To uninvite my mother for Christmas?

[IsThisYourSanderling]

She will probably end up coming anyway, as we already invited her, but oh how I wish she wasn't.

Reasons she should come:

• We had a baby in September, it's her first grandchild and his first Christmas
• When he was 8 days old she travelled up to help us on short notice (when I realised we were completely out of our depth) and stayed for nearly three weeks, doing laundry and other less than fun tasks. It was a lifesaver.
• She'd have a shit Christmas if she can't come here.

Reasons I don't want her to come:

• She has extreme paranoia issues that make her very difficult and often miserable to be around, you have to creep around on eggshells and she'll still find something to latch onto as proof you're conspiring against her.
• Her main thing is to accuse me of betraying her, conspiring, talking behind her back to relatives I haven't seen in years, etc. She brings it up whenever we're alone and won't believe me no matter what I say or do. When she was last year I had to leave the room with my newborn attached to my breast because she'd started attacking me about my supposed contact with my grandmother and uncle (I'm not in contact with either more than a card at Christmas, not that it should matter). She proceeded to follow me to my bedroom to keep going with the accusations. It's like this every time she visits, but I didn't expect to get chased around the house while breastfeeding a three week old.
• She's a pathological liar. These vary from extreme and damaging lies I won't ever really forgive her for, to silly ridiculous lies aimed at saving face, to lies that allow her to effectively pocket the occasional tenner here and there. It's a terrible bore and if you call her out you'll always regret it.
• Her latest thing is this: I suggested my husband and I get her a railcard so she can travel up to see us more (long train journey). She replied to say it wasn't like me to make practical suggestions and that I must be being coerced (she's always been obsessed with the idea of me being brainwashed/ coerced - even though I'm now in my thirties, have a PhD, a husband and a child, I still apparently am being brainwashed and marshalled against her by influences I do t understand...). So, friendly offer of railcard = getting accused for the millionth time of being coerced. Fuck that.
• She never, ever apologises for anything ever, and so me asking for an apology has been met with silence. What will happen now is that she'll refuse to acknowledge me for a while, then send a breezy text pretending nothing has happened so as not to endanger her Christmas up here. So far she has been giving us the silent treatment since Wednesday evening, when I asked if she would apologise or if she still thinks I'm being coerced into handing out railcards. She hasn't asked about her ten week old grandson once. She hasn't looked at his Instagram page (set up so she and in laws could see pics of him regularly) because she'd have to use the library computer and is too suspicious of the librarians, who must be spying on her. Her delusions and paranoid suspicions are more important to her than her only grandchild (and much more important to her than me).
• Her expectation will be that I shut up about the coercion thing, pretend it's fine that she withheld interest in my and my son as a punishment, and go ahead with our jolly family Christmas. I don't want to. I don't like being around her. But the guilt of telling her she's no longer welcome is pretty huge, because it means her having an absolutely shit time at her mother's (she lives with her mother and they hate each other)

So yeah. WIBU to uninvite her?

Forgive typos. I tapped out this entire saga with my thumb whilst breastfeeding.

eye, no - it's been 40-odd years and I don't think I'd recover from the shock it she did!

I'm touched by the support from so many of you on here, thank you. Sorry I'm being absolutely crap at responding individually- or properly at all - this caring for a newborn business is intense stuff! I can only check the thread during feeding sessions and attempt to bash out a reply.

I'm not worried for my gm- she is extremely toxic herself, and has her two sons visiting regularly so is not too isolated. It's not possible for me to let her know her letter was vandalised though, as my mother is in a position to intercept all her mail now that her mobility is poor. So it is an awful situation for my gm. It's awful for them both, absolutely bloody grim and beyond miserable for both of them.

Eddie, sorry your mum is like mine. I'm glad you have a sibling to take the pressure off just you. I though DS would be similar - something innocent she can focus on to bring out her good side (she does still have a good side, despite everything). But if she's so able to just withdraw interest in him when it suits her, if it's already going so badly when he's only ten weeks... I'm not sure how realistic my expectations are anymore.

And Sukey yes, it is more than just the paranoia. Some of her lying relates to it, other lies are totally unconnected and part of a wider picture of the damaged and damaging person she is. The day my son was born she couldn't text as she had no credit, for example; rather than say that, she made something up about there being a microclimate of fog around her village. That's what we call the face-saving lie. It was depressing getting such stupid lies on that day of all days, but that's very minor compared to a lot of the stuff she comes out with. Another recent one is DH giving her a tenner to top up her phone, and her keeping the money and pretending the top up sold at the shop was a scam. That was five weeks ago. Last year she pretended she'd had a fall. I used to get her jobs, which she's say she was going to until I'd happen to see her out and about. The list id endless.

Why is it nothing like dementia? Mental illness is illness like anything else. It isn't the person's fault.

The lies about my father a the ultimate, obviously. There's so much duplicity around her though - given the choice, she would rather lie than tell the truth, it just seems to be her default setting.

I know it's not my mother's fault. Nor is it mine. Fault doesn't really come into it.

The fact that she has a personality disorder rather than a mental illness makes it especially tricky for me, as the bad stuff can't be separated from the rest of her. It's not an illness that can be medicated - it's who she is. It's the oxygen she breathes.

Pete all mental illnesses are not the same. And Alzheimer's is nothing like a personality disorder. Look at Sanderling's last paragraph.

And YES to the comment about trying to find a position of strength. Haven't found it yet, but that's what I'm trying to do, somehow.

Hi OP

Just for you, going through. It sounds like you ate working your way to the least worst option for yourself and your family. Good luck with whatever you decide.

I don't have experience of relatives with MH problems, but to echo another poster, I would designate another day as "Christmas" to celebrate with your little family. I am doing it with my DH and DCs this year on Yule (21st), as I have the entire tribe of wider family visiting me on the 25th! I love them to bits, but it's going to be a non-stop affair and I wanted to set aside some time to really focus on the kids. Doing this could be your sanity saver should you go through with the visit.

It sounds so hard, OP. I personally would vote for not having her on this your first Christmas with your baby. You already say that you cannot sleep from worrying about it.

Your mother sounds deeply unhappy and will whether she spends Christmas with you or not make much difference?

We all owe our parents something, but at the moment you owe your baby and, in consequence, yourself more.

What is best for your son?

It makes me wonder how many of us there are and whether we can find ways to talk about it that bring us together and acknowledge the small differences that make big differences IYSWIM.
Good luck.

OP, a serious question. How was it ok when your mum was there for 3 weeks after you had the baby? I assume she didn't switch her personality disorder off. So is it a case that you benefitted from her being there so you overlooked things but now there's really no need for her you're not inclined to overlook things at Christmas?

Try contacting her GP, there are still cmh services out there and even if she doesn't want help at this time it's on record that there is a concern.

Mrspeelywally maybe I can answer that one on the OPs behalf as my mother also has a personality disorder and she also came to visit and help, sorry "help", in the early weeks after my twins were born.
I asked her to come because I was overwhelmed, because like the OP I had no other family (only child, dad died a few years back), and because, as my mother like most people with PDs has never seen the inside of a psychiatrist's office never mind been diagnosed, I continued to believe it was possible to have a normal mother-daughter relationship with her if I tried hard enough. She came to our house and behaved herself for about a day and a half but after that the strain of pretending to be a normal person was starting to tell, and since I was focused on the kids and not her, I wasn't able to do the sort of emotional smoothing over of every perceived slight she was receiving from, you know - the babies, the fucking postman, my mate who beeped her horn at us and waved out the car window one day - and she started to misbehave. It started with little snide comments about my weight, how I was looking, about how little I was doing compared to my DH, how difficult the kids were compared to me at the same age - and it descended into things getting broken and hidden, her going to bed at 5pm, that sort of thing. Because I'm a cheeky bitch, after about 6 days of this I told her to sling her hook and marched up to the train station with her, her bag, the bloody pram with my twin girls, and went and got the guy at the ticket office to rebook her train tickets home for that day. The OP was probably too polite to do that, and just managed through the 3 weeks, giving her mother the benefit of the doubt in that "at least she helped with the practical things".

OP, IAmNotAWitch has nailed it. It's about your son, or it will be ultimately. You have a duty of care to your son that you just don't have in the same way to your mother. He's going to end up in the crossfire eventually, you know that - he'll be one of the bad guys, or whatever the hell goes through their heads. Don't put him through it, don't put yourself through it, have a happy Christmas for once. People with PDs are like emotional vampires, they only ever seem to be happy, or even just comfortable, when everyone else around them is utterly miserable. It's not your responsibility to set yourself on fire to keep your mother warm.

(Oh and you'd be very welcome on the Stately Homes thread on Relationships as someone said above)

How awful for you, OP.

I agree with you that it would be harsh to uninvite her now. Can you cut the length of time she stays for?

We have our own Christmas day on a different day to keep family dramas outside our home - it kind of works!

When I had a sick parent and had concerns about their health, I called their GP and had a chat. This was taken as perfectly normal. My parent was called in for some kind of random check-up and the evaluation was carried out without their knowledge. But it will be on their notes and helpful to the GP in building up a picture, regardless of what happens in the short-term.

I think perhaps you should have these concerns noted. Your mum's credibility needs to be in doubt, I think. There is just a bit of a risk that she might perceive some non-existent threat to your child and feel the need to let someone know, isn't there.

People with PDs are like emotional vampires, they only ever seem to be happy, or even just comfortable, when everyone else around them is utterly miserable.

What a bigoted, inaccurate and cruel generalisation. There are many lovely people with PDs who are not like this at all.

toomuchtooold

Did your mum break things on purpose or did she hide them after they'd got broken accidentally?

Making comments about your weight and so on is not nice but unfortunately typical mum behaviour.

Can't really see how going to bed at 5pm (had her normal sleep cycle been affected by twin babies in the house) is evidence of a PND.

There is a lot of anger and bitterness in your post. I hope you find some peace. Don't assume the OP's mum is anything like yours.

I am on the fence. Mainly excuse when you found yourself put of your depth with Yorkshire baby. You called her. She came and helped. But now you are deciding to limit contact with her grandchild

That seems quite unfair. My mum has mental health problems. I am not unsympathetic to your it just seems a double standard.

OP, a serious question. How was it ok when your mum was there for 3 weeks after you had the baby? I assume she didn't switch her personality disorder off. So is it a case that you benefitted from her being there so you overlooked things but now there's really no need for her you're not inclined to overlook things at Christmas?

The OP has already said that her mother's behaviour was as usual during those weeks - causing the OP to try and escape from her clutching a BFeeding newborn.

From the OP

When she was last year I had to leave the room with my newborn attached to my breast because she'd started attacking me about my supposed contact with my grandmother and uncle (I'm not in contact with either more than a card at Christmas, not that it should matter). She proceeded to follow me to my bedroom to keep going with the accusations. It's like this every time she visits, but I didn't expect to get chased around the house while breastfeeding a three week old.

Hi there, I think this is a very difficult situation but you do need to think about the future situation of your mother and your son. It sounds like it isn't going to be a healthy dynamic and you will probably want to shield him from her.

We have members of our family with MH issues that are problematic where our children are concerned. One sadly cannot now come into our house after a violent incident in front of our DS. We meet them on neutral ground (where we can leave at any time) and that works and means a relationship is maintained.

However my DH definitely suffers from the FOG and I have to constantly remind him why we have the rule in place. My job is to put the DC first.

I am sorry but I wouldn't invite her.

Does she do this when anyone else is present? If so, can they not say something to her to back you up?
Do you have others coming for Christmas and if so can you warn them what she's like and try to make sure you're never alone with her?
I think Lucy101101's advice is sage; meeting on neutral ground may be the only way forward for you to maintain a relationship.

Oh god, she needs help and you need her to get help.
This sounds unbearable.

She couldn't possibly have early stage dementia, could she? Or has she always been like this?