To be extremely hurt - mother birthday drama

[Herewegoagainffs]

Have posted on here a few times over the years under different usernames for family advice, and you guys have always been fantastic. Long story short, my older brother is the golden child. My mother always puts him and his family first. My brother and I are not speaking (this is his fault, please trust me on that) and my mother had chosen to take his side and consequently we (husband, Children and I) are always left out of stuff. Ironically brother treats her like shit she is never included in his life and I include her always (invite her on holidays and heavily involve her in stuff as she is lonely and loves to be involved with grandchildren as brother shuts her out).

my son turns 5 next week. His actual birthday is a weekday, DM asks what we are doing. We are doing cake and presents after school. She asks if she can come. We say of course. DS is excited and has mentioned the plan several times. Today DM says she now has other plans, tickets to an event at 3pm so maybe she can “pop” at his bedtime. Maybe. Guess who other plans are with? That’s right.

is it too much to expect her to keep my son’s birthday free as fucking agreed and not treat him like an afterthought she can “pop” and see when she’s finished with her preferred plan with golden child, which she made AFTER saying she would come.

I would be on the website checking for alternative tickets and call her out if she is lying..

I would be on the website checking for alternative tickets and call her out if she is lying

there is an entire week’s worth of all day tickets! I suspect what’s happened is that now I’ve dared to say something suddenly she has been able to reschedule to another time/day! I am surprised she’s at least done that though. After all her gaslighting she suddenly said “I didn’t think it through”.

Imo rubbish dm's make for rubbish dgm's. Precisely why my dc don't see my dm.

Do you have Spotify OP? If so, I would thoroughly recommend listening to the In Sight podcast. It covers this kind of behaviour a lot and is well worth a listen.

I can't help feeling that the gaslighting message she sent you were directly out of the mouth of your DB, as was the 'I didn't think' . You say you and another sibling are NC with him, another is entranced, do they live as locally ? If you pull up the drawbridge, will he end up being expected to spend more time with your Mother ? Do you think he might have realised this might have been the straw that broke the camels back and quickly backpeddled for his own convenience ?

@Herewegoagainffs personally, I wouldn't pursue looking at the tickets etc. Whatever facts which you present to your DM you will just be met with passive-aggressive responses or gaslighting IME. FWIW my DGM had golden child D Uncle. My DM saw the damage this did to her and DAunt, but despite this, my Dsis is golden child. She once refused to attend a birthday in our house, despite the previous month going accross water to celebrate DBil's (DH of Dsis) birthday. 'D'Bil had recently swindled her out of £20,000, for context. When I pointed out that perhaps she could come, because she had celebrated birthday with fwit swindler, she realised in reality it was bad. So she came for said birthday, but had a face like a slapped bum the whole time, so was a somewhat hollow 'victory'. What I am rambling towards is, I don't think you can win here. If your or my mother was a reasonable person, you could say how you feel, and it would be considered and reflected upon. Not so in these cases. I do my best to lower my expectations, whilst not taking sht, whilst having no illusions. Every now and then it catches me out, but less as I get older, and accept that if she was not my mother, I wouldn't be friends with her.

Really sad about these experiences, OP

Some great advice on here. I do understand why NC feels too much right now, but please put rock solid LC boundaries in place for you and your family.

She won’t change. Her response to you was just awful and remorseless after she had royally screwed up. Just cut out anything proactive, wait for her to do all the running and then let her fit in where you want.

@SpongeBobJudgeyPants

thank you for sharing. I think you are completely correct about the expectation of reflection but how that will ever be forthcoming. Like your mother, my mother was also second fiddle to her brother, who was the golden child. I think it’s incredible how people are able to endure and discuss these painful childhood situations and then turn around and inflict them upon others.

i was just about to say do that ^

i would not go NC i would literally punish her and make her realise her behaviour is unacceptable!!

As a matter of interest OP, why did you nominate your birthed as your son's godfather ?

Brother not birthed

@Herewegoagainffs Here's a phrase I say to myself about my DM which keeps me just about the right side of sane.

Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and it annoys the pig. Also:
Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty, and the pig enjoys it.

Some time I shall embroider both of these on cushions. It sucks and you have my sympathy.

@SpongeBobJudgeyPants
very good, thank you for those 😃

@CloudPop

at one time my brother and I were very, very close. I looked up to him and I thought he was moral and worthy of respect. Turns out he’s actually a bully and if you do something he doesn’t like you get cut out of his life forever.

What a sad situation. Really feel for you.

OP either don’t answer to your mother’s goading message or send her @KittyKittyKat text.It’s possible she would either come before bedtime and wind up your DC or create some drama which you don’t need.

Please seriously lower your expectations as it means less disappointment and hurt.

Let her stew and don’t comment. Her relationship with your brother is none of your business so remove yourself from this toxic dynamic.Being second best is very damaging to self esteem and leads sometimes to life long issues- mental health problems or turning into people pleasers who might be taken advantage of in later life (think abusive relationship).
Break the cycle for the sake of your son. Don’t let him see this is acceptable way to treat people especially closest family.

This is exactly the situation we had with FIL and his wife. Her DGC were on pedestal and our kids didn’t get a look in. FIL decided to drop visit to DS on his birthday and prioritise going to a friend instead.
Expectations were there but nothing coming from them.
Many situations occurred that we realised our family was last in the pecking order and went NC.We were smeared to all and sundry,our name is a mud but…

No drama. No false promises to children, no disappointment. Just peace and quiet.
I believe they are elderly now. StepMIL family can help them with whatever seeing as they had everything. No regrets here.

It's very harsh.

The truth often is.

My advice is to shift your focus from trying to fix things somehow to trying to protect yourself.

I know my mother's inability to communicate while simultaneously blaming me for the estrangement and talking about me but not to me did my head in for two years but then one day I thought, I cannot fix this, I don't have to fix this, it's not my responsibility, I'm not contractually obliged to spend the rest of my days trying .......... it was quite the epiphany. Before I kept seeing opportunities to go back in with an 'appeal' to be heard, again. But now I think what class of madness is this that your only daughter was begging to be heard for two years and you wouldn't give her five minutes. They're mad. I need to protect myself.

So channel every decision (every family related decision) through the filter of ''will this upset me though''

Now, I am just leaving them all well alone. I know I tried. I have the comfort (and it will be a comfort) of knowing that I tried to communicate with her, she just wouldn't have it.

So take a step back OP. Don't prioritise her. Don't revolve days around her.

Some would say don't actively pursue the relationship.

You have my sympathies. I thought my brother was ''logical'' and ''rational'' and it turns out he can't think for himself. He's another foot soldier and he does kind of get why I'm upset but at the same time, the bottom line for him is irritation that I won't just buckle under and submit to mum's regime/narrative (that I'm mad and mum is perfect). I can see why that narrative is no skin off his nose.

This is not so uncommon....something about mothers and sons...my grandma had my mum who was the eldest...then her son...six years younger. He was the golden child though he did nothing for his mum. My mum did much the same...I have a brother who is a few years younger than me...she idolised him...though he did little for her... I have a daughter and two sons...they are all treated the same...I love them all the same... When it comes to small grand children....then you never, ever go back on a promise to a child...thats unforgiveable. I am lucky to have three grand children and dote on them all...

Yes, my mother would never disrespect my brother the way she has hurt me.
It just wouldn't happen. but with me, it's like, Oh I'll do what I like and then martyr up to avoid any accountability later.

So you can clearly see how these things can be handed down the generations.

Your children are the third generation that this is happening to.

You may not want to go NC with your mother, but you have a moral obligation to protect your children from this, seeing as you can clearly see it is now 3rd generation behaviour, that will impact your children.

Many posters were in this situation and chose to not to see family rather than have their children exposed to such toxicity.

You need to protect your children, ahead of what you want for yourself.

Your mother is prepared to put what she wants, and your brother ahead of any arrangement she makes with you and your children.

I would NEVER make a firm arrangement with her again.

But then I simply wouldn't tolerate anyone treating my children as an optional, dispensable arrangements.

I can empathise with a lot of this OP. We put up with so much, take it on the chin, minimise the hurt - but when our children start to be targeted, that's when we get angry.

I'm low contact with my mother now and it's driving her crazy. If I see her I smile and nod and don't give anything away. She's been so cruel and passive aggressive towards me in the past, but now that I've pulled away she's all sweetness and light. Too little too late mother. She's just sent me £500 for my birthday. Desperately trying to reel me back in so we can begin the dance again but I'm sitting this one out - permanently.

I would advise a huge step back and an arm's length approach from now on. Protect your son.

Not nice for your son but is this actually about you and your brother rather than your mum? Their relationship is theirs. It's not nice that your mum didn't come on the day of the party but I don't think it's that big a deal. I'd get counselling about your brother issues, my brother is a massive shit but counselling helped and if my mum wants to run around after him then whatever.

How has it been left Op-that she is still invited?

If so hopefully you are prepared for her not to arrive/be late?

Well you have 3(?) siblings so Christmas bdays etc doesn't have to all fall on you.

Well it doesn't anyway!

She's not a good GM though if she's willing to mess your son about like this.

I haven’t replied to her. It’s a bit bullshit, to what she’s done, the messages she’s sent me and then just saying “I wasn’t thinking” after being so nasty.

this time if she comes at the designated time that’s fine, and if she doesn’t she won’t be coming in. And I won’t be mentioning her coming to DS again (or for other events in the future). next time I would just tell her not to bother.

what this has all done is made me decide about another matter - there was a family wedding of a distant relative happening in a few months. I was going to attend (despite the distance and faff etc), because I didn’t want to NOT attend because of my brother. The advice on here has made it clear that actually I should disengage fully from all drama and not bother attending as these are not people I want to spend time with and I CBA with this shit in my life. Also because my mother will never change so she will just be rude to me as my brother will be there.

so thanks for that everyone! I feel a lot better about my decision!