PND - Did your relationship with your own mum play a part?

[ClearWater]

I got pretty bad PND shortly after ds2 was born, and looking back it probably had started when I went back to work after having ds1.

I don't know at what point I began to realise that some of the underlying issues were based around my terrible relationship with my own mum, but I felt like every decision I made now I was a mum, was unconciously based on being a better mum to my children than my mum had been to me.
It was like I was in constant competition with her and it was so exhausting.

I've never really had great self-esteem, but I really began to hate myself, the more depressed I got, the worse it became. I would analyse everything I said or did to see if I was starting to sound or act like my mum, and if I did, would dislike myself even more.

My mum spent a lot of time in my childhood telling me what a horrible child I was, naughty, argumentative, bad-tempered - she said all my family knew how nasty and badly behaved I was and none of them liked me. A few times she told me I was so bad she was putting me in a Children's Home, and she would carry on this scenario for a day or two, she had rang the 'Matron' and she was sorting out a place there for me and would phone when one became free. These times really stand out in my childhood memories.

Anyway, I started having counselling about 6 weeks ago, and already it is making such a difference to how I feel. We have been through my mum's life and I've realised that she was probably quite an unhappy and depressed person throughout my childhood. She was made to go into a job she didn't like, but which was 'a good job' working for the council, by my (strict)Grandad when she left school rather than following her hopes of being a cook or a dressmaker. She got pregnant unexpectedly with me and had to then get engaged to my dad and sort out a council house. She had to go back to work full time when I was 3 months old as my dad didn't earn anywhere near enough to support us. My dad drank a lot with his football buddies and wasn't around a lot.

The list goes on.

Basically she didn't have many choices, and this was probably why she was so resentful of me as I was growing up, and we have the bad realtionship we have because of this.

Posted before I meant to then.

I feel a lot better knowing that our bad relationship wasn't my fault for being a horrible child. This is quite a big breakthrough for me.

The low-self esteem part we are just getting to. I've come to realise the reason behind this is mainly because no matter how much I profess to hate her, I do care about her.

This is why it upsets me so much when she isn't interested in hearing about my getting promoted at work, getting engaged, married, getting pregnant, everything that I've been proud of. I've gone up to tell her about it and she ALWAYS pricks the balloon by not giving a damn about it.
And I always say to myself WHY? Why do I always go to her to tell her about stuff knowing that she'll react this way.

I really hate myself for being weak enough to care about someone who's never shown me any love, affection or interest.
I have spent my whole life telling people how much I hate her and don't get on with her.

So that's where i'm up to now. Trying to get my head round those feelings.

The reason for this thread is that I've noticed quite a few people have mentioned they have a bad relationship with their mum and have PND, and I was interested to hear people's thoughts on it.

Sorry for waffling, hope I've not bored you too much!

ClearWater - lots of hugs and well done to you for breaking the cycle and being the kind of mum to your own kids that you deserved and didn't get. I do understand where you're at, my mum is very similar, truly isn't interested in me (or any of my sibs) and my abiding memories of her are as being either downright nasty or indifferent to me as a child. It's taken me a lot of time and therapy to get over it and to break the low-self esteem and self-destructive behaviour that I had. For me the only way was to cut her out of my life completely which I have done for 8 years now and just get on with building my own life and putting my energies into more sustaining relationships.

I was worried when I had my first child 10 months ago now that issues around all this would resurface but so far they haven't. My (mild) bout of PND was all about coming to terms with feelings of being tied down by the drudgery of it all plus disappointment at failing at BF. Anyway, that's another story.

It helps that my mum isn't interested in ds - she found out from someone else that I'd him and she apparently refers to him as "that baby". If she did show an interest I'd probably crumble.

Good luck - you will emerge from this.

Thanks officerdibble. I have also thought about just not having any contact anymore with my mum.

My councellor said there are two choices - break all contact with her, as she's never going to live up to my expectations, or do what my sister does and let it be 'water off a duck's back' so to speak. But I'm just not that easygoing, laid back sort of person like my s, so I can't see it being the latter. And it still hurts, I can't see yet how to get immune to that.

While the children are still so young and not at school, I need my mum and dad to help out with childcare, babysitting, etc. I couldn't bear to not see my dad, he and I are really close, and he and my mum come as a package, so I've not really got a choice at the moment.

Maybe my mum and I will start to work thing out, but can't see it happening any time soon.

But I really do feel like a weight has started to be lifted from my shoulders because of the councelling. It's helping enormously, and I would recommend it to anyone.

Both dp and I are determined NOT to be anything like our parents. We both had terribly sad childhoods. All the time when things go wrong and we freak out, when things calm down again I can see how our upbringing has affected us. Of course we're now ultra conscious of everything we do with dd. That's a good and a bad thing. Good because we're v. caring etc., but bad in that we're never really relaxed if you see what I mean.

I think seeing a councillor is a brilliant idea. It's only by understanding these things that you can escape from their pull.

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I had terrible relationship with my mother and never had PND. But it was partly terrible because I thoroughly rejected so many things about her, made a decision when very young I would be different. So there wasn't a deep yearning or anything like that for things to be different. I never had any ideals about motherhood or families or romance (or anything, maybe; I was born disillusioned...). Maybe things are different if you feel like motherhood should be an ideal relationship. I tell everyone that one of my big hopes for my children is that they'll still be on good terms with me as adults. Most other people just seem to assume that will be the case, but I don't take it for granted.

Wow clearwater and all, i'll try to make this not to long winded. I also had a really shitty (scuse me!) relationship with my mum (and childhood with my dad) all my life and have spend the best part of 15 years in and out of therapy to try to deal with it all. I was really lucky to sort out my stuff with my dad before he died (3 weeks after my DS was born) but my mum was another story she died 15 months later and it has taken me a really really long time to realise that for me a) becoming a mum is such a huge issue in so far as revisiting your own childhood and your relationships with your parents that its almost explosive! b) counselling/therapy although really helpful to get me over issues that had me stuck in negative place after a while only served to continue to revisit the negativity and therefore keep me focused on the awful past. I am now strongly considering giving up counselling and transfering to Life Coaching which appears to focus on the future and the positive rather than the past and the negative.Hope this gives you food for thought. By the way although i would never have had the strenght to have walked away from me mum and spent way too many years trying every concievable was to gain her approval i have to say that on a certain level i am at last now free of her. Never completely because you cant erase the past but i do hope one day to truly be at peace with it and her!!! Wishing you all the luck and love for your journey.

I have started to wonder if having a child, which inevitably makes you question your parents behaviour, is a bit like becoming an adolescent in the sense that it is another stage in people's lives when they have the strong desire to become independent. Maybe we have to rebel and push against our parents because we want (need) to do things our way. I wonder if it is a completely natural thing, but how to deal with and understand those feelings is probably as difficult as when we are teenagers.

I have become more forgiving of my mom after having my own kids.
OTOH, I still shake my head in despair that she "let" a little child (me) have so much power over her. She was the adult, she should not have reacted like she did.

Clearwater and all you have read my mind exactly (are you sure you donlt know me?!) because I am currently off work due to PND (DD is 16mths- was a preemie but that is no longer a real issue) and the only feelings that come out during my counselling sessions are anger and bitterness about my mother, how she was in the past and still is. I know we don;t have a typical mother-daughter relationship but I do not want one. However she cannot see what she has been like/is like with me (although has gone through some depressing times herself they have been largely down to her own making and she thinks she has been so hard done to when in actual fact her paranoia is the real problem). Trouble is, she adores DD and is keen to help out, I loathe it but need her to look after her 1 day a week when I'm working. I am soooooooooooo determined to not bring my daughter up in her style but I canm see that as the months go on her behaviour towards DD is exactly like it was with me when I wasd growing up - so she has not learnt at all!!!! Its all too stressful and I have enough on but I know there would be such an almighty row if I challenged her about stuff (plus I don;t feel strong enough yet).

Wow, what an atypical thread.

I had a sweet and loving mother who died years ago. Her only problem was that she was weak, weak , weak and she let me be abused by her father just like I now realise he must have done to her too. I am still trying to make sense of it. Sometimes I feel sorry for her and sometimes I curse her. I know one thing: no man from my family will ever be left alone with my little one.