To be annoyed with DM for not being the favourite child?

[InPursuitOfOblivion]

I'm one of 5 brothers and sister and it's been a well known fact since we were kids that DM favoured Dsis 'V' above all of us. (DM completely denies this, despite everyone, even non-family telling her its obvious)
Most of the time I couldn't care less, I have my own family and love 'V' very much.
Just got off the phone from DM and she is at Vs Babysitting AGAIN. She seems to permanently be there but finds every excuse in the book to not come to mine. (She manages about 3 weekends a year)
Like I said, normally I'm not fussed, but today it has just really pissed me off I feel like telling her to F-off and not bother calling me again.

You're probably better off out of it tbh. My mum talks about everyone to everyone else, she's very two faced lol but then they are always off for coffee together and the cinema etc. I'm the youngest and my children are still young whereas my siblings are older with grown up kids, gc etc. I think they have more in common tbh. I seem like a generation apart, even though I'm not that much younger than the next one up. I think going down the cutting off route would make things much worse. I stay in contact and see regularly, but I have my boundaries and they are in place to protect me and to a certain extent my kids too. I very much doubt that my dm or sibs realise any of this!

Have you ever spoken to her about it?

Thanks Rosen, you've given me a totally different perspective on things.
I should be more grateful, because you are right, my DM constant presence would drive me insane!
I think it will drive V insane in the end and when my nephews are teenagers it's going to piss them off no end having Granny constantly monitoring them!

Definitely counting my blessings now!

We have had this on hubby's side of the family. It isn't pleasant. BIL was always MIL's favourite child despite her insistence that she was always even handed with all three of her children. He could do no wrong, the sun shone out of his arse, she always excused his poor behaviour and bailed him out of trouble.

When BIL's daughter was born MIL insisted BIL was now a reformed character and all would be rosy from now on. Not so. His problem with drink and self-control cost him his marriage, his house and eventually any access to his daughter, with the result that neither of them has seen her for several years. STILL she defends him and favours him like mad. Even all of the wider family say it is obvious.

Most of the time my hubby lets it just wash over him, but every so often it surfaces and he reacts. I can see this happening from the outside, so yes, I can see where you are coming from. Not sure you can do much about it though. Your mum will bury her head in the sand and deny that she is doing anything of the sort if you say anything. Either that or it will cause a disproportionate amount of tension and that will not be worthwhile.

I have been suffering from a major depressive episode lately. Despite the fact that I am 36, a big factor in it is that I can't understand why my parents treat me so much worse than my sister. To give you an idea, they have left me to survive by myself in horrible unheated housing in very poor areas, while helping my sister to buy a very nice house in a very nice area to the tune of hundreds of thousands of pounds. That makes it sound like it's about the money, but it's NOT, any more than your situation is really about the difference in help with childcare. It's the apparent difference in the quality of love that stings. What you're really asking, unless I've misunderstood you, is how on earth a parent could think it is OK to help one child, at the expense of the other... which is a deep and difficult question that goes right to the heart of family dynamics.

My GP recommended that I read a book by a guy called John Bradshaw called The Family. I am not big on self-help, so I approached with trepidation. But it has helped me to understand SO MUCH! If you look on Google books, the chapter that really gave me a lightbulb moment (chapter 4) is on there for free so you can read a sample without committing and see if it helps. He basically argues that roles within a dysfunctional family are all about the preservation of 'the rules' of the family, which are all about control, blame, and internalised shame and that anyone who dares express their individuality is a threat to that and is therefore given the label of 'a problem'. I can honestly say that it has given me hope and understanding that I have a right to be myself... and even compassion for my family for being the way they are.

I really hate favouritism.

I can't see how someone could do that to their child. Sure you'll like different things about different children but I honestly don't think my Mum favours me over my sister, although she sees me a lot more as I'm living with her at the moment and am the youngest.

Dad probably does favour me to a certain extent as he's my sisters stepdad though they see eachother as father/daughter which is lovely and they get on really, really well. My Dad's other biological daughter is challenging at best and although he loves her, he gets extremely frustrated with her (she tries to sabotage things sometimes and is 8 years older than me, so in her 30s).

I only have one daughter right now but honestly couldn't imagine if I had another 'favouring' her or the other one over the other, it just doesn't seem right. Perhaps I'll see it when I have another child, though.

I think it really got to me when I could see that what had happened to me as a child was happening to my children.

I was the eldest, a coper and expected to stand aside/help with younger ones.

My mother was telling me to buy matching cutlery for my sister as she only had mismatching stuff, unlike me and db. She had just had loads of money/vouchers as wedding presents, and I had only just got together a matching set of cutlery myself after 15 years!

Our visits were mainly helping her look after my sisters dc when she was at work. She was just not connecting with my older children any more. She was just seeing them through the eyes of their cousins, and how nice it would be for them to have them there.

I challenged her on this but she would not understand. I could see that mine were approaching their teens and would find their visits more and more irrelevant. It just caused more problems and I was the problem, because I wasn't like I was before.

I had to disconnect emotionally from this battle in the end and prioritise dc. We visited as before, but it has been sad to see the gulf between them as they grew, but I know I tried and that is just the way it was. dm has died now, but df is so taken up with the other dgc, that he is doing the same thing, albeit out of thoughtlessness and lack of social intelligence.

I have a lovey dh, dc and had kind supportive pil, so I focus on that.