Does anyone else feel like this re: parents

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I just phoned up my mum again to discuss something that happened which was on my mind but the conversations and her attitude always make me feel worse than I was! I know I should stop calling her and I know she can’t give me what I want and I feel jealous of women who can have a heart to heart with their mums and feel better as I never will.

I don’t even think she does it on purpose, this is how she responds - obviously not a real life example of our conversation but to give you an idea of how she is:

Me: hi mum, how are you?
mum: I’m okay.
Me: so I got hit by a bus today and I feel upset as I can’t walk and I’m in pain.
mum: what colour was the bus?

the above is just to show you how she responds. I don’t want to go into detail about why I called her as I can make a separate thread to get advice of the situation and detailing it here will mean I don’t get any advice on how to deal with my mum.

I phoned her today as I was really upset about an incident yesterday and she didn’t even attempt to give me any support or understanding or even any sympathy but just went off topic to ask questions about other things that are not important, I know for a fact if I got out of the house now and went to a random stranger and told them then I would get some sympathy from them but my own mother is always so cold and disinterested

Yes, my mum was very similar. Over time I think I made peace with it, and accepted that she was unable to give me any sort of emotional support. On her part it wasn't meant maliciously, it was just how she was.

It is hard when you see other people who have close relationships with their mums. But that's life x

She either can't or won't give you any support so phoning her will always just make you feel worse.

Make peace with the fact that your mum is incapable of showing empathy and kindness to her own daughter and pull right back from the relationship.

Once you stop hoping that she might provide you with help and support, you can aim to find other sources of comfort and support, whether practical or emotional.

Currently, you are hoping that each time you contact her for support to deal with a problem or difficult situation, she might finally be the kind of mother you want/need. This isn't going to happen and you are constantly disappointed and upset.

My MIL is absolutely like this. I’ve learnt it’s not that she doesn’t care, it’s that she struggles to process information and then respond in an emotionally/socially appropriate way. If we have big news we tell her by WhatsApp. Then tell her how we are feeling. Then ring her a week later.
It sounds ridiculous written down but that’s the only way she has it in her to behave in a ‘normal’ way. I suspect she is undiagnosed autistic (based on her grandchildren) so try to be understanding. But in the early days, she hurt my feelings hugely.

Mine would just reply that it happened to her once and then tell me all about that. No questions to check if I’m ok or if I need anything, nope, just all about her.

Im now NC.

What’s more upsetting is my husband is the male version of her! I just told him and he responded equally unemotionally!

This.

You either have to have a lower level of contact and keep it superficial or cut contact altogether. Get support elsewhere because it’s never going to be something your mum can provide. Thinking she may give you a different reaction, the reaction you want one day isn’t going to happen and her not giving it each time will upset and destroy you.

I’ve been there, lots of other issues too and annoyingly I’d get told about her neighbours or random other person had it so bad and she was supporting them. I cut contact for a variety of reasons in the end and life is so much better for it.

Similar issues with my own DM....I phone up about something and it always seems to move onto the same topic each and every time. I am not interested! She just steers it to that one topic. It puts me off phoning.

We marry our parents don’t we as they are familiar to us!

It must be difficult when it’s your mum, but obviously you already know that different people have different levels of empathy. Your mum just happens to be on the low empathy end of that spectrum. It’s unfortunate that your husband is too, but it means you’ll need to build a support network of higher empathy people around you.

We, assuming we are mothers, have to promise ourselves not to do the same thing to our own children.

My mum doesn't really offer sympathy, support or anything like personal interactions . We tend to just talk about very bland, impersonal subjects when meet and rarely talk on the phone - unless essential. We communicate by text mainly.

That said I think she may show more concern if I was in an accident. I certainly hope dh would!

My MIL is like this.

I told her I was in the hospital for suspected heart attack but after tests had come home in a taxi

She asked how much the taxi cost

As well as not talking about the real issue, I get negative or sort of shaming / blaming comments

At the same time she expects me to listen to her and her friends problems and be supportive.

I'm distancing myself now.

I am sorry to read this. I fully understand how you are feeling, I am the same with my mum too, you need to protect yourself, do you have a friend you can talk to?
You need to accept your mother is like this, don't make regular contact with her, be very disinterested when you speak to her, good luck xxx

I am sorry to read this. I fully understand how you are feeling, I am the same with my mum too, you need to protect yourself, do you have a friend you can talk to?
You need to accept your mother is like this, don't make regular contact with her, be very disinterested when you speak to her, good luck xxx

Hmm. There is an instinct as a parent to want to try and fix things. So you - 'I broke my leg' , if she had said something like, 'oh, but your other leg is OK?' I would say she is trying (in her mind) to solve the problem.

Being generous, maybe she is trying to distract you from your problems by talking about something else.

But people often listen to reply, rather than listen to hear. I also think parents are more likely to do that because deflecting kids' incessant 'asks' can become a habit. Sounds like she's stuck in a dynamic.

Yes, this. Your mum is incapable of being empathic and nothing you do will change her. There is no magic fix to this, nor is there a magic phrase, it's her core personality. It's akin to you expecting an apple tree to bear oranges - it will never happen because the capability isnt there.

You can't control her but you can control your reaction to her by not building an expectation that she will support you only for you to be re-disappointed and crushed every single time. Dont expect support from her. Tell her generic things about your life but seek actual emotional support from other sources such as close friends or a therapist if you feel it would help.

It sounds like, for whatever reason, she's unable to respond in an empathetic way. Was she always like this, when you were growing up? Some people are just not wired that way or they instinctively shy away from emotional conversations because it causes them discomfort (possibly from her own childhood/trauma)

I think it's normal to feel sad that you don't have the relationship with your mum that you would like to. Acknowledge it and accept the reality that you cannot change her and she is not the person to go to for sympathy and support. Do you have siblings, friends etc that you can talk to?

My mum is similar only her next question would have been, how did you let a bus hit you? Were you on your phone and not properly looking?
If I have a problem, she's always seeking to find how I somehow caused it. It's really shit so I totally get where you're coming from, OP.

My mum is more like this:

Me: I have a migraine
Her: I don't get headaches. Not ever, not in my life. Don't you think that's interesting?
Me: I am currently experiencing severe pain. So no, I don't find your lack of pain interesting.
Her: Oh, but it is!

She can only relate if it's something that happened to her. But then my grandparents were very neglectful, I think she's missing a few chips.

I've always had to rely on friends for emotional support as I'm a widow and my mum has always been all about her emotional needs, even when I was a young child.

My mum is another who couldn't seem to deal with anything that I was going through. As others have said about their mums, I don't think it was nastiness, I just think she was not capable of talking about anything that wasn't about her.

I empathise. My own mum has low emotional intelligence - which I think links to what you've described.

When I was a child, a close family friend, who I spent a fair bit of time with, died. She chose to break the news to me by saying in an off hand way 'ah well, [other relative] will be sad, because [family friend] has died!'. She simply couldn't come out and tell me properly.

She has a good heart but is pretty clueless how to deal with many situations in life...

You cant change your mum or your husband, but you can chose not to be around either of them.

We can't change others, only ourselves.
Time to start thinking about you, and whats best for you alone.

Hope you feel better soon.

I have a friend like this and I agree it's often not malicious. Seems like low emotional intelligence combined with childhood trauma.

It seems cruel to me to cut your mother out, as some of the advice here recommends, because she didn't/ couldn't behave in a good enough nourishing way. She still gave a huge part of her life and hard graft bringing you up. None of us are perfect mothers, and many of us know what a struggle it can be having children.

My DM is a bit like this, not as extreme. She just can’t handle negative stuff, she finds it very distressing. She also thinks giving oxygen to other people’s problems will deny her problems the attention she wants to give them.

I’ve just stopped talking to her about stuff (so now she complains I never tell her anything 🙄).