Cockroach Cafe - come and try our new sunroom

Merry Christmas to all here

Happy Christmas and a cockroach New Year x

Merry Christmas all 🎄

Thank you for the friendship and good advice

See you in 2022! 🙏

Thanks @MereDintofPandiculation.

She really is wonderful, I'm very lucky.

I'm going to try for a few days away from t'internet so will wish everyone a happy and uneventful Christmas and leave this here.. 🌲☃️🍾🎅

I married very young and was planning not to have children. I was lucky to marry a man who was a direct replica of my dad. Just like my dad, my DH Is such a good father and is adored everyone. My DiLs and SiL have always come to him for advice before their own parents. We sometimes went on holiday with them and it was such a wonderful relaxing time.

When I see them with their children and what happy nurturing relationships they have with them and each other, it makes my heart sing.

When we were dating, whenever we went out with friends, i would wait for the inquest after we left them. The taking apart of my clothes, hair my make up, my behaviour and criticism of what I had said. I had no idea that I was conditioned to expect this. He never ever criticised me and I think I loved him for that..

@Ieatmarmite

That's terribly sad. I'm so sorry your mum had that kind of impact on your lives.

@florentina1 Your remark about "learning how not to be a mother" is a way of thinking I wish I'd had when I was younger. I chose not to have children - I was scared that I would end up messing up their lives in the same way I think my parents messed up the lives of me & my siblings. I look at us and the 3 of us are damaged. I never talked to my siblings about this until a very recent conversation with my brother, who expressed the same thoughts about having children that I've had.

We were sitting on a beach at the time and nearby there were a couple of children playing and that's when we started the conversation. He told me he regretted not having children and the reason why he'd chosen not to have any. I'd never admitted it to anyone before, but I also am sad that I didn't have children.

Thank you @florentina1 good to hear from you.
minty get planning your independence. Your dm doesn’t deserve you.
opal hope you get some sleep- it sounds so tough🌺🌺.
knot how are you doing? Please natter away here any time.
🌺🌺🌺 to all

I find posts by those who have come out the other side among the most informative and often poignant. @florentina1 it sounds like you have navigated a rather different path to that of your DM

Thank you so much for acknowledging my post. This board was a life saver for me.

One recurring thing that young women ask about on MN concerns their own parenting skills when they have had such awful parents. Will they be the same as their Mothers? I fretted about this the whole time when they were small. In fact, I truly believed that when they were adults they would dislike me.

I reply that, what you are learning, is ‘How not to be a Mother’ I am so lucky to have a wonder relationship with all of my children as do they with each other. I have 8 grandchildren and very best moment of my life was when they told me that they wanted to raise their children in the same way that they were raised..

Because of my Mother’s Alzheimer’s, my daughter gave me a book where you can write your life history. It had many interesting questions. It took me two years before I could begin filling it in. I asked her if she wanted all of the truth or just to answer the factual questions. She wanted to know everything. It took me almost another two years to complete. It was so hard to write without crying.

@florentina1

@florentina1 I've had a few name changes along the way but my mum got sectioned in 2015 and then mhu/care homes ever since. She is now 90.
I remember you from around that time as a regular on these boards with loads of wisdom already painfully gathered after fraught times
Please keep posting your thoughts regularly here because you have a clarity that only comes after a period of distance and relative calm [pardon pun]. We can all benefit from your experience

The clockwise thing apparently mimics the way your intestines move, so you're kind of, um, encouraging things to move along.
Junior Engineer used to do that legs in the air and produce some amazing farts, so prepare for festive flatulence right there - and that's even before you've got on the sprouts!!!

Ah Florentina love I hear you loud and clear - especially at this time of year when we get told so often "Christmas is for FAMILY!"
Apart from when, for whatever reason, it isn't.....

Opal way back in the mists of time the Junior Engineer as a very small Small used to get awful constipation - tell DS to rub his tummy, clockwise, gently! (or lie on his left hand side, that apparently takes the pressure off "things internal" though that may be one of those weird Lancashire old wives' tales...)

I have not visited this forum for ages but just wanted to wish you all well.

I was a whipping boy for my mum for 70 years. Like many of you, everyone else thought she was wonderful. My lovely dad died at 50 and she married soon after. She chose someone just like her.

She told him so many lies about her life. I know he thought I was the worse person ever. I could never argue with her as she was so articulate, she would crucify me every time.

I did so much for them. Through his own stubbornness ,refusing medical help, he had a leg amputated. That meant she went into a care home for 5 years dying at 94. He was 8 years younger so then I had 5 years of caring for the most nasty man that ever lived.

My wealthy brother did nothing except make sure he got his share of the Estate. I, of course, dealt with all that too.When he asked me what I would do with my share. I told him it was going to my three children as it would choke me to spend a penny of it. He said I was insane.

She went on about that money at every opportunity. My DH family were poor so she loved to say how much her house was worth and how rich we would be when she was gone.

When they had both gone, I felt that I had been freed from from a life prison sentence. I wish had been able to walk away, but the guilt trap is so strong.

Sorry that was so much longer than I thought it would be.

I'm so tired
Ds2 says he feels OK this morning 🙄
I've started him on some lactose anyway
I've text mum to tell her I won't be going down til later.
Dh finishes work today so if ds2 is up again tonight dh can deal with him.
I've had a dreadful week sleep wise and really didn't need this
I feel a migraine coming on...

Oh Blimey Opal hope you get a break later on.

Thanks both for the suggestions.

DD got a job as soon as she finished her GCSEs and then got offered another for a charity she's volunteered with for a couple of years (paid). She did both over the summer and now just works for the charity and is likely to get a few extra hours in the new year.

The manager and trustees have already been talking about keeping her in when she goes to uni as most of her job can be done remotely.

She pays for her mobile phone, gym membership and buys her own clothes, make-up and most toiletries as well as saving each month so she's already contributing a fair bit bless her. We are funded for her college travel and her bus pass covers 24/7 so I'm only taxiing when she goes something that finishes late.

It's stuff that crops up like driving lessons that can be problematic. Her dad has very helpfullybeen looking up insurance for her but not once suggested that he actually pay for it .

Been up all night with ds2 who had abdo pain (constipation I think)
Ugh
He fu ally went to sleep at 4.30 and dh woke me at 7.30
Marvellous

Oh @AfterEightMintyCedric :(
I do get it, but I'm sure your dd would rather have you happy and healthy and dancing to the tune of your narc mother :(
And if you worked you could buy her these things?
I'd call her bluff - take round some brochures for homes.
Tbh it's what she needs...constant companionship.

I mean yes to NI credits