Hi all. I just wanted to get some thoughts from anyone else with parents who essentially disowned them as children but now feel guilty for not wanting to be their parents carer.
I’ll give some background in a nutshell.
My parents had my brother and I when they were very young, they split when I was 5 and my brother was 7. My mum got custody of me, met an older rich man and put me in boarding school at 6 years old. First weekly boarding, but by year 6 I was a full boarder. I hated it. I cried and cried for my family.I would beg her to take me out but my cries were always met with resistance. By the time I was in year 4 ( about aged 9) my mum and step dad were leaving me at school for the odd weeekend so they could go on holiday together.
I never went on holiday and would spend 8 weeks sitting in my mums office during the summer.
My mother loved the life my step father provided, but they were both heavy drinkers and this lead to them having a very toxic sometimes violet relationship.
When I turned 18 I moved out ..i didn’t feel I had much choice..so I moved to London, I had no money and a job that just about covered my rent.. I didn’t have money for extras such as food.. I asked my mum to lend me £20 one day and she huffed and puffed at me. My brother (who lived with our dad) once asked her for £20 and she said he could have it but he’d have to get the train to her to get it.. he didn’t have the train money obviously so was unable to get the £20.
I got married and had my first child at 32, as soon as I had him, my mother and her partner sold their home in the UK and moved to France.. she was never available for helping or babysitting.. she didn’t want to do it anyway..
At 38 I had my daughter and the night I had her my mother did look after my son.. I had a terrible hemorrhage during birth and honestly thought I might die, I really wanted my husband to stay with me, but my mother asked my husband when he would be home so he felt pressured to get back so she could go home.
She then moved to Spain and called me once a fortnight.. she didn’t form particularly close bonds with her grandchildren (including my brothers 4 children) as she was never really in the country.
she was very resentful of the relationships they all had with their other grandparents though and there have been many remarks over the years to demonstrate that.
She has smoked and drank her way through her adult life and now is incredibly overweight has COPD and is basically a carer to my 86 year old step father.. she is 69 (big age gap).
They moved back to the UK about 8 years ago and now she wants me to speak to her regularly, she’s been told her COPD is at stage 3 but she continues to have the odd puff of a cigarette and has done nothing about her weight, regardless of endlessly telling me she will be addressing her health.
She is forever talking about her health and wanting sympathy and more attention from me saying things like ‘if I make it to 70, I’ll be happy!’
After the life she has given my brother and I, I am really resenting this constant feeling that I should be doing more, that she doesn’t have long left and the guilt with my conflicting emotions about how I will feel once she has gone.
I tried to go no contact a couple of times because of the past but she was bulldoze her way in to my life.
My question is, do I forgive and forget and make her last months/ years wonderful? Or do I preserve my own MH and focus on my own family and keep her at arms length like I have been doing? My head is a mess.
Doesn’t help that I am nearly 50 and menopausal myself.
What would you guys do?
TIA x