I haven't decided to stop contact with my mum - yet. But am feeling the full force, yet again, of a mother who really doesn't seem to give a stuff about me, my children or my life. I'm currently undergoing something very traumatic - which she knows about, but the last time I attempted to talk to her - not expecting any answers, but just hoping for a bit of basic sympathy and for her to show me she was "on side", she told me she was ending the call (after all of 20 mins) as I was "making her feel ill". That was 5 weeks ago and since then nothing. This is typical .... she goes to ground at the slightest hint of anything "not nice" ... so long as I witter on about trivial superficial stuff like weather, TV shows or celebrities she's happy to chat. Anything real, and the shutters come down, calls are ended with the most ridiculous intelligence insulting excuses like someone at the door, lunch ready, toilet needed - and she won't contact me again for months. I could write an essay about this ..... how as a single mum she never helped me, not once, even for a day when me or my child were ill, yet helped my sibling, with their two children every week for 9 years. How she professes no knowledge of stuff I've told her about me - such as operations. Just makes me feel so irrelevant. How she's never had either of my children to stay, even for an afternoon, or taken them out anywhere.
I know totally what it's like to want a "proper" mum. I do know that we're not alone in not having one but I still maintain, that at least in my own personal experience, the vast majority of people I know do have a "proper" relationship with their mothers .... one of mutual caring, support and interest in each other. One where your mum is someone you can turn to without fear of being judged, whatever time of day it is (ha ha ha) knowing your mum wants to know what's happening in your life. One where your mum also seeks out your company, because she loves you and enjoys being with you, where she wants to catch up and find out what's been going on - good or bad .... and who doesn't make you feel even worse than you already do when things go wrong by recoiling in horror.
This is something I find very hard to deal with and I'm sure the lack of that basic fundamental relationship has really hit my self esteem - and therefore affected many other areas of my life quite severely. This includes making friends and trusting people which I find very hard - ironic really because if you don't have those basic close family relationships you really do need to build close friendships more than ever ... but I find this so terribly difficult as I have almost zero self confidence, am scared of being rejected, don't feel good enough or interesting enough for people to bother spending time with me and so on. I don't understand why my mum is like this ..... she had a good relationship with her mother, lived close by, saw her at least once a week, had quite a bit of help from her etc. We've never had a blazing row, so no back history to account for the recitence/stand offishness now. Even as a teenager I was always the "good" one, yet my sister caused heaps of trouble for my parents and her - umm - "lifestyle" is very questionnable now, but my mum seems far more involved with her and her children.
I'm very sorry for anyone missing their mum for whatever reason, including death .... but what I would say is that in comparism, I lost my dad many years ago and though I still miss him hugely, I bear him no ill will. After all, he didn't choose to die, and I've never felt he was lacking as a dad in any way. I do think - and really don't mean to cause offence - that it's different when a mother chooses to withdraw from a child, because that kind of separation is deliberate, and obviously therefore incredibly hurtful. I worry about my mum dying often ..... as do many people I'm sure ..... but most people with normal mother/child relationships would do so because they're obviously going to feel bereft and would miss that special relationship terribly. What I worry about - and it's hard to articulate - is how I'll feel afterwards, knowing that when that happens, there'd never be a chance for things to be different .... right now, I guess I still cling onto the hope she might come round, might finally show that I do mean something to her other than duty-bound Xmas cards etc ... though that hope has pretty much been dashed by recent events and her reaction.
So sorry for what you're going through Cath - and also apologise for hijacking this somewhat - your post just struck a nerve. I think you're very brave to cut contact though - and good on you ..... it's like saying, no, I deserve to be treated better than you treat me and I'm not going to pretend your attitude towards me is okay any longer by keeping up a pretence of a relationship. I don't feel able to do the same, as unfortunately, I think it would have rammifications on the last few remaining (extended) family relationships I have with other people. I'm not sure they would totally understand and it might make things very difficult for them.