To be hurt that my mother is not who I thought she was

[Purplenote]

I thought I always had a good relationship with my parents, i don't remember a great deal of my childhood but what I remember is happy memories and even as an adult I thought we were a close family. When dad got sick my mum became the main carer and my 2 brothers and I took turns to help out and we were all there when he passed 5 years ago.
Since my dad died I think I've become to realise that perhaps I always viewed my parents as one person because they were always together and now I'm seeing who my mother is for the first time. I thought she was a loving mother and grandmother but i didnt know She is also really impulsive, makes big financial decisions on a whim (and she doesnt really have much money to begin with), she also shows little to no interest in her children or grandchildren (I thought she adored my kids but now looking back it was prob mostly my dad), she is obsessed with meeting men on dating sites and will put that ahead of any family stuff. She also lies all the time often about insignificant things but sometimes bigger things. A few years ago we had a big argument about it and she turned so nasty that I swore I would never call her out again so I'm just trying to accept her as she is.

I know she is still hurting, she expected to spend her life with my dad and her life was turned upside down through no fault of her own. But I just feel like I'm grieving the person I thought she was. Aibu.

Sounds to me like you never bothered to get to know your mother, barely seeing her as human or an individual with needs and preferences and completely took her for granted. She's probably had enough of running after you thoughtless lot and wants her own bit of fun in life. You only live once.

This, with bells on. You saw her as a unit, not a person.

There are a few points in life when you realise that your parents are not the people you thought they were, and it's never ' they are much nicer', it's always that they are more unpleasant than you thought.

When you have kids that are growing up, you can realise that they were not brilliant parents and didn't do half the things that they could and should have done.

When they are alone after a bereavement, as my father is, another veil comes off. Since my stepmum passed away I realise that my father has always been reliant on ' women' to look after him, whether it be his mum, my mum or my step mum. He's lazy, selfish and completely self absorbed and entitled, something that was papered over when he had others around to balance it out.

It's difficult to accept, and honestly you really don't have to..this isn't ' Eastenders', you don't have to accept everything because of ' faaaamily' .

You say she "lies all the time", which seems unlikely, I mean how would she get through the day? All a bit vague. I'd buy, "lies a lot", or "more than she used to".

What were those lies that affected you so much?

How old was your mum when she became you dad's carer ? And how old was she when he died ?

Perhaps she struggled so much when both those things happened , or maybe your dad gave her his blessing to go out and start a new life .

I think with the death of your father the life they were living , and the way your family integrated that into your own life changed and that is what has upset you ..
Be happy your mum is making a new life for herself , even if it's not what you imagined .

It’s so incredibly hard being widowed and losing the partner you loved - the grief, the loneliness, and never feeling “normal” on your own in company. You’re the pity party add on - or you feel like that. 🤷‍♀️

I met someone, purely by fluke, after a couple of years. Luckily, he’s a lovely guy and the family like him very much. We probably won’t ever live together as we’ve both been widowed, and now just want a relaxed a care free life.

We go away together, we both work out our own finances, and I don’t ever feel the need to justify my new life to anyone.

I love my adult kids, and adult grandchildren, but I’m more than a Mum and a Nan. 🤷‍♀️

Give your mum a break - she’s adjusting. 😉

I felt very sad for you reading this as you clearly care about your DM. The only input I can offer is our experience with MIL. The she was married and with FIL, we always thought he was a little bit over bearing and a little short with her at times - then after he passed, we realised how self centred and difficult she can be and she shows no interest in anyone else. Some of this is cognitive as she’s late eighties now but we can see that FIL acted as a filter where he rebuffed some of the outbursts ie she makes a lot of personal remakes ie Littlemisssavvy you look like you have put weight on (I am a size12) , that outfit doesn’t suit you etc etc. FIL was also a good regulator on money and countering impulsive spending. We’ve had a few issues where she’s needed us to sort out a mess ie she ordered a new bathroom on impulse, when they came to fit it, she said it wasn’t what she ordered (it was), lots of tears, we had to persuade the company to allow her to make changes even though none of it was there fault. I suspect your DM will have benefited from the influence of your DF and big decisions being joint.

But also that she would tolerate racism and homophobia.
I wouldn't let my children near anyone like that.

The OP isn't a child and her children are going to meet lots of different people in the course of their lives. They can't be permanently shielded from people with opposing or out dated views. Anyway, they don't live with the grandmother. They see her infrequently and the latest man friend even less so as he doesn't live with granny. I think the OP is more concerned with her inheritance than her mother's flash in the pan boyfriend.

I wonder if her loneliness and grief (and aging) has made her more selfish. She’s desperate for love and looking on dating websites instead of leaning in to her family.

Would it be worth it having a heart to heart with her about this? Apologies if it’s already been done.

Do you mean she goes for nasty men (bad boys) over nice men? At least with the one bad experience with money she won’t be interested in online scammers.

But why would it be 'selfish' to prioritise her own desire for a sexual/romantic life after she's been widowed, or indeed to take up water-skiing, ultramarathons, or Dungeons and Dragons rather than 'leaning into her family?

I would be cautious of rewriting history. if you have happy memories of a loving and engaged set of parents then your mum was probably one of them.

Bereavement can do very funny things to people. It can turn them very selfish and unable to cope with even the smallest demands from others. If she is someone who always thrived as half of a couple, maybe she is focused on finding a new man so she can settle back into that security and relax again, and become more family orientated.

But if she is also being unreliable with money and volatile, it is possible that her brain is deteriorating. Way before actual dementia is diagnosed, people can start to show very odd behaviour. My mum, who was always so gentle, became quite horrible to me. Not always, just on occasions, but it was a shock.

I was widowed in my 60s. My life and plans for our retirement just disappeared overnight.
I had to adjust to living on my own, making my own decisions and finding a whole new identity as a 'widow' rather than half a couple, after 50 years.
My plans haven't included new men - just a new dog, but every individual has to find their own way to navigate a new world.
No-one has the right to judge.

I think she is lonely and looking for companionship. I also think you are naturally missing the way things where. The way there was two adoring grandparents, happy together and enjoying family time together with you all.
Inevitably things have very sadly now changed for ever op. Your lovely dad has passed away and any future partner of your mother probably; isn't going to be as interested in the grandchildren as he was and they were together.
If she finds a permanent partner she is happy with she may settle back into more of the person you knew and, who knows, it may be someone you like and is interested in the children...but equally your mother may see this as 'her time's a last hurrah before old age really sets in.
I hope you are both able to move on into a new phase in your relationship which you both find fulfilling or at least acceptable 💐

Your mom despite the taste in men is still your mom. I nursed my dying mom and it seriously puts your life on hold. I lost a good chunk of my friendship group. I just wasn’t able to go out or meet for coffee etc & a relationship through text isn’t sufficient. I had nothing outside my mom or family to discuss. I didn’t know what was happening out of the four walls of my moms or my house. I only did this for 8 months but if you’re a carer for longer I can imagine you lose yourself. Your mom isn’t self centred. She can’t be. She nursed your dad. She’s probably emerged from the whole experience changed and wants to prioritise herself. With adult kids etc she’s completely within her right. Moving to a smaller house in a rougher part of town is all about finances. Running a home on your own is expensive. I don’t know what other bad financial decisions your mom is making but moving to an area where rates are likely cheaper and people are more likely to talk to each other rather than getting a obligatory nod like I do from neighbours she may have made a decision she had no choice to make. Especially when her idea of life is to live and not just making ends meet

Or is she grieving and struggling and has she actually changed because of it? What support does she have?

It is a massive shock when you see your mother as a person with different values from the ones she modelled to you, and from your own values that you hold, as an adult. She has obviously brought you up well, with healthy self esteem and able to thrive without a man. Maybe her mum didn't do the same for her and she can't cope being single, having never experienced it.
She absolutely is a different person now, she has a totally different life, of course she has changed. It would be a bit weird if she had not changed.
I agree it's like you have lost 2 parents now and that is heartbreaking. She has lost her own life too, in a way. Bereavement is horrible.

This. Very few people find their parents are who they think they are when they get to know them as adults. It’s part of growing up.

It seems like you expect her to continue to focus her entire life around being a loving mother and grandmother.

She's an individual, on her own, trying to navigate the world without her partner. She has wants, needs. And why should they have to each be fully 'approved of' by you? She is her own person and you should try and see her as such. Not just 'mum/nan'.

The racist boyfriend is grim. But presumably she's not with him now?

@Purplenote couple of points on this OP and they may sound a bit harsh but may be in the mix .

1 has she got many deep friendships? Because I’m also 64 and I will be honest if I was a bit lonely it’s much easier to meet men ( because of online etc and yes they are often of dubious quality) than it is to make new deep female friendships at that age and it may have become a bit all consuming, partly due to the fact it can become a bit of an ego boost after a shit time and partly to give her something to focus on .

2 could she be a bit strapped for cash on her own? Because for some men and some women the survival instinct kicks in and underlying cocklodger/goldigger tendencies can sneak in simply because naturally many dont want a shit struggling life and realise that aspect can be a bit easier with two of you if you don’t have plenty of cash yourself .

I would cut her a bit of slack , people can react in what seem odd ways when suddenly on their own - was she ever mega interested in your kids or was that more your dad- some women and some men simply aren’t after they have raised their own -

That.

When I was younger, I had plenty of friends and would have considered that I had a great support network. But as I've got older, friends have drifted away/I've carelessly drifted from them.
Once our kids were adults, there was less to connect us. People were caught up in caring for older parents, or doing childcare for they grandkids who became their focus. Or they focused on their jobs, or they became less fit and keen to be doing that activities we'd done together. And then, they started dying...

So yes, a couple of decades ago I didn't expect I'd be a lonely widow, but I am. So don't smugly assume that you'll be better at widowhood (which of course I hope doesn't happen for you) than your mum is. Life changes a lot with age.

I wonder if some of the lies are because you are asking her more about her life than she wants to reveal so she lies because she doesn’t want to say “ I don’t want to discuss that” The dodgy men who steal from her and are racist sound depressing to watch but you can’t push her back in to granny mode. I didn’t realise how much my dad loved choirs and singing until my mum died. He was bored rigid with police stories on TV but would watch them with her because they did everything together. When she died the tele watching stopped ( until he got frailer) and he joined choirs and assorted classes. Some of this was because he disliked being alone especially on an evening and really missed mum. Both he and my mum didn’t live alone before marrying and I think some people cope very poorly with being alone without feeling lonely. You also don’t really know someone if they are in a relationship where they always do everything together as you can’t separate their individual likes and dislikes as well.

Your mum was in her mid 20's when you were born, how long before that did she meet your dad? Early 20's?

You're looking at it all wrong, I did too, My mum left home at 20 and got married immediately after being the youngest of 5, when she found herself single at 50 when her children had all left home it destroyed her. She didn't know how to be alone, she no longer wanted to be in the relationship with HIM as he was an abusive arse, but she needed someone, anyone else as she had never in her life been alone. It sounds like your mum is similar - independent or not, for her, being alone night after night is not the life she's ever led.

Maybe thats just not fulfilling enough for her?
There more to life than being a widowed grandmother - she's only 64 FFS.