To despise Mother's Day

[Beelzebop]

Anyone with me? It's hard work being pleased /motherly all day as it is but when you're grieving your own Mum and just want to hide... It's getting ridiculous, it's everywhere!

[Grinchatchristmas]

Gottagetmoving, wow! What a heartless response! Of course people are not saying they resent Mothers Day, just that when it's the first one since losing your own mother then it's hard. Is that so difficult to understand?

[Areyoufree]

Don't really get it. My husband and I parent 50/50. Not sure why I get extra praise for having pushed them out of my vagina.

[Topseyt]

Not keen on it either and I'm a mum of three.

[HenniePennie]

Everytime I shop in Marks and Spencers at the moment I get a friggin receipt telling me I can buy chocolates for mum.

I hate it.

Even when mum was alive I used to buy her flowers and take her out etc....but NEVER on "mothers' day". Commercial shite.

Do people really need a day to be nice to their mums?

[tb]

Scary mine was the same, would get the cold silent treatment for a few days if I dared to get a Mother's Day one. Thankfully the lady concerned is reaping her reward in the hereafter

[UnbornMortificado]

It's just a card in this house. My best friend lost her mam a couple of years ago really young.

Mother's Day is the only day she doesn't cope well with so I don't put anything on social media as I wouldn't want to upset her or anyone else who doesn't like it for whatever reason.

[NeverEverAnythingEver]

OP

[Gottagetmoving]

Gottagetmoving, wow! What a heartless response!

It was not meant to be heartless Grinchatchristmas
Some responses do seem to resent mothers day. I don't see that day as any worse than the other days I grieved for my mum.

[Corialanusburt]

It's the trying to train DD to observe it because it wouldn't occur to DP to help her do it that makes it a bit farcical.

[maddiemookins16mum]

I don't mind it, card and pressie usually and then we might go out (last year we had a Chinese takeaway in the evening). The first year after my mum died it was awful though. I had to go into a Card shop 2 weeks before and stupidly looked at the MD cards imagining (stupidly!) to myself which ine I would have purchased and felt myself welling up.
It's best to stay off Fakebook on Mothers Day imho.

[fruityb]

It's a mixed one for me as this year I am a mum for the first time. I lost my mum 19 years ago when I was 15 and remember seeing Mother's Day stuff everywhere before she passed and my sister saying "we might not have a mum by then." She died the week before. It can occasionally fall that the anniversary is also on Mother's Day. I think it'll sting this year as my mum was a fab mum and loved being a grandma but she only knew my sisters two eldest and died before the next 5 turned up!

I don't like the competitive shit on Facebook and won't be sharing anything on there. I have a friend who is all about the #familytime and uses family as an adjective all the time (family weekend, family day, family holiday) so sure that'll get on my tits at some point. I'll use the day to think about mum and how my life has panned out without her here - I've been without her longer than I was with her - and will make sure I tell DS all about her. He doesn't have a nana which makes me a bit sad.

[HakeLively]

It's hard for some of us who still have our mums, too.

Mine is horrible to me and emotionally abusive and I just know I'm going to get a lot of shit for not being 'seen' to make a big fuss of her (i.e. a gushing public Facebook posts so all her friends can see it) it doesn't matter that we don't have a relationship day to day; she will give me a huge guilt trip for not making her feel special on a commercialised made-up day.

DP's is still around somewhere but we don't know where at the moment, she flits back in occasionally and fucks off again when she gets bored of family life.

We don't have kids if our own. Last year we went to the pub. One that wasn't doing any kind of Mother's Day set lunch event.

[SaorAlbaGuBrath]

Mother's Day in general kind of goes over my head, but last year we were facing my DM having been given a terminal diagnosis (thankfully with very risky, radical surgery she is in remission) and it just felt awful. I am always hyper aware of not making a big deal of it on social media as I have friends who's Mums have died, also friends who can't have kids or have lost kids. So yes, it's nice to get a card and a bunch of flowers, but the shameless shoving of it down everyone else's throat is thoughtless and pretty narcissistic.

[SaorAlbaGuBrath]

Whose not who's

[Lottapianos]

Hake, I could have written your post. My mother is alive but we barely have a relationship at all anymore. I do send her a card (the most basic one I can find) but that's it. My DP's mother is awful as well. We don't have children and I have very complicated feelings about that.

It's one of the absolute worst times of year for me. I can feel my anxiety and grief rising up again just seeing all the cards in shops. I find it so pointless - if you have a nice relationship with your mum, then you buy her flowers or take her out for lunch whenever you fancy. You don't need to be ordered to do it by a day of commercialism.

Well done on finding a pub that wasn't doing any Mothers Day-themed crap. That must have taken some research

[Sallystyle]

Don't really get it. My husband and I parent 50/50. Not sure why I get extra praise for having pushed them out of my vagina.

Um, there is a father's day as well! Odd response.

[AHedgehogCanNeverBeBuggered]

Don't really get it. My husband and I parent 50/50. Not sure why I get extra praise for having pushed them out of my vagina.

As someone currently experiencing the sickness, tiredness, migraines and bloating of pregnancy, I absolutely expect extra praise for carrying this baby! DH has been nothing but supportive, but it's still my body going through all this, and it's still me that has to give up caffeine, booze and yummy cheese for 9 months!

I fully expect flowers and a nice lunch on Mothers' Day, he will get something nice on Fathers' Day in June.

[Sallystyle]

My teen sons find Father's Day hard because their dad died and I find it hard because my dad was horrendous growing up and I don't have a relationship with him. I understand OP

[glitterglitters]

To the OP, totally agree with you. Despite now being a mum myself, which does take the focus off slightly. Getting asked by acquaintances what I'm doing for my mum, and then having to explain she's deceased, then they look awkward and stumble the rest of the conversation is more than I can be arsed with at this time of year.

[TheFirstMrsDV]

Of course yanbu beelz and I am sorry about your mum.

I usually post something on FB about MD but I can't find it.
It is for all those who find it a difficult day.
Those bereaved of their mothers or their children.
Those separated from the children for ANY reason
Those yearning for a child of their own
Adoptive parents and birth parents
Adopted children and adults

So many of us struggle.

I find it easier to deal with now but for many years after the death of my DD it was torture.

I hope it gets easier for you too.

[JugglingFromHereToThere]

I liked it a bit when the children were little but not too little and I managed to get us all to church and some nice older ladies had organised for all the women (not just the mothers which was a nice thought) to be given a little potted plant by their child or another child.
That was sweet. Also a few years running my DC managed to make me a card, sometimes one from school.

But nowadays, since a tragic family bereavement where we lost my nephew, I mostly just worry about my DSis, my DM, and my various friends who either don't have DC or have lost their own mothers.

I think it's a bit like Valentine's day, I'm not really sure it adds to the sum of human happiness overall. The commercialisation and probably social media haven't really helped.

[jay55]

I lost my mum a few weeks ago and the endless Mother's Day offer emails are really getting me down.

[HakeLively]

Thanks Lotta. It's a tricky one isn't it and I totally get the pre-build up anxiety. Mine gets a card too but nothing else. When I was younger I used to visit for the day and take her out but I've stopped trying so desperately to please her now and she was more interested in taking photos for Facebook purposes than actually spending time with me anyway. It was an awkward day as she can't bring herself to show me any praise or affection and never will or even just listen when I'm talking, and I'd just go home feeling like crap, so no more.

Pub was a backstreet boozer with an old carpet and a dart board, no food except from scampi fries and KP peanuts. It fitted the bill perfectly

[CatCafe]

I'm a mum and I can't really be arsed with it. I get my own mum flowers or a small gift and we generally go out for lunch. She does alot for me and it's nice to show her I appreciate it.
She also "helps" DS get me something but I'd be fine if no-one bothered.

[EdSheeranswife]

I hate Mother's Day, my mum died some years ago now. But the day she died I had to pop to the supermarket to get some food, pregnant and trying to look after myself. The Mother's Day stuff was everywhere. That feeling of being completely lost and heart broken while all you see is Mother's Day cards, flowers, teddy as etc. Every year since I hate going anywhere where there is Mother's Day things.