Relationship with mother

[VivienLeighshandbag]

New poster, will try to keep short. I have a difficult relationship with my mother and we’ve not spoken for 5 years now. I live in a different part of the country. She has a spiky relationship with my Dsis x2 as well, and they are nearby to her.

Since my DF died over 10 years ago, she has become more difficult - critical, passive aggressive, unkind remarks. He kept her balanced. Her priority and take on any situation is what does it mean for her and how does she feel, which she’ll tell you about. She is unwilling to help any family members in the ways that families do. All family members, including grandchildren who are grown up have observed her to not be an easy person. She is fit, healthy and financially well off to live her life as she likes.

We stopped speaking after a difficult phone call where she was aggrieved her birthday card hadn’t arrived in time, and she exaggerated that my sister was angry I had done this as well to her. It wasn’t the case for sis and our final conversation was a build up her of behaviour over the last year. I have always had an uneasy relationship with her and feel I am her least favourite child.

Whilst we don’t exchange birthday cards or speak, we have exchanged Christmas gifts every year via my DSis. This year she deliberately excluded me from her gift giving. All of the family knew. She sent monetary gifts to my DS’s, which I didn’t deposit in their accounts. I gave them the money myself to avoid their disappointment and took the position of it’s all of my family not being included, not just me. I felt very hurt by this act and my sisters were shocked. I have felt hurt for a long time that my mother would let me drift from her so long and the longer it goes on this feels reinforced for me. I feel even more stuck about how we might repair our relationship and if this possible. I know if this was my children, as their parent, I would do everything possible to repair a breach of relationship.

The question is AIBU in my actions at Christmas?

Any advice on this appreciated from others. Thanks.

Don't think you are being unreasonable. It was her actions not yours, which were.

Have a look at the out of the FOG site online, it might help you.

My (non)relationship with my mother is pretty much the same, including the siblings dynamic & feeling like the least favourite. In fact I would say she has behaved as though she actively disliked me.

I have been NC for 16 years now. I relented once during this time when she was very ill & was apparently keen to say her goodbyes. Within an hour, she was giving me the spine-chilling looks that she reserved for situations where the presence of others prevented her from spouting her true feelings. I came home, cried for several hours & have never looked back since.

You only need to make peace with your own behaviour. You’re protecting your children & yourself. And I totally understand that you would do anything to heal a rift between you & DCs - I would be the same. Unfortunately these “mothers” of ours are not that person & so they never will. They cannot see things from anyone else perspective & care more about being right than their own children.

@Orangeblossom78 @EdinaMonsoon thank you

Her priority and take on any situation is what does it mean for her and how does she feel, which she’ll tell you about

You've answered your own question OP. Everything she does is about her, so she's not going to reach out. It's not in her nature. To try to mend things would, in her eyes, mean that she was losing face. You've taken away her control over you by going NC, so her response is actually to go in the opposite direction to reaching out, it's to ramp up her behaviour to bring her back to being the one in control.

So I get why you did what you did at Christmas, it was to mitigate her response. But if you recognise what's going on, you can take a step back. She's not going to do anything to heal the breach because of who and how she is. So you have two choices. You can either make the first move yourself, by approaching her - no doubt she will expect profuse apologies and much grovelling, and she won't have changed going forward. Or you can accept what she's like, grieve for the mother you wish you had, the one that you will be for your own children, and maintain your NC. Stop expecting anything from her, don't allow yourself to get upset by her, leave her to it and focus on your DSs.

I know which I'd choose.

Sometimes our parents are just not who we need them to be. And it’s totally fine to walk away.

I’ve been NC with my mother for a long time as she was toxic