As you get older, is it normal to find your mum increasingly irritating?

[makeminealeosayer]

I do mine. She is baby boomer age. She used to be very easy going, laid back, open minded. Now she is very DM in views, moans about immigrants, generally uptight and of a curtain-twitcher mentality. Anybody else found this?

My mum is a baby boomer but as far from a DM reader as possible. She puts me to absolute shame: very involved in politics, goes on marches against war / cuts etc though in poor health, gives lots of money to charity, she's even better at doing the recycling than me. She's also incredibly kind and generous. However, she still drives me to distraction and I can't even feel morally superior......

The older I get, the more I understand my mum and the more I value everything she and my dad did for me as a child and still do now. My mum had a virtually non-existent relationship with her own mother, as the youngest - unwanted - child of a large and poor family. That she's somehow forged her own mothering role without having had any role models is something that really impresses me, and something I wish I'd thought about more when I was a teenager.
My parents' support through a young marriage and young-ish motherhood (twice), not to mention returning to university to do my doctorate (all whilst my DH has deployed abroad frequently) has really driven home how much I love and value them. I reflect back upon my teenage stage of mentally blaming mum for lots of things in my life with a great deal of shame, although I accept that it was a sign of immaturity not malevolence.

Of course mum and I are completely capable of driving each other up the wall still, but I look at my daughters and pray that I can be as good a mum as she is. I'm very different to her and, yes, as she and dad get older I see their views change and their patience reduce, but it's nothing compared to the revelations of their love that I've had through loving my own children.
And now I'm crying ... great! I hope that one day I get up the courage to tell them all this. As a family we don't really talk about feelings. I also hope that when the children are a little older I can start trying to give them the practical assistance and time that they've always given me (they live more than eight hours' drive away). Right now they're both well, but I'm uncomfortably aware of how fast that might change.
Sorry if that was unbearably cheesy.

And another thing! She treats me as if I was still about 6 and when I go to stay I am instructed on how to hang my towel up, how to clean the bath and when I volunteered to clean her kitchen floor I got about 1/2 hour of instruction and constant supervision and "constructive" comments about my performance while I did it. I am 55, married 27 years and have brought up 2 sons.

I used to revere my mum as a child - i now see all her shortcomings and yes she irritates me. Still love her of course - but I remember as a child thinking that if anything happened to her I wouldn't be able to live through it and I regret the weakening of that bond. As per other posters mothers, she is obsessed with minutiae, overly opinionated .....and she repeats the same anecdotes endlessly. However I will always totally respect her for her stoicism - she has struggled with severe debilitating shingles, macular degeneration, skin cancer and now a life threatening heart condition but she doesn't complain or wallow, but simply gets on with it

Started to read rest of thread - barnebear

Wow Sailorvie we are on the same page ...i'm a baby boomer and my mother has always been like yours..only it has taken me all of 60 years to totally break away...she has a partner who is younger than her..so i dont feel too guilty that we dont meet very often..phone calls are the way to go.
today she told me how clever she thinks i am.(i'm not) btw.it has taken ALL these years...but then she did say....erm..who is the Prime Minister...then remembered quite quickly..

Wish she was still in my life.

aah Rosie

I believe that as you get older it's normal to find your children increasingly irritating . . .

Crumbs, everything and everybody become increasingly irritating. It's one of the joys of aging. Enjoy!

My Mum's horrific menopause clashed with my equally terrible adolescence. Fun times
It took the birth of DD (was almost thirty) for us to become close. She was the only person (XH couldn't give a toss) who worshipped her like I did and would never tire of listening to my PFB ravings.

Now her dementia is just galloping. Apparently Winston Churchill was PM the last time the GP asked but in a bittersweet way I'm glad that she can recall that much as I know it will get worse and next year she might not even know who I am.

But yes, in her prime she did get more irritating. My Dad was a right miserable git until my Mother became ill and now he is much better - as if he is developing and exercising patience muscles which he never had at any time of his life before He didn't have much to do with raising my sister and I when we were young and was wholly unsympathetic about DS who is autistic but now it's like he suddenly gets it... which is good as we're having to pull together as a family.

A Mam lost forever

A Nanna sadly missed
But in our hearts she lives
In all of those she kissed

Remember her living
Cherish the time we shared
The moments are fleeting
But those memories are there

Mam and Nanna to one and all
She loved and lived and smiled
In her sleep she will not weep
For those she reconciled

A precious last breath
Eased from her peace
She even smiled
With the relief of release.

Family around her made her happy
The love of those who tended
Duty bound and with affection
As her life so sadly ended

Think of her in good times

Wear her badge with pride
Hug her memory with your thoughts
And she?ll always be at your side.

Goodbye Mam we love you
We held you softly in your pain
We miss you now and forever
Until we are in your arms again

I lost my Mum last year and she was a serial complainer.

But I wish she were here complaining right now.

Enjoy your Mums if you can ladies.

Not cheesy Frozen that was lovely.

Can I ask how people deal with the repeated anecdotes?

I have jumped in with MIL (she is so long-winded, I can spot her preambles) and said breezily "Oh yes, I remember that! It was funny..." but she clearly hates it, her eyes narrow and she sometimes goes on to tell the story anyway, I'm sure just to teach me my place.

There must be a better way. I swear if I hear the story again of how she began her first garden (for example) I may say something I regret.

I love my Mum, she made sure we had a wonderful childhood - shit happened but she shielded us as much as possible. It was only reading MN that I realised that no everyone had the childhood I did. (I made her cry when I text her to say thankyou after reading a particularly sad thread) She's been a constant support from school/friendship/bf issues right through to careers/marriage/children and every serious or trivial issue in between.

She's made mistakes, we've pissed each other many times but I know in my heart that she loves us and that's all that matters. I hope one day my DD can say the same.

I live in London, and my mum is in Sweden, so whenever I see her - it's for a long period of time and 24/7. She either stays at our house, or we stay at theirs.
Every single time I tell myself "Be more patient. Hold your tongue", but every time I end up getting annoyed at her and then I feel guilty.
Most of the time we are great friends though.
I am very happy to say she is NOT rasist. She doesn't seem to be able to grasp the fact that women actually WANT to be muslims though. She thinks they should all be saved from the burkas and their dominating husbands/dads.

Arachnaphobic - you really must tell your grandparents that they are not allowed to say things that are rasists in front of your child. Even at three years old children pick up what they hear!

I'm 51,my Mum's 86.

She rang last night to say she'd had a fall but is ok...no broken bones but a bashed up face,two black eyes and steri strips across her nose.

She is nearly 200 miles away...and i'm going up tomorrow.

She has the ability to drive me fucking bonkers with some of her comments about my weight or other observations but...

She is the kindest Mum and the very best Grandma i/we could have and i've been dreading that phone call for years.

Nah, my mum is brill and so relaxed about life She's usually the one to give me perspective rather than the other way round, she's really open-minded and always seems to be thinking of other people and helping them out. Puts me to shame!

My dad, now he has his moments and he is definitely a bit set in his ways; but he's alright too really.

Oh God my mum drives me mad. I live near her, and have done for the last few years after a long time of living hundreds of miles away.
I am also somewhat dependent on her for occasional babysitting as I am a single parent, and sometimes I feel that she tries to get me to be more dependent because it makes her feel in control.
Having said that if I specifically ask her if she can babysit one night because I want to go out (this is about every 5 weeks, and she never offers) she acts all uptight and offended, as if she doesn't think going out is important.
In fact one of the things that worries me is that since she stopped working she hardly leaves the house, has no hobbies and refuses to do any kind of class or activity.
At Christmas she becomes a flustered nightmare because she has a small number of family over on xmas day. She will spend three weeks washing sheets.
I had her over for xmas day once-never again! She wouldn't have anything to drink, not even a fresh cup of tea. She insisted in sipping cold tea "for the liquid" and sat clutching her handbag the whole time!

She treats me like a child, corrects my grammar constantly and interferes with things to do with ds, often in secret.
When he was a baby she wrote in his medical book without asking, and recently she let him play alone in her front garden after I had asked he not too, and he got out and wandered onto the road. She never told me about this-ds did.
She has no respect for my way of doing things and has to be in the right about everything.
She undermines my authority all the time, and rolls her eyes if I give ds time out, talks over me if I tell him off about something. Once I told him off and she told me to shut up!
What worries me is that since my siblings live a long way away, it will just be me and my mum as she gets older and even more batty...

northernwreck

I understand my mother better as I age.

reelinginthe years- I actually begun writing that thinking it was kind of funny but having read it over, I guess it is a bit sad!
We can get on ok on the whole, I just think things would be better if I lived a lot further away, and if I had a partner!
Actually, what I would love is if she had a partner-she has been alone for years, but there is no way she would ever do online dating or anything.
I think if she was in a relationship she would be a lot better.

My parents got divorced after 28 years of marriage (my Dad fucked off and we never saw him again).
I wish my Mum had found someone else.

She has her friends but she still gets lonely.

LaPrune - I deal with repeated anecdotes by most of the time smiling and switching off - although if I can't bear to hear it one more time, I do say you have already told me this. My parents live quite a way away so I have kind of got used to when visiting, that I will hear any "news" in the first 20 minutes of my visit and the rest of the visit will be "listening" to repeats of what I have already been told.

But it used to drive my mum crackers with her mum - who was just the same. My DP stops me telling anecdotes again and again - but without DP I fear I would be the same!

HMM - partially I agree with the op as I find my mum v irritating now I am rapidly approaching middle age. But when I was a teenager I hated my Mum - she was very depressed and attempted suicide a couple of times and my Father was very ill and died when I was 18 so I resented her for being 'selfish' when the family was going through such a difficult time.

In my twenties I relented and was much more understanding and less resentful more grateful. Then I had my own children and some of her actions/ behaviours particularly in relation to my father while I was growing up became even more inexplicable to me. I don't think I can truly forgive her for some of her choices now I have my own family. So things have been cyclical and may change again as we gets older.