AIBU to be fed up with my mum criticising my sister?

[Honeysucklelane]

I’m getting fed up of my mother’s irrational anger / annoyance over the way my sister lives her life, what she spends her money on and how cluttered and messy her home is.

She’ll visit my sister more and spend more time with her than me, not bother to see me even though I’m local. Then she’ll bitch to me afterwards about how chaotic their life is and how much money they waste.

She was absolutely livid they’d brought new garden furniture, literally in a ranty rage about it, yet they have the money and it’s their home. It’s gorgeous too. Totally irrational response, I cannot understand her anger.

WTAF is that about? And why do I have to suffer the verbal offloading whilst trying to defend my sister?

I’ll bet she’s criticizing you to your sister!
Hard to understand why parents are so verbally critical of their DC.

I don’t think so. She’ll say most of this stuff directly to my sister too, so if she was criticising me to my sister, I would hear about it. Besides, my house is tidier, organised and I shop at cheaper shops. 😂I do know she does bitch about me being vegetarian and how I should lose weight.

I don’t get the anger over what they choose to do with their house and what they buy though. They have plenty of money and don’t owe my mum anything so there’s no valid reason to be spitting feathers about it.

@Honeysucklelane this is an easy one to resolve really.

As soon as your Mum starts on about your sister, you immediately shut it down with "Mum, I don't want to hear it"

Record her doing it and play it back to her. Hopefully that will shame and embarrass her enough to shut up

I doubt she’d care. She told me she didn’t think my sister would be speaking to her for a while after what she’d just been saying about her house etc.

We’re both completely baffled she’s so angry over some new garden furniture. It makes no sense.

Does she have MH issues? Or is she struggling for money maybe?

is she jealous? that your sister has nice garden stuff, or it might be a nice house or lovely clothes or a new haircut or whatever? the anger sounds like jealousy to me.

Possibly. It also feels like a loss of control. She can be quite controlling and highly critical, but at the same time very helpful and generous. She gets very angry they aren’t spending their money on the things she deems they need to spend it on to improve their home.

My mum is a bit like this she never use to be but as soon as she retired and her world got really small she just has nothing really to talk about or anyone else to talk to i let her have a few minutes then I change the subject and try to talk about positive happy things

What was DM’s married life like -very hard up?, serious financial problems as she had no savings for emergencies?
What was DM’s mother like , or her father - skinflint, out of work a lot ,
what was DM’s siblings like - one favourite who got lots while she got nothing.
try looking into her life at that stage- is that where her anger comes from

I woukd ask her to stop it or leave.

Quite. Tell her stop. Point out that your sister can live her life, and spend her money however she likes and you're not going to listen to your mum trashing her.

And hang up phone/walk away etc. if she persists.

It honestly sounds like your mum is jealous of your sister. She’s obviously also completely mental and I wouldn’t entertain her rants. I would and have hung up on/walked out on/kicked out my own mother when she behaves in a deranged, hateful manner.

Have you asked why she even cares?

Ugh yes my mum is the same. She’s so opinionated and critical and I have to listen to her going on and on about my sisters family (and others). No doubt she does the same about me to my sister 🙄

Needless to say we’re both utterly fed up of it and my sister has really started withdrawing from my mum which gives her another thing to bitch about.

My mum lives for gossip and drama. It’s exhausting.

Would you not feel confident enough to say “mum stop going on about (sister)’s life choices, it’s boring and I want to have a nice time with you not be negative” or similar? You need to start making it clear you’ll walk away from a conversation if it’s just bitching.

Maybe your sister is your mum's scapegoat so she can never do right in her eyes

"Mum, you need therapy for your control issues. Please stop talking about this with me, or leave."

On repeat.

Do you actually enjoy spending time with her?

(Child of super controlling/abusive mother here)

My mum is very like this. My sister identified that it seems to come from a place of low self esteem. She sees us doing anything differently to what she did/would do as an insult and rejection of her as a person. Without really taking into account that we are different people and life is different in lots of ways for our generation.

She would bang on and on about the money my sister and her partner were "wasting" on rent and they ought to be buying a house. The reality was that they were renting a tiny one bed flat and saving madly for a deposit. Mum and Dad had bought a big detached house as soon as they were married because house prices were so much lower then. Mum just didn't seem to "get" that the equivalent is just out of reach to people in an ordinary income now. She wasn't offering anything towards a deposit either so where she thought the money would magically appear from I do not know.

Nevertheless it's really tiresome. It used to annoy or upset me. Now I just shrug it off and change the subject. She got a bit better, I dont know if she just ran out of steam, became more accepting or found us ignoring her comments worse than the original thing that offended her!

She sounds controlling and seems to think that she should be consulted on all matters. My mother is a tiny bit like this and I have often have had to tell her it is not her place to comment on certain things/people, She is getting better.

my mum can be a little like this, but without the anger / insults. She had fairly fixed ideas about how things ‘should be’ , for her normal = what she would do 🙄. Eg my sister lived in a basement flat for a while. The big window at the front was set in a bay shaped space, and my sister just had a very light Roman blind on it, and just bare wall on each side. My mum thought she was made not to put proper heavy insulating curtains on the window and covering the bare wall, to make it ‘more cosy and warm looking’. My sister hates clutter and likes clean open space. But my mum went on and on and on, repeating her opinion over and over, both to my sister and to me. It’s like she thinks we haven’t understood and recognised the wisdom of what she’s saying, so she has to keep saying it until we do 🙄

I think you might be spot on with this thought.

It also feels like a loss of control. She can be quite controlling and highly critical

Being highly critical is another attempt at controlling if you can’t control the behaviour try the narrative.

This is my mother. Never happy for me and it from jealousy and insecurity. I know that now having been put down and dismissed all of my life. Look up scapegoat and golden child, I am my mothers scapegoat and got blamed for everything that went wrong in her life - I got blamed on gossiping and bitching in the family who now no longer speak to me about something that I never even knew as it happened 20 years before I was born! My mother HATES that she has no control over me and now I dont talk to her and I am thriving she hates me all the more because I have shown her up for who she really is. Parents like this are venomous. Stop her and cut her down every single time she does it as she is triangulating you and trying to turn you against your sister.

She sounds utterly toxic. Well done to your sister for moving away. Tell your sister the truth. Then step away yourself.

How do you respond to her?