Narc mother and christening

[NewChoos]

Have found the relationships board very helpful, following others threads on here, have diagnosed my mother as a narc and it has actually helped with how I manage her. So thanks to all the wise posters for this!

I won't go into the long and complicated history but suffice to say she is selfish, self centred, a bully and generally emotionally manipulative. I went through a stage of distancing myself from her, visiting 1 -2 monthly but from about 15 years ago she has had health issues and so I helped more (hospital appointments, monthly shopping and lunch out etc). My 2 sisters live locally, I am an hour away. 1 sister visits/helps daily, the other 2 times a week and we generally just try and tolerate her unreasonable behaviour by doing a lot of hmm'ing when she is ranting! So we all muddled on until she was then vile, and said very nasty things about me in the lead up to my wedding a few years ago, I told her that her behaviour was not acceptable, she half apologised, came to the wedding but then spoilt parts of the day by behaving badly, refusing to eat/drink food and wine provided/being generally demanding/ being morose. I had to talk to her 3 times during the day and ask her not to be so negative/nasty and this was supposed to be a happy day, please could she try to be happy for just this day (I had asked her this prior to the wedding as well).
Since then I have remained a polite relationship with her, although she continues to shout down the phone at me for things like not weaning my DS earlier than 6 months or not phoning her enough (she tells me she can't afford to phone me - which isn't true she has plenty of money). I generally tell her I am not continuing the conversation if she is going to shout.

I am now planning my DS's christening and I just don't want her there. I have told my sisters, but they think I am being unreasonable and are making me feel guilty (of course I feel guilty but I just want 1 nice day that's not about her! It's such an important day for us and I don't want it ruined). My sister's don't really challenge her behaviour, and they think as she is so old and has ill health we should make her life as nice as possible and ignore her behaviour. But I am totally fed up of her, I think I would cut contact if it was not for my sisters, I certainly don't want her influence too much in my DS's life.

Sorry this is a long post. Would value advise.

Earthymama That's dreadful. It's amazing how hard it is to be able to stand up to them though!

My mother was a fucking evil narc cunt. Bashed me and showered me with insulting words - and always twisted everything round so it was my fault. She was vile to my dad, spitting at him, scratching him and throwing scalding tea at him, not to mention the vile humilating insults she yelled at him. She picked fights constantly - I used to say she would fight her own shadow if there was nobody else to fight. Sometimes dad lashed out at her; this didn't happen often, but when it did she was gleeful. Threatened to take me away "then I'll bring you up MY way!" That would have meant continued mental torture and physical abuse and no love or kindness. She was unstoppable - it was like spitting peas at a Sherman tank. She was like Hitler in a frock.

When I got severe depression at the age of sixteen she was beyond vile. She called me nutty-fruit-cake, funny-ah-ah, loopy lulu and dinny bitch. Dinny being local slang for mad. She'd tell me I wasn't all there. Cunt.

Just one example of what else I got from her: in the run-up to my wedding she was inviting her work cronies (gruesome, most of them) and told me I couldn't have any more of my friends. In the course of the row she told me "you're a fucking whore and you don't deserve a ceremony." I slapped her face. I am not ashamed of this in the slightest. She had it coming.

One of the people I couldn't invite was J, a good friend. I was determined she would be invited but fate took a hand and she was killed in a car accident about a week after the quarrel.

I went to J's funeral, a requiem mass which was beautiful, but not to the interment which was private. We lived near the cemetary. So what does my witch mother do the following day but go (with chief crony, the one with spoilt brat daughter who behaved appallingly at my wedding) to have a nosy at the flowers and read the messages on them. Then she came back and told me all about it. I got up and walked out of the room. Fucking evil BITCH. Didn't occur to her I was grieving for my friend, of course, and didn't want her morbid prurient shit all over me.

When she got old and lonely and depressed, I did my best for her (grocery shop, trips out in my car, lunch on mothering sunday) but it was a thankless task because everything I did wasn't good enough. If my dear brother so much as nodded her way, she was ecstatic. The day that man does anything for anybody else, I'll die of shock.

She's been dead four years, but I am not free of her. All the hateful opinions about me, the cruel words, the mocking gleeful laughter when she had reduced me to tears - I do them to myself now. Always will. Therapy won't shift it. I'm trying again with that but my mother's messages are hard wired in and too strong to shift.

(Sorry this is so long, and about all the swearing. And I'd like to stress that I don't go round hitting people; have never hit anyone else before or since.)

You cant get it right with Narc's no matter what you do. If you invite her then something wont be right and she will manage to make it all about her, so you might as well choose the "not right" option that suits you!

She will be a pita whichever way you go, so dont invite her and you will still get the crap but your DS's day will be perfect :). If you do invite her then you will still get the crap and the day will be ruined. And your sisters probably want you to invite her because they know that they will get the ranting when you dont.