People should make an effort on Mother's day.

[madaboutpurple]

I feel sorry for the Mum's who were disappointed with Mother's day presents or lack of them. At Christmas it was full of messages about husband's who made little effort. Now there are loads of messages from Mum's who got nothing. People need to be a lot more generous. I was given flowers from the supermarket manager and I am not a mum.

So why do you put up with it?
Theres no point martyring yourself buying gifts from his mum and slaving away all day doing DIY when you’re actually just feeling bitter about it all.
You’re choosing this life.

Well that's the point isn't it? It's not about stuff. Now it's about stuff. It's weird.

Because despite doing that to me yesterday, my DH is actually pretty good. He remembers my birthday (even if hes not entirely great on the gift buying) and he usually gets me a little something for Christmas.
He dropped the ball on this one, because he’s autistic and his brain won’t let up on doing DIY when he’s got it in his head.

I think its a shame that people are instructed to show their mums their appreciation on a certain day of the year and if they don't meet an arbitrary standard, vaguely defined as 'effort', then it causes angst and discontent.
People are talking about their children and must surely know if they are loved and valued by them anyway. The wrong sandwiches don't mean a loving child doesn't care, and a lavish gift doesn't mean an otherwise indifferent one does.

Lovely card and dafffodils and some hugs. Affordable but lovely. No one ever feels like they have to make a grand gesture and spend money they don’t have.

I agree with PP that if you have expectations you need to actually communicate them and then hold people to them. There's nothing wrong with being explicit that you would like XYZ for a few years until people know what level of effort you expect every year. Shrugging off them ignoring your requests and being a martyr for the day is only going to get the same repeated next year. Likewise many don't want a fuss and communicate so.

People should make an effort for their loved ones all year round, not just on one artificially created day per year (tradition and religion are as artificial and meaningless as commerce).

Being so downtrodden and uncherished for 364 days of the year that you have to pin all your hopes of being appreciated on one day, and have to use that as the litmus test of whether your family loves you, is what's sad.

Conversely if you feel loved, cherished and appreciated as the year-round default in your relationship or family, these artificial "special days" stop mattering as much. People are humans and humans sometimes drop the ball, forget things or get things wrong. That's OK, and if it's not a pattern it doesn't matter.

I have never forced or expected my children to make a big show for Mother’s Day and hate the commercialisation of it all, but appreciated one son who came to stay for the weekend, helped with some gardening, bought a takeaway and spent time hanging out and having a laugh. He gave me a card which he said had been difficult to find as he knows I can’t stand pink, flowery, women-love-prosecco-and-cake type cards.

Not so much from the other son who called in for 10 minutes, an hour and a half after he said he would because he’d been at his gf’s grandma’s all morning, dropped off some sad garage flowers and a generic pink, flowery card and then rushed off because he was treating his gf’s mother and her partner to lunch.

It hurts like hell to be so disregarded, but from reading a couple of other threads it is apparently entirely my fault for being difficult, unwelcoming and expecting too much from him when he has his gf’s family to think of.

Tbh mothers day is about spending time with your mum, not presents. Ive seen so many mums complaining they haven’t had a child free day and I honestly don’t get it.

Did you tell them how you felt? If not, I'd do that now. More in a "next year I'd like ..." rather than "you let me down"

I see it everywhere - “I made a huge deal of his bday and Xmas and Father’s Day … i spent loads of time energy and money on personal gifts for him” easy solution is don’t bother next time but some women seem to be perpetual victims of crap presents and put up with it year in year out and rather than actually saying to their chap this isn’t good enough would rather quietly cry and/or complain on MN

that being said I also see plenty of - he got me xyz but it wasn’t good enough. I want a lie in and a meal out and to do nothing at all and and and……maybe these women like to play the hard done by victim who knows but they won’t do anything about it and it will be the same next year

So people carry on they are desperate to conceive their life will be over if they don't have children they goon to have children and sacrifice their whole life and martyr themselves now their children have thank their mother for being born

There is something odd about all this

This. And it doesn't have to be at a financial cost. Just love, respect, kindness and consideration.

Getting upset over one day if you are otherwise treated well by those close to you is pointless.

Getting happy if you are given gifts on the day if you are otherwise treated poorly is also pointless.

Take the bigger picture into account.

Nah. I told my kids not to bother. I don’t celebrate any of the hallmark holidays.

I was happy with hugs.

i certainly don’t expect DH to do anything cause im not his mum.

Also it’s not an American tradition either - “Mothering Sunday” in the U.K. predates the American Mothera day by a couple of hundred years

We have marked Mothering Sunday on the 4th Sunday of Lent since the 1500’s in the UK… however we choose to celebrate it, it’s definitely not one of those ‘made up by Clinton’s dates..,’ like Father’s Day has turned out to be. It was originally for those in service to return back to their ‘Mother Church’. That aspect might have been lost but it’s not just about the cards and bunch of flowers from Tesco - it’s been around nearly 500 years. I’m a single mum and chose my own present like a lot of people (!) as well as buying something for my own elderly mum. Of course we should all treat our mums with love every day and some people aren’t too bothered about it, but to say it’s all ‘made up’ isn’t it xxx

Why?

When I was a child, I remember there being a general idea that Mums should have the ‘day off’ on Mother’s Day. That Mums did a lot for their families and this one day was a chance to thank her and encourage her to put her feet up for the day. We made cards at school for our Mums and some folk gave flowers but I think gifts were rare. My brother and I would make mum tea and breakfast in bed on the day and we’d give her the cards we’d made.

As a mum myself, my expectations are the same. I do like cards, especially homemade. I usually get breakfast in bed and lots of cups of tea through the day. Sometimes they make me a cake. I don’t want to cook on MD and they all know that so either DH cooks or we get a takeaway. This year DS cooked.

So yeah, cards and lots of tea and not having to cook makes for a perfect MD for me.

It's not about not having the self-esteem to expect anything more. I know my worth and I know what I expect and deserve everyday. I'm not holding out for recognition on just one day.

However, the kids learnt about Mothers day in school so I've helped them to find ways they could surprise/recognise me for that day because that's what they wanted to do. I didn't wait around for anyone else to show them the way.

So if something is important to some people out there, they should get on with showing how it's done to avoid future disappointment.

I think these days can be very performative, it’s the year that counts not the day。I didn’t receive any flowers or card on Valentine’s Day - never have had flowers from DH occasionally a card but that isn’t important to me. Yesterday had one virtual card from one child and none from the other never have had or expected gifts and that doesn’t bother me.

Not even a mention from my husband. DD who is arty gave me a bunch of flowers and hand painted me a canvas of an animal I love. Disabled DS bought me a chocolate from his pocket money. Great to see my kids are not selfish like their father who I'm quiet quitting on and getting my ducks in a row for some time now so not bothered or surprised to be honest.

My children made me cards which was lovely. My husband had his mum ordere 2 completely random things from amazon because they said 'mum' on them then had them delivered to his parents address and his mum wrapped them in christmas paper (in the amazon box which had their name and address on).
He says I looked ungrateful when I opened it. Every year he does the same. I say I would be happy with a box of chocolates if you just went to the shop with the kids and let them chose themselves. I don't want your parents ordering and wrapping them, it is pointless!

It's very strange to me to see a grown adult claiming "heartbreak" over their partner not getting them a "wrapped gift" on a completely arbitrary day.

And it's completely inappropriate to talk about "training" your spouse (or ex-spouse!!!) to dance around you with cards and gifts, imo. And an odd thing to model for your children.

I'm not really bothered about my kids spending money on me. I'd rather they spent some time. I've trained them over many years to know I like handmade cards (helps they are all arty). Mine cooked me dinner, we went for a walk together, played a game and watched a show, all my choices. Perfect.

THIS ////////\

It is commercialised nonsense. I do not need society to tell me what specific day I should show my appreciation to my mum.

I told my DDs to get me nothing, and they were fine with that. It was just another day imo.