to want to tell my mother to f**k off and leave me alone

[sevenkeystomysoul]

My mum's lovely, really she is, I'm a single parent and she helps me out the best she can, but she is the most selfish, self-obssessed woman who ever lived and she is currently driving me insane. She isn't in the best of health, nothing serious, but a lot of issues relating to being very overweight (something she refuses to do anything about as she says she's 'too old' to change her ways.) For the past few weeks, she hasn't been very well, but she is one of those people who seem to 'enjoy' being ill, never stops moaning, talking about it, fretting about it. She's been calling me 20 times a day to wittle on and on and on about every little ache and pain, and I am just about all out of sympathy. She isn't on her own, she has a husband and lots of friends, but seems to think it's my 'duty' as her daughter to listen to all this, despite the fact that I have a very demanding toddler to cope with on my own and a lot of my own worries (that I don't share with her, firstly because I'm not a moaner and secondly because she would then have more things to worry about, and she does love to worry and make everything about her). Her GP has put her on anti-depressants now, mainly, I think, because he's fed up of her whingeing on too. Today, she has told me I 'have to' bring DD to see her, because she (my mum) will 'die if she doesn't see her (DD)'. Now, I take DD over to see her regularly, but I really object to being told what to do and I am sick of the melodrama and frankly sick of listening to her endless moaning. I don't even have to ask how she is, I just pick up the phone and the diatribe begins (there's no point not taking her calls because she'll call every ten minutes and leave increasingly hysterical messages). She doesn't seem to care that she's piling all her shit on top of the shit I'm already dealing with. So, AIBU for thinking she's VVU? I already know I am BU for such a long, ranty post

I don't think her GP would put on her anti depressants because of her whingeing.

Give her times when you are available to talk and tell her not to call outside those times.

Put the phone on silent and speak to her when it suits you

She has obssessed so much over her current illness that she has actually become very mildly depressed. I am sure that her GP would not prescribe ADs for anyone else with her symptoms. I have tried setting boundaries, she ignores them. If she hasn't been able to get hold of me during the day, because I've been at work, she'll think nothing of calling at 9pm to berate/guilt trip me, even though she knows DD is a bad sleeper and I have real problems getting her to bed at night.

I sympathise with you, my mother is exactly the same! She also likes to create memories in her head. She lies for attention. I wouldn't trust her as far as I could throw her.

YANBU

I think all you can do is put your foot down with a very firm hand tbh.......answer her call, tell her it's not a good time to talk, tell her what time to call you back, and hang up. Repeat ad infinitum until the message sinks in!

You have my mother...you can keep her!

I really have nothing to say, either way, other than you really do have my sympathies. It's so hard. 14 years of crap blew up between me and my mum fairly recently. It's peaceful now but it was a dreadful experience, we argued, angrily, hurtfully solidly for 2 days and I dont think all the damage will ever be undone. I had to hoped to be gratified after finally saying some of the stuff I have wanted to say for years. My sister, my grandparents and my father all agree that she acts dreadfully a lot of the time but it fell to me, the eldest and the most forceful daughter to say it. I had hoped somewhere vainly that mum would have taken some of it on board but she didn't see it my way, no matter how I put it. She was left bruised, hurt and upset, overwhelmed by her own self obsessions, opinions, illnesses emotions and I was left feeling nothing but guilt and nothing changed. I am just rising above it/ignoring it better now. Still keeping my mouth shut as the drip feed begins again.

That's it though, isn't it mrspir8? My mother doesn't take on board anything I or anyone says, refuses to see anyone else's side of things, and I am left feeling horribly guilty and just plain horrible for 'upsetting' her. My brother feels exactly the same way, but he has refused for years to be coerced and won't put up with the moaning and the melodrama at all, so it all falls to me. I had an ally in my lovely dad, who had been separated from my mum for 25 years and remarried but still knew what she was like, but he passed away last year. Her latest thing is worrying (and constantly telling me) that I might 'snap one day'. This is from a woman who had a very comfortable lifestyle with my dad when me and my brother were kids, a succession of nannies and au pairs, and who, according to one of her old friends (and this was told to me through a third party) didn't actually do a great deal of hands-on parenting. I'm a single, financially-struggling mum, but I'm intelligent, grounded and more than capable of dealing with a demanding three year old on my own without 'snapping'. If I tell my mum that DD is being difficult, she (my mum) starts fretting that I can't cope. It's insulting really. My DD is the absolute love of my life and I can deal with her three-year-oldness (if I sometimes bang my head against the wall in frustration, that's fine) I would never hurt her, but I can't even say, for example 'Oh, DD has been a nightmare today' to my own mother because she'll start worrying (and telling me) that I'm not coping, that I'm going to lose it, beat my beloved child to death and cook her up for sausages, or something like that. And yet, when I take DD to her grandma's and DD starts acting up, as three year olds do, and I try to discipline her, my mum completely undoes everything by saying 'Oh, don't tell her off, I can't bear to hear her cry (she does this on the phone too). When I tell her she's not helping, she tells me it's her perogative as a grandparent. I doubt that my mother had children in order to use them as vents in later life, but I do think she had them because it was expected, not because she wanted them. She told me, when I was fourteen, that she didn't want my older brother, but loved him when he arrived, didn't want the second (me), but loved me also, then aborted her third pregnancy. She has since denied telling me this, but I was fourteen, not four, and I know what I heard. On the other hand, my DD was conceived quite late in my life, when I had reconciled myself to being childless, and was most definitely wanted and joyously anticipated. I guess I should be thankful because I know I won't repeat this cycle of control with my DD. I will make other mistakes, as we all do, but blighting my daughter's life with my own self-obssession won't be one of them.

Goodness she really does sound identical to my mum, apart from the early years at home, which mum did work her arse off and we were often very skint. Thats Something that I should be grateful for apparently. But hey mum, I was a kid and it wasn't my fault we were skint and yes I know you worked very hard but that isn't an excuse to let your life stop now!

But on the other hand they wont be around forever and I could never cut my mum from my life, however bad she gets, I do love her. Just gotta keep rising above it!

Big fat virtual hugs to you, anytime u want a rant then let me know!