Anyone else find Mother's Day cards uncomfortable to read?

[ContessaDiPulpo]

By that I mean the cards that pop up as adverts, not the ones I actually receive from my darling DC!

All these cards saying things like 'You're the best mum', 'You always have my back', 'You look after me and I love you for it' etc. I find myself reading them and becoming slightly sad at just how few of them would have applied to my own maternal situation. My DM died several years ago so this is admittedly somewhat of an academic problem, but I still find myself revisiting it every year.... I always end up thinking of that phrase from Philip Larkin, the one about the effort to find 'Words at once true and kind, Or not untrue and not unkind.'

Just posting for solidarity really!

[ContessaDiPulpo]

[quote MrsBobDylan]@SunshineCake the truth is there are people who think giving birth allows a woman to repeatedly fail her child but still be forgiven. And that forgiveness is is the 'right' choice if we want to heal and move on.

Well fuck that. I prefer to stay angry and full of vitriolic hatred [/quote]
MrsBobDylan I understand your preference, althoughmust admit I had an unsettling moment some years ago on this point. I was reading a history of the Mitford sisters (yes, I know) and there was a bit where Nancy, the eldest, described lying in bed in her apartment in Paris and mentally rehashing all the things her mother had done badly in their childhood. Nancy was 63 at the time of this letter. I remember that shook me, the idea of spending another 25-30 years being really viscerally angry at something that couldn't be changed. I'm not saying it made a difference to my feelings about my mother, but it was an eye-opening thought.

Again, my sympathy to everyone who goes through the card-buying ordeal every year....

[SunshineCake]

For everyone who dreads today, please find some time to do something for yourself that you wouldn't normally get chance to do.

Usually something happens to upset me in Mother's Day. A child does nothing, dh and I have a tiff about past MD as we did last year, I end up doing too many chores as usual.

Today, I asked dh to go all out and I am thinking about how I am the mum and not thinking about how shit mine was. I am not washing all the bedding as usual or doing any laundry, dishwasher duties or cooking. I'm opening Christmas chocolates. Doggy will be allowed on the bed shortly. All small things but good things. I will ring my friends in their 80s who looked after me as a small child and come off the phone feeling loved and grateful I have them.

Take anything you can to get bit through the day but to change how it usually goes.

.

[Blustered]

I was in M&S shopping for a Mother’s Day card this week and there were about 20 gushy ‘you’re such a special, amazing mum, always there for me’ etc etc cards and one that said ‘happy mother’s day’ with a non-gushy message something along the lines of hope you have a very happy day.

I got that card and it was the second to last one. There were plenty of the others left. It made me wonder at the time if it wasn’t so uncommon for people not to feel their mother’s warranted such a heartfelt card.

[FunnyWonder]

I remember DP saying years ago that the perfect card for his mum would just read 'You are my mother'. Nothing else. Because, as far he's concerned, that's about it.

She loves gushy verses and reads them carefully, believing every word. There are five siblings, three of whom are no longer speaking to her. DP's younger sister still lives with her and happily fulfils her mother's need for affirmation by giving her sickeningly gushing cards (even though the woman has made her life a misery and stripped her of so much self confidence, she still lives 'at home' in her late thirties). This pisses me off, even though it's none of my business, because as long as someone is telling her how wonderful she is, she will cling onto that as a true version of herself.

[Heysiriyoutwat]

My mum was horrible.

She died when I was 11, but every year my dad forced me to write a sickly sweet card that he would laminate and put on her grave. When I got to 16, I refused. He still does it on my behalf. I got sent a photo this morning of one he's going to take to the grave saying "you are the best mum ever, all my love, hey Siri"

If that woman was still alive I'd have cut her out of my life as soon as I could, but still, he persists!

[HandyBendySandy]

My mum was lovely, but she died in May last year without ever opening her mother's day card. It's fine, we knew what we were to each other - miss you today mum. I always got her a card that said something not too excessively gushing, but maybe a little bit twee that we would both cackle at like a pair of witches. But we would both be a bit shiny eyed.

Poor DH, on the other hand, is stoically going through the torture of visiting his mother today with a suitable card because he is doing his duty. She has done many evil, dreadful things in her life and she is a poisonous, black-hearted, duplicitous liar. She has 7 siblings, 3 children and 7 grandchildren and an ASBO yet only her 2 sons still speak to her - I think that says a lot about a person. DH will bite his tongue through all the bitter vitriol and hatred she can spew for a maximum of an hour - her card simply says "Mum - On Mother's Day".

[HedgeOwl]

It’s getting harder to find cards that just say “happy mother’s/Father’s Day” without the gushing to send to parents who really aren’t the worlds best mum/dad!

[HedgeOwl]

Very sorry to all those missing their mums today who had wonderful mums.

[minniemoocher]

I choose one that's only got basic wording eg happy Mother's Day on the front and with love inside, I love my mother but hate card wording. Dd2 sent me beautiful flowers which had a card with she could choose the words, dd1 lives with me but is yet to grace me with her presence and I seriously doubt she will have bought me a card - she has medical issues

[ContessaDiPulpo]

Hugs to all who find this a hard day

I got one card from DS1 where he'd made me look like a cartoon villain (he admitted this was an accident but still hilarious) and one from DS2 which showed the forces of good slaying my enemies. There is no gush. It's wonderful.

Am thinking of my sister a bit today - I still mark Mother's day because I am one, but she doesn't have any new associations with the day since our mum died. That must make it harder

[SunshineCake]

@HandyBendySandy Your poor DH. Please tell him there is a stranger here who stands behind him while he goes through the shitty motions for a woman who doesn't deserve it and who is cheering him on to release him so that Mother's Day 2022 never happens for her and him as a collective but he focuses on himself and his family.

[cafenoirbiscuit]

I have been known to snort in derision and argue with the verses in the cards when I’m choosing for mil. She places great store on the verses in the cats - a minimum of 3 rhyming ones, there needs to be a paper insert, and a ribbon.

[cafenoirbiscuit]

Cats? Card

[Ginqueen20]

I am glad to see a thread full of other people like me (although sorry you all experience it too). I have never been close to my mum after an abusive childhood, I finally cut her off recently and I feel relief that today wasn’t about her. I would always find the 29p card in the card factory with a generic happy Mother’s Day and no message instead, then a cheap box of chocolates. Now I don’t have to make the effort and I’m much happier not having such a nasty person in mine and my children’s lives. to you all.