This ridiculous mum situation

[causeimunderyourspell]

So I'll try and keep this brief but there's quite a backstory!

I don't know how to describe my mum but she has always treated treated me and my siblings like her personal assistants basically. I was the last to move out and by that point, she was having me do all sorts like rolling all her cigarettes, sorting all of her general life admin, grooming her dogs, dying her hair, the list is endless. She was massively controlling, I at 21 years of age obviously liked going out socialising, seeing family, to the gym etc and she would give me the silent treatment every time. I'd go as far as to say she was emotionally abusive in some ways.

Cut to now, 8 years down the line. I'm married with 2 children (she didn't come to my wedding because she didn't want to leave her dogs), my brother is successful working full time, my sister has a successful career and owns her own home. We've all done really well for ourselves I'd say but we all live very busy lives as you can imagine! She's never been happy for any of us. She complained when my sister was saving her deposit, as she resented that she (mum) had debt, why couldn't my sister give her money?!

Some of you might remember my post a while back about her basically refusing to come to mine ever (I don't drive so had been catching a bus weekly with 2 babies for well over a year) to visit her grandchildren but complaining to everyone who would listen, about how she didn't see them enough. Well the end result of that was her refusing and not speaking to me for weeks. For clarity, she works 2 days a week and then 3 days a week on rotation, so plenty of spare time. No hobbies or other commitments.

She's recently decided to throw her toys out of the pram because I've not seen her for a month (we'd been given notice to quit and were frantically house viewing with every spare moment and then moving). My sister had been going through some difficulties with her marriage and my brother has just gone through a messy break up. All valid reasons for everyone to not be at her beck and call in my opinion.

My brother phoned me this morning saying basically shes decided she needs to be on her own now, she loves us but goodbye she's having nothing to do with any of us. So in her own head she's though fuck the lot of them, no ones been to see me, I'm done with them. Yet never speaks to any of us unless she wants something!

I don't think I am, but AIBU to think fine that's that? Part of me feels guilty but I'm sick of being manipulated by her like I have my whole life. I feel sorry for her that she has nothing in her life more interesting than slagging us all off to each other. But it's all her own doing and I'm just at the end of the line with all her petty, imagined drama.

It's so sad when families fall out. I had 2 aunts who didn't speak to each other for years and only did so just before one of them died, closely followed by the second. They'd forgotten why it was they didn't speak! It's rarely a good idea to close doors permanently so may be just a card to say that you totally understand that she wants some space and that you hope she will be in touch soon. That leaves the ball in her court, but shows that you care. She is your mum, after all and however badly she behaves, that remains a fact.
She sounds a very unhappy sort of person really. Happy people tend not to behave so negatively, in my experience.

@retirementrocks I'm sorry to hear about your aunts thank you for your response but unfortunately the door isn't, and won't ever be open again. I could fill a whole thread with the horrible things she's done/said to my siblings and I. I have forgiven her time and again because 'family'. But not this time unfortunately. I have to draw a line for my own sanity.

The fact that she is my mother doesn't give her a green card to treat us in the way that she has. She decided to close the door, not me, and I'm relieved that she has to be honest. I feel a weight has been lifted.

Yanbu at all - yep fine, bye!! You do not need someone like that in your life, concentrate on your kids and your family and leave her to it.

YANBU at all... and in theory I totally agree with all the advice you have been given. They are all right. She has no right to treat you this way, you are not her life support system, you deserve to put yourself first, etc. It's all exactly right.

But. I had a difficult, needy, depressed mother who I found exhausting and draining and who felt like she was taking over my nice, functional life with her galloping self-made disaster of one. I desperately wanted to take a step back, a big one. But when she was low, she would talk about suicide, she had tried before. I was scared if I didn't continue dropping everything for her, she would kill herself. Everyone told me, everything I read told me, she wouldn't really, it was a control tactic to keep me in line and on side, I had to call her bluff, put myself first.

I started to believe that. I took a step back. I called less often. I got less involved in the dramas. She said she wanted to sell her house and throw the money in with our house deposit for a house with a granny flat and move in me and my DP and my baby daughter, when her marriage fell apart because she didn't want to live in her house any more with those bad memories (step dad had moved out/been thrown out). I took a step back. I put myself and my family first. I said no. She threw a tantrum, much like the one your mum is throwing, unfriended me on FB etc. I stood firm and eventually she got back in touch, and afterwards was a lot less demanding. I even had to chase her for updates! 1-nil to me, you might say.

She killed herself in June. She left a note, with no message for me, even though I was her closest real friend, her executor, and her only beneficiary in her will. I was her lifeline for over a decade, her backstop. And then I stopped being there for her the way she needed. What she needed was totally unreasonable and inappropriate for a parent to need from a child. But it was what she needed. And I stopped being there, and now she's dead. It's not always an empty threat.

Just be aware of the possibility. I wasn't, or I talked myself out of acknowledging it with all the right on self-love stuff, and now there isn't much I wouldn't do or sacrifice personally to have the chance to be there for her again. The guilt will never leave me, ever.

@Ennirem I'm so sorry to her that so firstly

You shouldn't feel guilty though, she chose that instead of getting help herself from a professional. How could you possibly be to blame for that? I truly hope you can feel free from guilt at some point in your life, it was not your fault.

Goodness, it's like reading my own relationship with my own mother, I ended up going nc several years ago. I didn't speak to her or see her until my df funeral (they were long time divorced and re married other people). I was surprised to see her there considering what she used to say about him, but really it was to see my sister and I and my dc. I spoke to her there to be polite and obviously was rather preoccupied with emotions. Anyway that was the last time I saw her as she died 7 weeks later. Like a pp said, I felt guilty because of the nc but I had to do so for the sake of my dc and my own mental health.
I will say those years of nc were great in the knowledge that she couldn't phone me and send vile voicemails and verbally abuse me, I wish you luck and enjoy the peace 💐

What a drama queen she is. She knows that if you crack first she’s won. Why even tell your brother that she doesn’t want to see you any more. She knows he’ll pass that message on and you’ll all come running. She sounds very controlling. I can’t believe she didn’t come to your wedding. I would have cut mine off myself for that. You need to put yourself and new family first now! She’s the one missing out on seeing the grandchildren.

Sometimes you have to cut people out of your life. I did it with my younger sister who has run up debt in my name. On one occasion never knew about it till an attachment order was placed on my wages.

Like you I could list it endlessly the things she has done.
I will always keep the door open for her children but not her. I think I would return the gifts if she tried. Regardless of how you do it you will be the bad guy who takes the gifts or the bad guy who rejected. If anything like my sister everyone know what a bitch I am.

retirementrocks - sorry to hear about your aunts; i am NC with my toxic sister, and I can assure you that i will never forget what she'd done, or said, and why we 'fell out'. I have had many people tell me that 'life's too short' (to bear grudges) and 'but she's your sister', and in one occasion 'she doesn't even remember what she said [to upset me]' (like that makes it better?) Your post comes across a bit like that - yes life is too short - too fucking short to spend with people who do not like you, do not love you and who would willingly hurt you if they could, purposefully or to suit themselves.

ennirem your mothers suicide is in NO WAY your fault. How could it be? It would have happened whatever you had done. If you have taken her abuse, she would still have done it. Do not take the guilt of it on - it was HER decision and hers alone. The ultimate selfish act.