to feel like my DM has completely whitewashed my childhood?

oh yes i completely agree. My mum would say the same, she said some awful stuff and didn’t keep me safe which had consequences.

I am so sorry that happened to you. Its incredibly common for children with poor, neglectful, or abusive parenting to take the blame for what happened to them and only really start to realize it was wrong when they have their first child.

People have told me “I assumed I had done something wrong/was the problem but I can see my own baby is innocent. If they don’t deserve the treatment I got perhaps I didn’t either.”

No mater what, DD will never go to hospital for an unrelated matter only to discover historic (badly healed) fractures caused by me. That’s just one “small” way in which we are very different parents.

In the context she uses it, just reply with “oh, I don’t care about that” . If she blusters because how could you possibly not (my mum does that) I say “I have other priorities “. That normally quiets her down.

But in fact children who have been severely abused by parents and caregivers are more likely to forgive, excuse, and minimize or naturalize the abuse than name it and claim it in public.

Thank you, this is very true. I guess because it’s “normal” to us. I am still in contact with my mum despite trying to cut her off several times. There’s a barrier I do not understand and cannot get passed. It took me having my first child when I was in my early twenties to even start realising that she was a horrific mother. I will and have defended and shielded my children from her behaviour (it’s not all physical abuse certainly not now she’s older and “frail”). I even defend my husband. I cannot seem to do that for myself so easily.

well done for breaking the cycle! I don’t think you will get closure from her. I certainly didn’t get any from mine. I think previous generations didn’t have the same culture of self analysis and reflection and owning your mistakes, validating other people’s experiences etc. They grew up indoctrinated with ‘I’m the parent I’m right’. I have found both my parents and DH’s to double down and be rigidly confident about how right they were, and are completely unable to accept any differing viewpoints. Whereas if my children said they were upset about something in their childhood, I would listen, reflect, and take on board what they had to say.

What is wrong with you? How dare you minimize, dismiss, and condescend to the OP and every other person on this thread who have described out and out abuse as just some kind if child’s misunderstanding.

Your assertion that children report parents shouting when the parents are only speaking firmly is totally irrelevant to this discussion. Its true that at some ages children are unreliable narrators. Or a child may report something like a parent scaring or hitting them because it was so unusual it stays in their memory as significant long after the parent has forgotten what happened in the heat of the moment. Bit we aren’t talking about these cases.

But in fact children who have been severely abused by parents and caregivers are more likely to forgive, excuse, and minimize or naturalize the abuse than name it and claim it in public.

I really hate these comfortable pieties of bad parenting “oh Im sure your children will complain about your parenting one day.” Bullshit. I respect and love my parents snd my children respect and love me as a parent because I raised them, as I was raised, with love and caring and respect for their individual natures. I am 65 and my daughters are 29 and 26. They don’t complain about childhood treatment and we pretty much share our memories of what happened and why. If they did complain I would owe it to them to listen and apologize as I had the power over them at the time.

My mother does this. She once told me how upsetting it was for her when she heard me raise my voice to one of my children (I shouted because he bit his sister hard enough to draw blood!). Anyway, I completely fucking lost it at my mother and reminded her that not only did she shout a lot at my siblings and I but she hit us, threw stuff at us (plates, chairs, anything to hand), chased me down threatening to wring my neck, dragged me out of the bath when I was 3 by my hair because I splashed water on the floor… anyway I told her she was a shit mum. She “didn’t remember” any of it. Sure Jan. she said she did her best at the time. Honestly, some people, if their best is being utterly shit and abusive they have no business having kids.

The reality of the parent/child relationship means that it is very rare for both parties to remember everything exactly the same way. The obvious power imbalance, the cognitive and emotional development that occurs during childhood, the changing cultural expectations of behaviour for both parents and children, etc. all combine to make an "objective" version of events highly unlikely. For instance, sometimes children will say that they were shouted at, when a parent or teacher simply used a firm tone. The children aren't lying, that is genuinely how they experienced the incident.

I'm absolutely not saying that you are wrong in your recollections. And maybe on some level your mother feels guilty that she wasn't always the kindest or most nurturing parent, and for that reason she tries to paint an unrealistic picture of herself as Supermum. But at the same time, I expect that your own children will one day describe their childhoods in different terms to the way you would. 'Twas ever thus.

I could have written your post with how I was brought up. I've had therapy around this and it's helped but I still struggle with my relationship with my mum. I tend to grey rock her now if I find it all too much and keep her at arms length.

Apologies if you have said this and I missed it but when were you born / brought up.

I had a lot of comments about tidiness and how our house was spotless as kids but mine with my kids is a “total tip”. There are other examples too. Like PPs I value other things so yep my house is messier (it’s never a “total tip” but it’s not a show home).

I just started saying “yeah, I have a different focus, for me it’s more about: teaching my child how to bake/enjoying watching them play with craft materials/wanting them to feel soothed by the sand or flour or whatever/letting their dexterity develop with different tasks (etc). My focus isn’t on being super tidy”. And then stop. No further explaining.

Ditto my kids had to eat in the car as we travelled longer distances than in my childhood, again I have said things like “yeah we do eat in the car. It doesn’t bother me in the same way it bothered you. We’re all different”

if the digs continued I just kept up “we have different values / my focus is different you yours” dialogue.

Children were bought up differently in different times. Best just get on with life, and do better with your own kids. Rehashing the past achieves nothing.

My estranged father is the same. Absolutely no idea why I won’t talk to him and I’m “not right in the head” meanwhile he was an angry temperamental bully I was terrified of and hated from a young age

Consider NC

My mother does that too. A total rewrite of my childhood where she becomes some kind of cross between Mary Poppins and Mother Teresa. The truth is……very far from that.
But, I’ve done the work and I’ve processed it, it’s her problem not mine. I very deliberately became someone who is nothing like her and I’m proud of that. She however is very disgruntled that I keep her at very arms length (after basically ignoring me for the entirety of my childhood, other than to tell me how very disappointing I was and how I’d never amount to anything. Safe to say, I’ve surprised her and she’s pissed off about that 🤣)

She knows very little about my life. I’m happy, she’s not. That’s the way it goes.

Maybe the frequency of contact with your DM should be reduced from occasional to practically never. She doesn't bring anything positive to your life and she has re-written history and insists that her version of events is correct.

That must be both annoying and upsetting. Having your own children can often shine a light on the the way you were parented and bring back painful memories. Your mum will never acknowledge her parenting failings and will continue with her self-praise and congratulations so I'd give her a wide berth.

When I was a kid I was beaten. I dont mean the odd slap which was common in the 1950s and early 1960s. I mean beaten with a belt or fists. My father had a very violent temper. Later my mother told me I had imagined it. When I discussed this ltaer with a friend she said "Well I didnt imagine you coming to my house with bruises
and big hand prints on your arms". She validated my experience. When I tried to talk to my mother and sister about what happened they blanked me and denied me my own reality. After that I went low contact.

My mother is very similar, not physically abusive but very psychologically abusive- I found the only way to deal with it was not to talk about the past, I would challenge if she brought it up- if she got angry , tough.
When she says you knew better when seeing your children's behaviour say "yes but you hit us so we had to do what we were told" That will bring it to a head she will either deny it or say you should hit your kids- either way you have won. Should she deny it say well I'm afraid you can't see your grandchildren until you can accept your behaviour as a parent.
Don't expect your mother to change- mine is 87 and has a terminal diagnosis , she still maintains she wzas a perfect perent. You have to find your limit for this bullshit , and stick to it.

I worked as a therapist with an incredibly damaged woman. She had been vilely abused as a child and was pretty crazy in lots oof ways. We started therapy (mandated) with her screaming abuse at me.

She had a terrible relationship with her own son,and had told him when he was a child that she had “found him in a rubbish bin” but could not understand how that had profoundly crushed him.

I really liked her and we got along well. But she was just incapable of anything more than rudimentary functioning and reasoning. She could act and react but she could not pause and reflect or change her behavior.

Think you've missed the part where the OP says her mum gets angry and defensive when she tries to talk about it.

You can't have an adult "oh we see things differently/norms have changed" conversation with someone like that.

OP, YANBU unreasonable. I hope you find a way to manage this. Still looking for one myself. While I no longer feel the need for my parents to actively acknowledge how they raised us, I also can't tolerate the selective memories/rewriting history. And even the slightest pushback from me results in such reactivity, I end up feeling even worse.
Good luck to us all hey!

Threads such as these are MN at its very best
for which I am thankful, the cathartic effect
invaluable,
the self awareness and eloquence shown,
the counsellor/therapist fees superfluous
thank you all

I would have to say thing as well.

’no, we didn’t do xyz because you hit us and we were scared of you, have you forgotten?!’