.. to be really cross with my mum and her inability to respect boundaries

[delphinedownunder]

i have some health problems at the moment. A pain in my side and a heap of bleeding has turned out to be a giant ovarian cyst. It has taken quite a bit of work and more than a little table thumping to get to this place - my GP was very difficult about referring me, blaming my problems on a fibroid and so i am pretty fed up with the whole thing already. i am currently waiting on some blood tests and these will determine my treatment.

Best case, i will have an op and a four day stay in my local hospital in a couple of weeks. Worst case, i will have everything out, lymph glands investigated and chemo at a big hospital 300 miles away. Various scenarios in between. So I have told my Mum the best case option and have vaguely alluded to other options once the tests are back.

I should be up front and say that i find my Mum really hard work - she makes everything about her, she bangs on about stuff and is really judgmental. Luckily she lives in a different and faraway country.

She knows how i feel about privacy - we have had disagreements about this before. However, she has once again told loads of her old lady mates all about my current health issues and when she rings me, I get inundated with old lady opinions and anecdotes, as well as her take on my illness, which is largely uninformed bollocks. I don't respond at all, but inside i am fuming. The terminology also aggravates me beyond all reason - troubles 'down there', 'ladies' bits' womens' problems, all that shit. And if I use a proper medical term like, gasp, uterus, she tuts and says I am vulgar. I just want her to shut up. I want facts and a way forward, not a load of old wifey nonsense and emotional banging on about how she is really feeling this because she might lose a daughter (and she doesn't know the half of it). For fucks sake, i have 5 year old twins and yet she doesn't even mention them. I know I am probably less than balanced on this, because inside I am concerned and upset, but I just want to know what I can say to her that will put her in her box and think before she opens her mouth. Help!

I hope all goes well with your operation.

delphinedownuinder bless you and so so sad for what is happening to you. I really don't know what to say except perhaps give her a need to know approach.The bare minimum, ie tests were ok. refuse to discuss any furhter or claim total ignorance and change the subject, keep the call brief. Is there anyone to filter her through like a sister or brother?

Obviously, you are never going to get a sensible and rational conversation with someone who makes everything about them, playing to the gallery regards it with her friends. I call it a game of Granny One Up Man.... I had that but worse. I knew someone had that, and so on. It gives them something to get their knickers in a twist about. Don't worry, it will be someone else next week.

She is worried, but in her own unique way. Mine is like this, an almost obscene attraction for drama and pain which feeds something in her somewhere, so I give her tiny amounts and make it as bland as possible. Sorry, your mother is so self absorbed, I know how hard it is and it is a very lonely place. Have you got good friends in RL

I hope everything goes well for you, please let us know how you are.

I know lots of mums like this in my culture, it is very frustrating and lonely to have to deal with as you cannot ever really rely on someone who is so self obsessed for any support. Best of luck x

People like that need bluntness. They don't respect your feelings, don't respect theirs.

"Mom be quiet. You have no idea what your talking about and I am tired of the crap that you say."

Then change the subject.

She sounds like my MIL. DH, DD or I can't have anything without she's had it worse, has a friend who died from it, and she knows all about it because she trained alongside Florence Nightingale as a nurse.

You say "I want facts and a way forward". Your mum isn't the one to give you those things. Stop telling her about your health problems. Talk about the twins, the weather, anything but. If she tries to talk about your lady bits, tell her you're not talking about that today.

You're an adult - you don't need to do anything you don't want to do.

Sorry to hear about your health worries - I hope it all goes well.

Agree with ladytee

I hope that all goes well . I think you have to go with Ladytee's suggestion.

I forgot to say, hope everything is okay and it's minor in the end!

Hi, you mention it's a giant cyst. I've been exactly where you are now on the medical front and the fact it's giant would often indicate that your best case scenario is the more likely. I hope everything works out for you!

hope all goes well for you.
tell your mum she's being a pain and you don't want your medical condition discussing with random old ladies.

I hope the op goes well and you get best case results.

I have similar issues with my mother, so can empathise. In my case I stopped telling her anything at all about anything after she told gossipy friends about I health issue I had when I'd not told anyone other than her and DH (OT but one time she falsely told my DH that I was divorcing him ...after I'd complained to her casually about him being in a mood).

I haven't had the same health issues as you though, so it may be more difficult in your case. Agree with the poster who said be blunt with her, though I'm more of a coward if I'm honest.

Thanks for these words of advice. i maybe need to grow myself a backbone. Have never liked confrontation, but some well placed words and a need to know basis seem to be the way forward. Luckily I have some good friends in RL - not heaps, but a few and they are great. Also a supportive DH,who thinks my mother is an old goat!

I sympathise. Good luck.

So sorry you are going through this.

I would suggest saying, 'Mum, I have a great doctor and I trust him to advise me about my condition. It isn't helpful to me to hear your friends opinions because they don't have all the information'.

Really, what everyone else has said.

Glad to hear that you have medical treatment all lined up. Wishing you the quickest and most straightforward surgery & the quickest and most straightforward treatment and recovery.

Please do keep coming back to update us with what is going on. Plenty of MN-ers here to cheer, hand-hold, be factual, be silly, be supportive etc.

dont tell her then

simple

So sorry to hear about your health problems, but wtr to your mum, I can't see there's such a big problem there.

Old ladies discuss this stuff, they just do. I discuss most of my family stuff with my friends, I think it is normal.

They aren't doctors, they will always give personal, anecdotal 'advice', not qualified medical advice. But you have a doctor, so presumably that's well covered.

I feel a bit sorry for your mum - her DD is potentially very unwell, as a parent I can't imagine what that must feel like.

Of course its you who has to go through this, and I hope you have all the support that you need. But in a smaller way, those close to you are going through it too, and to a lesser but still important extent, they need support from their own soldiers too.

Hope it all goes well x

I can sympathise. My mother tells everyone my personal business as well. She even told a friend when we were TTC despite me & DH stating clearly we didn't want anyone to know.

Sadly it means I cannot trust my mum with anything that I wouldn't want strangers to know.

Don't tell her anything you aren't happy with the whole world discussing.

I have a different relationship with my mum to you, but I would just tell her that

• I asked her not to share this and she did, I am now furious and feel I can't trust her

-I am concerned about the health problems and need this ti be about me not about her and her friends -If she insists on discussing it I want her to use proper terms or I would rather not discuss it at all -I want her to ask about my twins, my life etc

• At the moment I am stressed and I cannot cope with her behaving in this way, if she can't talk to me in a way I can deal with I would rather not talk to her for a certain length of time/until its all over etc

I have put my mum on a talk time out because she was driving me nuts. She has done the same to me. It seemed to work.

MorrisZapp, a new perspective on my Mum was interesting - thanks. Sometimes I think i am too 'precious' about things being private, but being discussed/ the world and his wife knowing stuff makes me feel so uncomfortable I feel a little bit sick every time I have to talk to her. Of course, i could not tell her anything at all, but that would involve some direct lying - I can lie by omission quite comfortably, but find direct lying really difficult.

I have tried in the past to pull her up over this kind of thing with some clear rules (as per Ruby's suggestions). I got tears, 'I don't know what you mean', it's alright for you - you have your children and a husband (at the time my Dad was still alive, so i never really got that one) and stroppy phone putting down. I make a point of never putting down the phone in a strop - it's so childish and is one of my mother's favourite tricks.

As an aside, my mother and this weird attitude she has to things happening to other people being all about her is not new. When I was pregnant, she used to stress me out so much with her comments and discussions with old lady mates (we lived in the same country at that time) that my bp became uncontrollable and I ended up staying in hospital for 6 weeks. Now, you might say that this wasn't necessarily to do with my mother, but the nurses quickly spotted a bp pattern where my readings were off the scale around visiting time and once my bp was being taken as my mother actually turned up and it went haywire. My midwife asked her to calm down around me as she was affecting my health and she had a right paddy.The woman in the next room came to talk to me one day to offer some comfort as she said my mum sounded like a complete nightmare through the hospital walls!

When my twins were 15 months, my father-in-law died a very sad and lonely death in a hospital on the other side of the world. There was no time for my husband to get there in time, but he went a day later to arrange his fathers' affairs. I told my mum FIL was ill and she said it was probably nothing and then I told her my FIL had died and she said "I expect you'll be thinking you can ask us for help with the kids now that his lordship is away". I said "no, not unless you want to help" and looked after the kids on my own for three weeks - not that much of a deal, but a little hand with food shopping, or taking the poor old dog for a walk would have been nice. But helping me would not have been visible (we live in an isolated community 80 km from the supermarket) and i didn't get one visit and just a single snappy phone call, with the usual phone putting down.

This stuff is pouring out now so I'll stop and concentrate on the issue in hand..

She sounds like a mare!

About the ovarian cyst. I know it must be scary but the chances are it will be OK for you as a huge percentage are benign. Both mine (6cm by 6cm) were. Of course I was really worried but they were told me how unlikely it was to be anything serious.

If she's in another country then why discuss it with her at all? I only discuss medical stuff with my distant family after it has happened, histology back etc. Different if I saw them weekly and they'd notice I'd gone to hospital but there is nothing my family can do and I hate "what if" discussion and being fussed over. Keep it to you and your husband and just tell your mum stuff when it's sorted.

Agree that usually large ovarian cycsts are good news.

Well, lots of comfort here is terms of large cysts. Mine is 15 cm by 10 cm. I can feel it when I push on my left side! CA 125 blood test still not back because of public holiday. It's been a week now and it has seemed endless.