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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To burn the bridges?

43 replies

ps1991 · 19/11/2019 19:27

My mum is irritating me so much I just do not see the point in continuing to force a relationship. I grew up with my dad, seeing mum 2/3 times a year. I now have my own little boy (10 months) and she is irritating me more than ever! We live 2 hours apart and I have said we won’t be travelling at Christmas but she’s welcome to come here. She doesn’t drive so if she comes she’ll have to get a lift from friends/family. She has never worked. Her husband works part time in the supermarket. I’ve asked her when she’ll start working and she said she can’t because they’ll loose their benefits. My siblings are 18, 15 and 12 and so I have always been annoyed that she isn’t a good role model for them, but more and more I am finding myself tip toeing around actually saying to her ‘you need to get a job and do something!’ My husband and I both have well paid teaching jobs and it really really gets to me that we work hard and balance work with the baby and running our own home while she sits at home all day everyday, getting our tax money back in benefits! Additionally her home is absolutely filthy so much that I can hardly stand being there and definitely won’t take the baby. (I’ve posted about that before)

So. Wibu to write her a whole text (she only ever speaks to me via text) with all my feelings in etc? Or should I just keep brushing it away with her being totally ignorant to the fact that I am constantly trying to make excuses to not see her and constantly getting worked up?

Ps she is a heavy smoker

OP posts:

VolcanionSteamArtillery · 19/11/2019 19:41

Is your only objection that she is on benefits? Is the disability in the family?

Original poster

ps1991 · 19/11/2019 19:43

Yes she had been on benefits since I was small so at least 20+ years. She has no disability at all. And never had.

OP posts:

Original poster

ps1991 · 19/11/2019 19:44

Has*

OP posts:

TidyDancer · 19/11/2019 19:44

Other than being on benefits, what has she done to upset you? Because that's a really shitty reason to look down on someone. Lots of people have dirty homes, not ideal obviously but you just don't see them in said homes.

StoneofDestiny · 19/11/2019 19:49

I'm annoyed too!
If I understand your post, you, me, and others like us, are working hard and paying tax to support able bodied people to avoid working so they can collect more benefits!
We should all be annoyed.

StoneofDestiny · 19/11/2019 19:52

tidyDancer
OP has little relationship with her mum - brought up by dad and sees her a couple of times a year. I think she is irked her mother is feckless and living off the state with no just cause.

StoneofDestiny · 19/11/2019 19:54

I'd not take my baby to a filthy house with cigarette smoke polluting everything. Your first duty is to your child.

Winterdaysarehere · 19/11/2019 19:54

I am nc with dm. Have been for many years. Once tried to reconnect. It didn't work. I wrote to her and said simply that I was unable to have with her the sort of relationship she hoped for. And best we went nc.
She accepted it reluctantly I believe.

VolcanionSteamArtillery · 19/11/2019 19:57

They'll be a reason she's on benefits. You can't claim them for no reason. Its just not possible.

Yeah i find benefit bashing pretty shitty and uninformed

TheTrollFairy · 19/11/2019 20:00

I would just tell her straight.
You don’t get enjoyment from being around your mum and I think it’s actually quite damaging to be bought up in a filthy house (I’m not talking messy as this is different from being in a filthy house) which your siblings have no choice but to live it at the moment.
Do you think she will actually listen to you and take note from your text?

InACheeseAndPickle · 19/11/2019 20:03

What feelings do you want to express to her? If it's just about being on benefits I wouldn't bother. She would be very unlikely to find a job after so many years out of work. If she has kids still at home she presumably wouldn't want to come to yours for Xmas and you understandably don't want to travel to her. That sounds fine you don't have to spend Xmas together. Her house being filthy is gross and obviously means you can't take the baby there (I wouldn't either) but you can't dictate how she keeps her home (unless it's so bad social services would get involved).

Blanca87 · 19/11/2019 20:04

I agree you can't just sign on for two decades without proving you are actively looking for work. Universal Credit is purely designed to stop people doing this. It seems you have a a lot of resentment from her being absent in your childhood, which I totally understand. Why did you only see her 2/3 times a year when you were young.

spacepyramid · 19/11/2019 20:21

Like others have said, she won't have been on benefits for 20 years without good reason. Perhaps stop being so judgemental and find out what is happening in her life - if you actually care?

Original poster

ps1991 · 19/11/2019 20:39

Yes it does annoy me that she is on benefits. She has no disability, no illnesses and yet has managed to live just fine (foreign holidays, smoking, drinking, new sofa etc) you don’t do that with three kids living off a part time wage from asda! So, although I may not know exactly what benefits their household receives, I know it must be pretty decent.

I’m irritated that she just does not see things for how they really are. She does not seem to have a clue that people have to work for a living. And I’m irritated by the fact that every year of my life since being a teen I have had to work out excuse after excuse not to see her and the thought of having to do that for as long as I can think of is exhausting. It’s not that I don’t want a relationship with her, it’s that she isn’t a good role model and I am left feeling guilty/bad when I can’t see her, whereas she moved away when I was young and never learned to drive and never worked to better herself.

It’s all a bit ranty I know but I really feel at the end of my tether

OP posts:

VolcanionSteamArtillery · 19/11/2019 20:40

The OP doesn't care. Otherwise she'd know why her mum was on benefits.

Id be very surprised if Someone in the family isn't on disability. My guess from the texting and untidy home is a long term depression. It sounds like the mum and the partner on carers, but thats just a hunch from the OP.

Generally I find benefit bashing a good way of identifying arseholes who lack empathy.

I get not going over Christmas. I dont get not visiting the house because its dirty, an hour in a dirty home isnt going to harm your baby. i do get not visiting cos of smoke, although i do wonder how much harm an hour will do.
If she doesnt drive i wouldnt be making 5 people trek over on the train at £50 was it? Id go visit somewhere neutral, park soft play etc.

But it sounds like the OP isnt after practical solutions. Would you be unreasonable to burn bridges? no but only because you clearly aren't invested in the relationship. Theres no real justification for going nc in your mums behaviour as you've given it.

Benefit bashing is a really unappealing characteristic and way more harmful to your childs development that short term exposure to a smokey dirty home.

InACheeseAndPickle · 19/11/2019 20:43

I think you're probably just holding onto resentment from your younger years (totally understandable). She sounds like she's not dynamic, perhaps she's lazy perhaps there's something going on with her (mental health) but she's not going to suddenly change now. She's presumably only claiming benefits she's entitled to and she's not living a particularly enviable lifestyle sitting at home in a grubby house with not a lot of money.

Mammatino · 19/11/2019 20:53

You sound really angry and frustrated at your mum. I don't think your intentionally "benefit bashing", or calling all people on benefits nasty names. I think you have lots of pent up anger at your mum and possibly now you're a mum yourself, you think your mum should have done better by you. You might benefit from a couple of sessions with a relationship Councillor to help you work out what you really want to say. There are always two sides to every story and your mum might have taken paths in life for reasons you don't know. I hope you find the answers and solutions you are looking for.

StoneofDestiny · 19/11/2019 21:01

The OP isn't benefit bashing, she has lived her whole life knowing her mother with 4 children to support has done little to do that, even her partner only working part time.
Benefits exists to support the needy, not to be squandered on those who don't help themselves.
No point posters double guessing if the OP's mother has been depressed since OP was a teen - the OP has seen the situation close up and it's a credit to her she has ended up qualified as a teacher.

Dutch1e · 19/11/2019 21:09

I can completely understand if you feel like your mum just takes up valuable space in your life with little or no return. Certainly it sounds like she was barely involved in your growing-up, why should you choose her company now?

You don't have to stay in touch, it's ok to let this drift.

VolcanionSteamArtillery · 19/11/2019 21:12

Benefit bashing is always a choice.

Its a choice to buy into a very harmful stereotypes and willful ignore the often the sad reasons why benefits are necessary.

Its a choice not to see the real sadness, and difficulties in other people's lives. Its also an arrogant form of self congratulation, attributing your own independence to your own inherent superiority when in reality its just luck.

I can see elements of all this in the OP's post.

StoneofDestiny · 19/11/2019 23:23

It's not benefit bashing, it's bashing the abuse of the benefits system. Tax avoiders should be equally bashed - but some people like to see it as a victimless crime - it's not.

Original poster

ps1991 · 20/11/2019 18:58

@Dutch1e you seem to have really understood what I’m saying. I feel like I spend a lot of time worrying about managing the situation when I actually get nothing in return and it’s getting exhausting.

@VolcanionSteamArtillery you seem to have used over complicated words to say that I shouldn’t be so harsh on her and it’s just luck that I’m not like that too, when i have worked very hard to get to where I am in life, and feel very fortunate to be young and already have a good career, marriage and my own home.

To all those who say I’m benefit bashing, it definitely not. Benefits are there to support those in need, whether that is short term in between jobs or long term through sickness and disability. However I think we all agree that benefits are not there to support someone with zero additional needs or disabilities for their whole life! I’m amazed by how many people aren’t annoyed that we pay taxes all of our working lives and yet some people get by not working ever!

OP posts:

MitziK · 20/11/2019 19:19

Have you ever considered getting counselling for addressing possible Parental Alienation inflicted upon you by your father?

hsegfiugseskufh · 20/11/2019 19:25

Have you ever considered getting counselling for addressing possible Parental Alienation inflicted upon you by your father?
Thats an incredibly odd assumption mitzik

MitziK · 20/11/2019 19:31

It's a possibility - living with father, not seeing mother more than a couple of times a year, despising her since teenaged - even the language used is reminiscent of an adult talking about a much hated ex - or a middleaged Daily Mail reader.

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