AIBU to snap after my mum kept calling a bike a trike?

[Crayo]

i am looking to get my daughter her first bike. She’s 5 and has had a balance bike before but never a real bike. Everytime I speak to my mum she asks me if I’ve found a “trike” yet. I keep telling her it’s a bike I’m getting, 2 wheels” and she always says “oh yes, you know what I mean”.

Well this has been going on weeks and literally everytime I speak to her she asks about the “trike” and I constantly correct her and say “bike”. She does have a habit of asking the same question for weeks at a time and she also has form for deliberately saying the wrong words for attention and it’s tiring.

this morning I was at my mums and my sister was there. I went to toilet and when I came back my sister said “not being funny but isn’t DD old enough for a proper bike now?” I asked what she was on about as I am getting her a proper bike and she said “mum! You said she was getting a trike!”

So I lost it, screamed and shouted “stop saying it’s a fucking trike!! You know it’s not so just fucking stop it”

my sister said “Jesus Christ is there any need for that?” So I told her she’s been saying trike for weeks and it’s winding me up so she said “she gets mixed up, there’s no need to scream like that” but the annoying part is she doesn’t get mixed up!!! She does it on purpose and has been doing this for years!

the OP's mother has been doing it since she (mother) was 30. I doubt its dementia

I would definitely recommend a memory clinic appointment to her.

She may or may not be doing it on purpose you can't always tell. (Dementia has long tendrils into your late thirties/early forties for some people)

I'd suggest it but only to annoy the hell out of her

Well, win-win really.

When she starts up with this crap again flip it around on her. Act concerned about her declining memory annd inability to remember what you’ve told her, names of things etc.

Get others involved - Start sharing your concerns privately with family members etc -“I told her I’m buying DD a bike and 3 or 4 times a week for the last x number of weeks she is asking about when I’m buying a trike. I correct her every time, but she’s still calling it a trike” Mention the bonsai issue and a few other examples of her behaviour recently. Suggest “maybe we need her to speak to her GP, I’m concerned something is wrong?”

She’ll either soon stop that crap as either 1) she was making it up to wind you up, or 2) she is actually in mental decline. I’m guessing it’s 1.

My mum kept telling people I studied at a school that back then was only Sixth Form level both when I did my bachelor's and my master's. My dad just got the university wrong but instead of calling me an economist, he has told people I am "economa" which is a cook. He has done this for more than twenty years. I found out last year.

I never did yell at any of them about it, but I might have had a voice that was a bit exasperated after the twentieth time I heard them say the wrong places of education.

I get into trouble with my teenage grandchildren when I say are you going to the pictures? I believe its cinema these days!!

lol yes

I learned not to mention INSET days after years of this bloody conversation...

"We had an INSET day last week"
An insect day?
"No mum, an INSET day"
^An insect day?"
(repeat)
"No! An INSET day... Teacher Training Day!"
A what???
"A Teacher Training Day!!!"
A what???
"A BAKER DAY!!!"
Oh (now magically understands now I've finally referenced the Tory education secretary of my infant school years 🙄)

I think the PP that referred to them playing on not keeping up with changes was correct for my model of mum. Teacher Training Day is both clear enough at surface level and is what they were called throughout my school years if INSET was genuinely incomprehensible after years of me having several a year, but no, to get her to understand I had to dredge up a 1980s colloquialism each bloody time.

Oh and there was the ear/ smear test debacle where I ended up shouting S.M.E.A.R. down the phone. That one may be more reasonably attributed to shit hearing, but having dodgy hearing myself I end up putting a lot more effort into piecing the context together rather than constantly repeating something that is clearly not correct.

It's bloody tiresome trying to sustain a meaningful relationship with someone who plays dumb or doesn't put much effort into clear communicating and retaining information. It can cumulatively be quite diminishing over time (Add in other difficult behaviours such as being told off in your mid-40s for having an untidy bedroom as a teenager while conveniently overlooking that it was in a better state then than it is now with her hoarding disorder and cat-piss-soaked carpets...)

It's not being old, she's done it for decades and pissed most family members off at some point, and driven wedges between others.

My word, why did this wind you up so much? Unless you know her to be deliberately provoking with vocabulary, but even then it's not a big deal.

My MIL does the whole deliberately using the wrong word/name thing. She also gets my family members names wrong. It's definitely deliberate. And it's nothing to do with aging as she's been merrily misnaming things for the whole 40 years I've known her.

Drives me batty. YANBU. But I probably wouldn't scream at her just in my head.

The thing is, you DO know what she means so just reply in good faith about the thing. It’s kinder if she is making a genuine mistake and it’s giving her no pleasure if she is trying to wind you up. My dad always mixes up abbreviations like DVD. He does it every time, no matter how many times he’s told the right order. I don’t get angry though because what’s the point? It’s not that deep.

Her asking about the ‘trike’ multiple times doesn’t mean she’s showing you she thinks it’s unimportant. Changing the subject, or saying it’s a silly idea to buy one at all, would be doing that. She’s showing interest, even if she is calling it the wrong thing.

Are you sure your mum didn’t also have dyslexia? It commonly runs in families. If she had undignified dyslexia it would explain why she was struggling to pronounce unfamiliar words.

😂 😂 😂 😂

I've lived in Canada for 17 years but my brother still refers to me as 'living in America'

Because it's incredibly irritating???

I hope you will always remain perfect & that when your daughter is older, you don’t do anything at all which causes that kind of reaction.

honestly, at least she’s showing interest in your child & their birthday.

My mother also occasionally seems to mispronounce words on purpose
I.e.

The name Bao which is pronounced to rhyme with How but instead pronouncing it Bay-ow, even when she's heard it pronounced properly??

I mean, why?

Quite sure. Her pronunciation issues were very selective, and limited to things she didn't approve of. In her youth she was accepted for a prestigious drama school, so I doubt she was showing any pronunciation problems then.

out of interest, what did your Mum say after you shouted at her about it?

So it's not maliciously deliberate, just irritating? I'm sure your DC must be irritating at times, can't you reciprocate this tolerance to your Mum? Hopefully you will learn to reign in such disrespectful comments as you mature and realise how much you love her because it's not forever.

I came to the conclusion that she does it with me to minimise everything I do - “forgets” the right word for stuff to show me how unimportant my thing is.

That part. That's exactly it. That's what she's doing and that's why you snapped, because you don't want her doing this to your daughter as she has done all your life to you. I get why people think YABU because they have never probably never been on the receiving end of something like this but I totally get it. I would suggest taking a step back from her if you can, in my experience people like this never change and she will absolutely treat your DD the same way. Sending hugs from someone who knows 🩷

I would also find this incredibly frustrating, OP. I think it comes down to some women who act all silly, almost like bimbos, because it gets some attention. It's very stupid and immature, and something they should have grown out of. Incidentally, is this something that she's always done around men for attention?

I live in a bungalow and I call it my house sometimes and not always home. It’s quicker to say 🤣🤣🤣

Totally frustrating but your mother taught you to go to the toilet, use cutlery and everything else growing up - did she scream at you like then when you kept making mistakes? I experience similar and ooofftttt it’s frustrating but never shouted and sworn at her because she’s my mum.

But a bungalow is a house!