Mum said I've "stolen her future" because I live an hour and a half away from her. I'm scared to tell her I am pregnant.

[JessieJackets]

Me and my husband live up the coast from our mums. His mum is super nice and supportive. My mum says I have broken her heart and "stolen her future" because she now will not have her dream of idealistic grandparenthood of being involved with them daily. I love where I live because the peace I have helps me heal. She says "I hope your precious house is worth all the heartbreak you've caused me." etc.

Right now, I drive to see her every single friday, but she's always saying it's not enough and she's so sad... It's a big commitment, and I feel like I am burning out. Despite this she shows no gratitude for the effort, and makes me feel like a terrible daughter constantly.

Neither of our mothers know we are expecting yet (early days, only 5 weeks) and I am scared to tell mine because she will make it about how far I am from her and I should move back, and was selfish for buying a house we didn't need, etc etc.

Can I please have some advice? Particularly anyone in a similar scenario raising a child away from grandparents, particularly difficult ones? Thank you

That's usually a good reason to move away from your parents. I put a good 500 miles between mine and visit 3 times a year.
I am parenting my dd very differently and like a wise pp said, you want your children to go out into the world and enjoy their own lives. She knows I don't enjoy our visits to my parents - when she was younger I hid it better for her sake.
I also wouldn't want them living nearer me either!

An hour and a half is technically not really far away.

She’s being a total dick.

Distance is doable as a grandparent. We are a days travel from daughter and grandchildren, they are very firmly settled there. I am sad that I can’t see them day to day but it is what it is. Weekly video calls, visits every few months where we see lots of them. We don’t stay with them but in an Airbnb close by, we try to respect their routines, wishes etc and are grateful to be in their lives in the best way we can.

we were trained to meet others needs, not our own

Can your DH articulate it for you? If his parents are supportive he should have a good idea of what role he'd like your mum to take (hopefully pretty limited)

To put it in perspective my DC both live away from their home area (where I still live) one is 3 hours away and the other is 5 hours away! I saw all my DGC this weekend (they weren’t together I drove between the 2 homes - 3 hours apart). Admittedly I wouldn’t normally see them all in one weekend; I was scheduled to see the eldest. However, the youngest had been in hospital so I wanted to reassure myself he had recovered from his surgery.

Do NOT encourage her to move closer - she will just create the same emotional drama about something else!

My family have lived in my house for 5 generations. I hope one of my kids will want to live here one day, but absolutely expect they’ll go away and live their own lives, I just feel lucky there is so much tech available that keeping in contact is easy - when I left home at 18, there was only posting letters or a phone call to the phone that lived at the bottom of the stairs!

You decided to move with your husband to this area. You wanted a family home and it a cheaper area to get a family home with a garden. You had to do what was going to suit you, your husband and possible family down the line.

Your mother said you "stolen her future"" moving an hour and half away.
You have been visiting her a day each week and she is making hardly any effort with you when you visit. Why is she not visiting you?

My feeling is that she wants everything her own way. She said she wanted to be near by when you had a family and see her her grandkids a lot. My feeling is that she was saying this to keep you close by. When you had kids she might have done very little. My feeling is she wanted you to stay local so she have help as she got older and needed more care.

The reality is that when your adult kids grow up and get married or have kids they have to put there own family 1st and do what's best for them. In a lot of cases that can mean moving to a new area or even another country. It appears that your mother moved to Australia so it was ok for her to move X number of hours flight away from home but not ok for you to live an hour and half away.

At this stage I get a better therapist. I would step back from the weekly visits saying that your busy. Tell her about the baby with your husband there at 12 weeks plus and if she gets nasty he can tell her to behave otherwise you won't be calling to see her.
The reality is that once you have the baby you won't be be able to visit every week and as your child grows up they will have sports ect at weekends.

You decided to move with your husband to this area. You wanted a family home and it a cheaper area to get a family home with a garden. You had to do what was going to suit you, your husband and possible family down the line.

Your mother said you "stolen her future"" moving an hour and half away.
You have been visiting her a day each week and she is making hardly any effort with you when you visit. Why is she not visiting you?

My feeling is that she wants everything her own way. She said she wanted to be near by when you had a family and see her her grandkids a lot. My feeling is that she was saying this to keep you close by. When you had kids she might have done very little. My feeling is she wanted you to stay local so she have help as she got older and needed more care.

The reality is that when your adult kids grow up and get married or have kids they have to put there own family 1st and do what's best for them. In a lot of cases that can mean moving to a new area or even another country. It appears that your mother moved to Australia so it was ok for her to move X number of hours flight away from home but not ok for you to live an hour and half away.

At this stage I get a better therapist. I would step back from the weekly visits saying that your busy. Tell her about the baby with your husband there at 12 weeks plus and if she gets nasty he can tell her to behave otherwise you won't be calling to see her.
The reality is that once you have the baby you won't be be able to visit every week and as your child grows up they will have sports ect at weekends.

"Sorry Mum, if I wasn't so impacted by the generational injustice your generation have rained onto mine I might be able to afford to live where you do but, as it happens, I can't. And I also don't want to. I won't be talking about this aymore"

Your mother is selfish, controlling and manipulative.

It sounds like she has 'trained' you from when you were a kid to feel guilty and responsible for her happiness.

There is nothing wrong with what you are doing and you priority has to be yourself and your own family.

Living an hour and a half is not that far to start with.

I would continue with the counselling so you can start seeing that the dynamic you have with your mother is not healthy.

Don't call her or feel like you have to apologise.

You need to start putting boundaries in place and no longer get suck into her drama.

I presume that in all your years of therapy you and your therapist have explored what options there are for daughters of narcissistic mothers.

Personally, I'd suggest going NC but you sound like a couple of friends who've spent 40+ years trying to appease their narc mothers and can't seem to cope without them. Trapped in the game, always hoping things will change. The only person you can change is you. I would try a new therapist. It sounds as if you could do with a fresh pair of eyes on your situation.

I'd say that for the sake of your child you need to become stronger and less dependent on your mum's approval. Who cares what she thinks?

I hope you, your partner and your child, with help from your sister and in-laws, can build a new and better life away from her. She gave you life but she can't hold on to you for life. If she's going to act in an unloving, self-centred, repellant way then she'll succeed in repelling you.

Op, sorry but your mum is awful and selfish. She doesn't care about you - otherwise she wouldn't put pressure on you, make you feel bad about your life choices, and guilt trip you. She chooses not to visit? Her choice.
You're starting to feel burnt out from the visits.
You need to protect your baby - you need to protect your own health, you need your rest and you need to not feel stressed or pressured or burnt out.
Stop visiting. Tell her your health comes first and she will have to make the effort to visit you.
If she still wants you to visit then she clearly has no regard for you and the baby.
Also - don't feel the need to tell her if you don't want to. She's not speaking to you? Her choice. She doesn't get to find out about your life then!

I'm a mum and I'd never, ever dream of being like this if my DDs moved away. I would be happy for them, I'd want them to live the life they wanted, and I would be supportive. I'd reciprocate visits, because that's what normal people do. Yes I'd be sad they'd moved away but constantly criticising and guilt tripping? That's abusive.

I'd honestly not want contact with a woman like this.

Your awful, awful mother has done a real number on you. 💔 evil woman.

Congratulations on your pregnancy!!

Secondly, ditch your therapist because it’s clearly not working all! Therapy is meant to solve the problem, not keep you dependent on them.

You’re an adult and need to be fully free to live your own life and not feel obliged to your mum for anything. As a MIL, I only see my grandchildren about once a year as we live abroad from them so we visit one year and they visit us the next. Yes, of course we miss them but they have their own lives to lead and don’t owe us anything.

You need to find a better source of support to enable you to break free from your mum and lose your guilty feelings. You’ve done absolutely nothing wrong here.

She's a nightmare and you need to escape now you are having your own child for their sake if not for yours.

think about it logicially - whats actually stopping her and your dad moving to be nearer you / their GC???

She's "stealing" her own dream 🙄

Get yourself in to good therapy (cutrent one is clearly crap) and get some boundaries.

Also when I read this I KNEW she'd have some kind of medical thing like a weak heart that gives her "funny turns" or chronic fatigue etc. 😒
I am telling you right now for free her ailments will inexplicably worsen once the baby arrives.

I always end up saying this on these threads, but I'd really recommend this book. It helped me with strategies to deal with my parents. Your mum sounds like an absolute nightmare and you may find becoming a parent yourself sheds a whole different light on your childhood.

www.amazon.co.uk/Adult-Children-Emotionally-Immature-Parents/dp/1626251703

This sounds crazy and very unhealthy. My DM was upset when we moved 9 miles away! She got over it though .Our friends DS moved to the US and she is upset.Visits when finances allow .Does she have friends or any social life of her own at all? You sound like a wonderful DD.Maybe see if she can meet halfway or something 1.1/2 hours seems like a long trip when you are expecting

There’s probably peace to be found knowing that you could move next door to your DM, with interconnecting doors, and it probably still wouldn’t be enough.
If she’s unhappy with her current life, she needs to find a way to improve it. It’s not on you.
Personally, I’d hold off telling DM about the pregnancy. You just don’t want that sort of drama in the early days. Congratulations on the pregnancy though. At least your DM is role modelling how not to be as a parent x

Take some time to read online about narcissistic parents. I'm not saying your mum fits this label perfectly, but I'm sure it would resonate to some extent. There are tactics and techniques widely available online that will help you reinforce boundaries, and see more clearly patterns of unacceptable behaviour. Many people in the world have parents like yours, and the vulnerability of being their child makes them confused about what is acceptable as an adult. Arm yourself with knowledge about this personality type, learn how to deal with her and understand that guilt, shame, catastrophising, drama creation and many other behaviours become an established pattern that allows the parent to manipulate the child. She will likely never change, so you are left with the choice of having no contact, or becoming very proficient and knowledgeable about how to manage her.

OP you remind me so much of my DM and her own selfish, emotionally controlling mother, except my mum could never see the control for what it was and therefore never moved more than half an hour away. The trouble is that you have been raised with the understanding that your role is to ensure that your mum gets what she wants and you are never supposed to cause her any upset. It’s become part of your normal, and therefore feels unnatural to you to push against that.

I think you’ve done a good thing by moving to your new place, but now you will have to sit with the uncomfortable feelings it brings to do something that displeases your mum. It’s so necessary. Believe me you don’t want to end up like my mum who spent her whole life being emotionally manipulated and made to feel guilty. My mum was widowed very young and didn’t meet my step dad until nearly 20 years after my dad had died. My nan made life very hard for her when she wanted to spend part of her weekends with him because she wanted mum all to herself. In the end my amazing DSis intervened with some straight talking to make sure mum didn’t give in but it was really tough because she’d never put in suitable boundaries.

Can I also say, given that you’re now pregnant, my mum’s refusal/inability to stand up to her mum has really affected her relationship with her children, my sister and I. DSis and I have worked hard at forgiveness and moving on but it has definitely meant a less close relationship with mum than we could have had if she had been willing to stand up for herself and us when we were children. And my teenage years and early twenties were spent deeply resenting the way my Nan’s wants and needs were always put above mine. Mum has since said that she knew at the time it was wrong but she didn’t know how to disentangle herself and couldn’t cope with feeling guilty all the time. Please
don't let this be you and your DC. Moving away is probably the best thing you could have done. My mum refused to move away from her mum when we were young even though my dad had been offered a much better job an hour and a half away, which he ended up turning down because she wouldn’t move. You now have an opportunity to draw some boundary lines, take charge of your own decisions with your DH and put some distance between yourself and your mum. Her behaviour is NOT REASONABLE and you need to keep telling yourself that. You might have to sit with horrible guilt to start with in order to push through the pain barrier to get some normality back. It will be worth it!

For the record my grown up DC both live with their spouses at opposite sides of the country from each other and have done since they left uni so I’m not near either of them. Grandchildren are soon on the horizon and I know we’re not going to be just down the road from them but DH and I will just throw ourselves into being the best and most supportive grandparents we can be in the situation that we’re in. My DC have both got their own busy and fulfilling lives and I’m really glad. It’s not about me and nor should it be.

Good luck OP - I hope you manage to stop this cycle and establish some normal boundaries before your LO comes along. All the best.

That is not love it’s control. I would halt visits tbh, see how long it takes her to visit you. Of course as a mum you would prefer your adult children to live close by but it’s their life you cannot dictate and you certainly shouldn’t make them feel guilt for the choices they make. You haven’t done a thing wrong OP, this is totally on your mum. Visits and calls work both ways. Many congratulations on your pregnancy, OP. Don’t walk on eggshells around you mum, I did that for far too many years, you won’t change her. Good luck.

Well I'd tell her to get a grip and to get her head round the fact that life is not all about her.

It’ll probably be you that’s crying when you’re struggling with childcare. I moved away from my mum and dh’s parents are dead. The people who have the best time with parenting that I know have grandparents around who are helpful. Do you work? How are you going to manage childcare when your kids are ill? That said, she’s out of line to be saying these things to you. It won’t get better though. My mum’s very ‘you’ve made your bed now lie in it’ when I ask for any help with the kids. It’s a shame for kids growing up with no grandparents around as well.

You aren't. This isn't your fault.

What an emotionally immature response.