Mums strange lie

[dontsaystuff]

One day when I was about 7/8 I remember my mum coming home visibly upset and rushing to the bathroom. I followed her to find her undressed, in tears and scrubbing at her skin. She was covered in arrows, dots and lines almost like surgical markings but on every inch of her skin.

She shut the door, I asked her about it often for the next couple of weeks she said that it was ‘just drawings’ and that she was fine. I could tell she continued to be upset by it and honestly feel like she changed since then.

I asked about it again a couple of years later and she completely denied it even happening, said it must have been a dream. The couple of other times I’ve asked about it she’s stuck to that story. I’d convinced myself that it might have been but it feels like it was such a clear l memory from my childhood, not just seeing her but the conversations we had after. I was very scared, confused and upset by it, still am.

Last year she got an upwards arrow tattooed on her wrist, she looked upset/guilty when I saw it. I’ve just seen a photo of her that shows a series of dashed lines tattooed on her other arm.

It’s driving me crazy, I can’t stop thinking about what could have happened, why she would get the tattoos and seeing her covered in the markings.

I understand that something upsetting obviously happened to her and why she wouldn’t want to tell me but
AIBU in thinking that it’s not fair to say I made it up especially when she’s gotten these tattoos?

I think OP said she's in her twenties so her mum could only be in her forties or even late thirties if she had her young. So if OP was 7 when this could have happened her mum could have been mid twenties and it the result of some daft drunken/ druggy episode that meant nothing I know that doesn't really explain why she denied it, maybe going through some embarrassing phase she doesn't want to remember. It is also possible OP has misremembered it. I'd just ask the significance of the tattoos and see if that sheds any light on it. Presumably she'd be willing to talk about the tattoos otherwise she'd have had them done in a more hidden place.

Why grow up? Gaslighting someone is wrong and distressing. I certainly don’t think the OP should harangue her DM for an answer but the tattoos in visible places that she’s quite happy to be seen in public opens the conversation IMO.

I think I would say something like
"this feels really bizarre to me. Those tattoos you have got look so familiar because they look like the ones you came home distressed and scrubbed off when I was a child. Remember that time that you told me i'd imagined it?
We both know I didnt imagine it, but I stopped asking anyway. Now youve got tattoos of the marks, are you still going to tell me it was my imagination?

If she didnt at least acknowledge that it had actually happened, even if she didnt want to explain them, then I think i'd find that really difficult to believe her and trust what she said in general.
Obviously everyone is entitled to a private life, even mums! That doesnt mean its fair to gaslight your kids.

So true. Trauma can absolutely be passed from one generation to another and emerge in different ways: emotionally cold parenting, mental instability, violence.

Lots of trauma from WW1 and WW2 was passed to the next generations and still emerges today.

Posted in error sorry

I agree with @OpalQuartz , you are not making this about you. I really don’t agree about privacy etc. You are entitled to your feelings, and shouldn’t be minimised.

I agree

It is about OP though. She was a child and she saw something that has impacted on her, her mother is meant to be the person to shield her from such things and instead, let her see whatever this was and then subsequently gaslit her own child saying it didn’t happen. Her mother has a right to privacy, but her daughter has a right to not be gaslit and made to feel she’s made something up, her mother could just say yes it happened but I don’t want to talk about it. From OPs posts I think she would accept that, but just wants reassurance she did see what she saw

You are making it all about yourself.

It’s about what YOU remember, what YOU need to know and how YOU don’t want to be lied to.

If your mother doesn’t want to discuss this with you, leave her be

Do you think you would both be better for knowing something she seems so wary of sharing? Could you cope? Are you equipped to support her if you unearth past traumas?

Honestly unless she's prone to cults, some sort of 'alternative therapy' or been kidnapped you probably are remembering it wrong

You don't agree that the OPs mum is entitled to any privacy over whatever this matter is? The OP can ask if the event happened and the mum can confirm that it did, which is all the OP says they want. But then it must be left there unless the mum feels otherwise.

Radiotherapy ones are small, discreet. Not arrows, not dashes, not lines. Small dots no bigger than a freckle

If I were you I would ask her again too, but I would wait until you're at least in your mid thirties.
I hope this doesn't sound patronising but as you're only in your 20s your mum is still going to probably still see you largely as an inexperienced child snd may not feel it appropriate to share yet

No one has said the mother is entitled to no privacy. OP is allowed to talk about a frightening childhood experience that she got no explanation for on an anonymous forum without unkindly being told she is "making it all about her."

@OpalQuartz I've never said she wasn't entitled to post or that she was making it about herself. But the poster I quoted said that they didn't agree about the privacy and that was what I was looking for confirmation about.

Sounds runic to me.
OP… she doesn’t want you to know.
Leave it.

Because it's the mum who had the scary event happen to her. I understand OP was freaked out but that doesn't mean she deserves any kind of explanation.

I don't believe OP has a right to know what happened to her mum all those years ago. I have lots of random memories from my childhood that I never got an explanation for, but it's not my place to push my parents for answers. If they wanted to share with me, they would.

If OP is still struggling, she could talk to a therapist.

I’m with OP. Regardless of what the marks are, she’s been told something didn’t happen that did. That makes it stick out even more in her memory, and even doubt real memories as dreams. It’s a short cut to addressing the issue that has repercussions for how OP views her relationship with her usually open Mom.

Id say, at a convenient and quiet time, are these tattoos something to do with what happened when I was little?

it acknowledges that it did happen. And that may be what OP needs to hear; not the details of it all.

This is a good point.

OP doesn’t need to be told the whole story. She only needs to know, for her own sanity, that her childhood memory is correct. She appears content to leave it at that.

However, if her DM wants to go further and tell her more of what happened, and it’s something very traumatic (e.g. sexual assault), I agree OP should suggest her mother tells her with the support of therapy for them both, with time booked off work straight afterwards. To ensure there’s a safe space and support for both of them, rather than them having to provide this for each other. And they both have mental space to process.

OP, whatever it was, your mum was very upset, she hasn't wanted to talk about it, so I really think you should accept that and leave it in the past.
My mum is sadly no longer here, before I was born she suffered a terrible tragedy.
Through various members of my family I heard little bits of what had happened, how it had affected my mother, but it was like a taboo subject. Then those older relatives died, and I never found out details.

I would never have quizzed my mum about it, because she had buried it in the past, and it would have been cruel to bring it back.

There's no way I'd not do all I could to find out what it was,it's had a big impact on your life clearly, of yourself it's about YOU, it impacted you. The gaslighting would piss me right off.

Have you considered that she isn’t gaslighting her but she is protecting her? You don’t know what happened to her mother and you don’t know whether the OP will able to handle the truth (assuming her memories are real). OP had asked several times and for whatever reason has been told nothing. Pushing for such things when the person is not ready will only make them feel cornered and will not accomplish anything good. As I said earlier in the thread the only thing OP can productively do is share her feelings with her mum and let her know she is there if her mum wants to talk. I speak from the point of view of a daughter whose mother lived through trauma and is still affected by it. She told me when she was ready and believe me I wish she hadn’t as it’s so difficult to now live with knowing what she had to endure.

As you are going to ask your mum about it again @dontsaystuff , I would approach it by specifically saying you're not asking what it was all about and you're not prying into things she doesn't want to share, but you'd like confirmation and clarity about the memory you have.

@NovemberMorn the difference between the OP and you is that, fir your mum, it happened before you were born. Whereas the OP witnessed the aftermath. She was part of it. She has memories of the incident.

Telling her it was just drawings when she was 6yo was not a surprising answer. It certainly didn’t take into account how traumatic it was then for the OP to see her mum so distressed. But you can also understand why.
Telling her it didn’t happen/lying/gaslighting her as a teen wasn’t.