternoon doing something nice.

@GettingChunkier I’d maybe ask this question in either the ‘stately homes’ thread in Relationships or on the relationships board where you’ll find more children of narcissistic mothers and more tips/strategies for coping. You’ll also avoid the ‘you only get one mother’ etc etc. You do only get one mother. Unfortunately for some of us we got dealt a rum hand when allocated our own. Me included. Your issue is also compounded my your Father who acts as her enabler. I had one of those too. Lovely man, no balls to stand up to her batshit crazy behaviour resulting in everyone living a miserable life. They have both passed on now.. I did the right thing when they were poorly for my own conscience but sadly life is so much more peaceful now I don’t have to deal with the drama.

The only strategy here is you biting the bullet and doing what you want for the day. Ignore your mother. They’ll be histrionics, sulking, a period of her cutting you off (quite enjoyable tbh) and then, like all narcissists she’ll then be nice to draw you back into the drama during which you’ll be expected to apologise for ‘hurting’ her over Mother’s Day. She’ll try and separate your family - drawing grandchildren into siding with her. Watch out for that and talk to your children about it. DD even now years later talks about some of the batshit stuff Nanny would say to her.. utterly incomprehensible nonsense. The fact is though your mother won’t change. She can’t. She also has zero self awareness. No narcissist has ever googled ‘an I a narcissist?’ Which is why so many are blind sided when contact is cut off. They push people to the end of their limits as they cannot hold a rational discussion about their own behaviour to the point where zero contact is the only strategy to preserving your own mental health.

My life greatly improved when I met DH who unlike my first DH did not pander to her and let her know he saw her behaviour. She then backed off. Mother’s Day was mine the minute I was a mother and I made sure that was the case from the off. Your DH sounds the same as mine. So you need to reclaim your Mother’s Day back.

Narcissist mothers are basically bullies to their own children - usually acting out their own childhoods. Control is important to them. The narrative is important to them. How other people see them is very important to them. Your mother doesn’t care about spending time with you nor the fact she’s taking over your day. She wants to be able to tell everyone how spoilt she was by everyone. How adored she is etc etc.

The upside of all of this is if you survive being parented by a narcissist mother and break the cycle, you are generally an awesome mother yourself. I know I’m a great mother because I have a great relationship with my DD. She’s balanced from growing up secure knowing she is loved. She isn’t scared of me, she doesn’t hide things from me, she doesn’t avoid spending longer than an hour with me. It was a shitty childhood for me but she is living proof that the cycle can be broken.

Enjoy this Sunday your way 💐

My mum died 5 years ago very suddenly, two weeks before Mother’s Day. She was fairly low maintenance, and as there are three of us, we would informally share it out, so one of the three of us would see her for lunch or an outing but it wouldn’t have been the end of the world if we hadn’t. MIL is slightly another story…. DH’s family are really arrangement avoidant. There’s an expectation that you will be available for key dates, but if you try to make a plan further in advance than a week or two, you get dismissed with ‘well we haven’t even thought about it yet, it’s far too early!’

This year, we preempted by saying ‘we are going to x restaurant for lunch, would you like to join us’ and they are, which is lovely. 2 hours of socialising and wider family time, then job done, I can spend the rest of the day drinking tea and being looked after!

Is this a dig at the OP? Are you saying that OP should continue to pander to her selfish, demandingg mother?

Tell your mum your own kids have planned something special, a surprise, for you (and only you!) this year so you'll be enjoying them treating you on Sunday. And pop a card in the post to your mum.

I have adult children and I'm happy with a card. My sons have children and I expect them to celebrate Mother's Day with their partners and children. I sometimes go out for lunch with my daughter.

Your mum sounds terrible and your dad obviously enables her. You are right to put your foot down this Mother's Day, but I'm sure she makes your life a misery throughout the year. Does she have any good qualities that would stop you cutting contact with her completely? What is she like as a grandmother to your children?

When my lovely DM was alive she lived alone nearby, so we’d have her over and DH would cook us a roast. I was a mother too and she would never have expected anything. DH mum lives far away so we send card and flowers but his siblings take her out. Again, she is very low maintenance and wouldn’t expect a fuss. Agree with the others that mothers of dependent children take priority. More because young kids enjoy making an effort for you.

the problem is people are so busy and wrecked they come to holidays such as these and want them to be amazing.

I think the real problem is people are influenced by advertising and increase their expectations accordingly (which is also linked to how "busy" they like to think they are, but that's another topic!). People can obviously mark the occasion how they like, but it doesn't have to be as complicated as the annual Mothers' Day posts on here make out. Just some flowers and/or a card is fine.

Ime, when she died. By then, my kids had left home.

I’m not a fan of Mother’s Day, I find it very complex.

I have two DD, a mum, nan, 2 sisters, aunts, cousins so that’s 5 mums who get together, no one doesn’t lift a finger on Mother’s Day instead, we all spend the day together and enjoy each others company.
I don’t expect my girls to wait on me any more than my mum expects me to do it to her, Mother’s Day for me is a chance to show appreciation for you mum not be their slave 😂

In an honest answer, it shouldn’t be anyone’s and not their mother’s, it should be everyone’s!

Mn is gone mad this year on ‘but I want it to be about me’- it should always have been about you, it should always have bern about your mum too and it should be about mils too. Everyone this year is like I want it for me, but it can always be both, the trouble is your mum wants it all about her, so that wipes any sensible plans.

As people have said a lot before on mn, the problem is people are so busy and wrecked they come to holidays such as these and want them to be amazing- they want a break, they want everyone to acknowledge and laud everything they do and have done, which isn’t realistic really!

I would do whatever makes you happy. This year I am spending Mother’s Day with my daughter and her family and she has also invited her mother in-law. Luckily we all get on but this isn’t always the case

Think of you and your children...life is too short....x

I was coming on here to say this - that's what worked for me!!!!

@Glitchymn1 why do so many dinners per year? I would start drop them all apart from Christmas then invite them over for a random dinner that is not linked to any event. Your kids would probably like time with just you as they will have noticed their grandmothers are hard work.

OP my mother's now dead. She made it clear when she was alive the children who should be doing Mother's Day stuff for her were her childless children. (That's because it's actually Mothering Sunday.)Even then she just expected a card and a gift to be able to watch more TV.

I'd say I first enjoyed Mother's Day without stress when MIL was no longer the main mother it was about, so when I was 52 and ds was 17.

Neither my DM nor my MIL was narcissistic or demanding but my MIL did expect a visit, lunch etc from my dh which meant there wasn't any room for me to have a day I enjoyed. Ds does a card and I'm happy with that, but if I'm honest I'd expect as and when his partner becomes a mother that the emphasis would be on her.

I’m the same as you, DM and MIL get collected, fed (starters, big roast, desserts, nibbles), watered, dropped home. Flowers, decent choc, wine gifts. My DM is a good un to be fair, but there’s no acknowledgement from either DM/MIL that I’m a mother too. DH often isn’t even here for this meal as he’s travelling back from work.

We don’t go out as DM can’t manage/doesn’t like it too busy. It would be much easier to go out, no cleaning up!
Posted about this before and was told you just have to stop and make it your own. This time I’m going on holiday, so both will get gifts dropped to them but I’m not cooking.

I already do a lot of dinners, Easter, Christmas, even Halloween. So I’m intending not to feel too guilty, but I will.

I have a narc mum. Emotional abuse and all the scars. Stopped doing Mother’s Day absolutely years ago now. My family do Mother’s Day for me: tea in bed, flowers and we spend the day together, go for an outing. It means a lot to me. I feel guilty for my mum. I don’t call on Mother’s Day. It’s a bit of a principle really. Not sure but I think my DBro does the same although we haven’t discussed it.
Well done taking a first step. I’ve found it helps to adopt an approach of “never complain, never explain”. If you complain about DM’s narc behaviour it will BLOW UP. If you explain your decision to fuck her off on Mother’s Day it will BLOW UP. Just quietly do what you want.
Terrifying until it becomes the new normal.
A few horrid texts and voicemails that go unanswered are usually be enough to stop the shitty behaviour.
Easier said than done, I know.

@GettingChunkier ride it out and don't give in to your mum or dad. Stand firm, say that from 2025 you are making a change and it is your day. It would be lovely if your dad could support you in that but he has also been conditioned and is expecting you to make his life easier. Don't rescue him, rescue yourself.

Stay at home, spend it how you wish, how you deserve. It will be difficult and you will feel guilty because that's what she does to you. But in retrospect it will be a huge step.

For me mothers day is about sharing the joy and acknowledging our supportive relationships with each other through the generations. However my DH grew up with a neglectful mother and there is no supportive or positive relationship to celebrate and yet he still buys her a card and takes her flowers the day before.

Like yourself he feels obligated and the fall out of not doing anything, is worse than a trip to deliver a card and flowers.

I wish there were Mother’s Day cards that said
“I’m sure you did your best”

because that’s all I feel about that witch

sometimes ds invites me and my dm for a meal
this year i may meet dm, my dd i may persuade to come too
when my dc were younger it was about me,
now, less so

My mum moaned about how she’d had to organise lunch out on some
of her latter mothers days when we were older teens and I pointed out that I’d been the one to organise a whole family meal out for my first Mother’s Day (was happy to do it). Like every time when she looks like a hypocritical dick, she seethed visibly, but knew she couldn’t contradict me. My favourite is when she complains about her poor treatment as a child and I point out she did the exact same thing to me - HATES that and usually denies it ever happened. Also when she spends a long time venting and criticising the nasty, selfish and controlling behaviour of her older brother but again gets very angry if I say my brother (her golden child) did/does the same to me. Won’t hear a word against him. Probably bc he’s so like her.

She can be a fucking nightmare and altho I’m learning to ignore comments the older I get it still pisses me off to fuck. And she claims her mother was a self-absorbed narcissist - totally oblivious.

How kind and nice you are.

Dc - mid teens give me home made cards or bought, breakfast in bed. Flowers if .
Dh makes me my fave cake. We don't go out because he is a very good cook.
We don't do anything madly different tbh, as apart from the cards/ flowers it's a normal Sunday:)

My dm and mil have passed away. Mil would have got flowers and a call from DH - but we lived in different countries and if there would have been expected to have spent the entire day with her and made a giant fuss if we didn't. Dh always caved. I didn't so always caused a row.

My dm was different and would have been embarrassed if made a fuss over. But was always surprising her with little treats when could afford it, gardening mags in the post etc. She didn't expect anything. But always popped in, called, etc.

Why don't the DF's make it easier on their grown up adults with children and make a fuss of the 'old bats with attitude' organising a meal out for the 2 of them (plus nan) to take the bloody pressure off everyone. Not much help to anyone being passive aggressive towards you is it. There are so many families struggling with mother's day issues where grandma's think it's their chance to stick the boot in - it's so childish and just ruins it for everyone.

@GettingChunkier were either of your grandmothers alive when you were a child?

Just wondering if they were around, what treatment they got?