Is this a 'mother' thing or is it just mine?

[DeckSwabber]

I'm in my forties. Since I left home I see my mum every few weeks.

Every time I see her comments on my weight.

I'm in the normal range, though could lose a few pounds atm. So last time it was 'are you pregnant?'. This time it was a pointed 'Are you slimming?'. Sometimes its a comment about how slim she is herself, while looking pointedly at my tummy.

Then she spends the rest of the visit trying to make me eat.

She pushes food in front of me saying things like 'you mustn't starve yourself!. This week she had bought a huge chocolate cake and lots of cream and ice cream. If I stay overnight she tries to get me to eat a cooked breakfast. When I say 'no' to all this extra food she makes a comment to other people about me being 'on a diet' as if this was the silliest thing ever.

Is this just what mums do?

My mum is like this, she hates that I'm thinner than her. She's doing slimming world and doing really well yet she still felt the need to tell me my tummy was bigger than hers it fucking isn't last time I saw her.

She's also the reason I have massive body image issues, bordering on body dysmorphia. :(

My mil was always the same. I used to come away from a weekend visit thankful that I could finally get a few hours without being fed!

Anyone who comments on your body size in a negative way can fuck off. Tell her. She'll probably be hurt but she'll get over it.

She is a 'feeder' it is quite a dangerous dynamic and requires an assertive word or a standard response from you.
I have learnt this from an over-eaters anonymous 12 step programme, she obviously has her own issues.

She comments on your weight because she thinks weight is important. That doesn't mean that you have to think its important. Perhaps tell her that?

My dad is like this a bit.

She clearly has self-esteem issues and is trying to hurt you in order to feel better about her own inadequacies.

Agree with that.

I wouldnt of thought she knows she's doing it, people like this are ill and its rare that they dont pass this illness on to their children.

Oh mine commnets on my weight, my clothes, my hair, the food I cook, the DC, their school, how much homework they get, my work, where we go on holiday...you name it, there is nothing my Mother does not feel expert enough to comment on. And nothing that she feels better kept to herself.

I mostly ignore but sometimes I crack and tell her she is being an utter bitch. She always seems shocked and tells me she can't 'say anyhting'. Oh the irony.

And no, I will never ever behave like this towards my daughter.

My grandmother is like this (except she won't also feed you- more likely to starve you).

She is obsessed that we are all too fat and at the same time she is aghast that she is now having to wear smaller clothes because she is shrinking and eating tiny portions of everything

It's very sad, we largely put it down to her age and ignore... Which is probably hugely ageist... But if the other alternative is telling a 90 yr old to fuck off, it's a bit of a rock and hard place station...

Your mother sounds very similar to mine, my weight fluctuates - I'm generally a size 14, I have a very glamorous size 8 sister and my mum's entire notion of attractiveness is bound up in 'being thin', I get comments about old photos ' I can't believe how thin you look ' , ' would you like to borrow some of my clothes ?' - ( size 18-20), she lost weight for my wedding and then expressed the view that she hoped I wasn't worried that she'd distracted attention from me as so many people told her how great she looked. Yet yesterday she virtually forced me to choose some chocolate in the supermarket.
I deal with it by accepting that she is deeply insecure about her own appearance and attempts to foist those insecurities onto me, as a consequence of this I've ensured that my own daughter has never heard me criticise my own appearance, seen me obsess about weight or 'go on a diet'. I don't think it's possible to change one's parent's mindset but I'm damned if my own daughter will be subject to that kind of insidious self-loathing message.

Yeah, mine does this.

'S all part of the rich tapestry that makes us who we are, innit?

It made me decide as a teenager that I wasn't going to buy into all this diet-diet-chocolate cake-diet crap, and I happily bumble along at about a size 16-18.

Have you tried the MN classic - "Did you mean to sound so rude?"

Everyone comments on my weight, I think my mother was one of the least likely to say something, ffs. (I am not fat or underweight, and I don't care about my weight as long as my clothes still fit).

No. I would never tell my children that they should lose weight and I try and look on the positive when they insist on discussing their bodies and perceived 'imperfections'.
And if they are on diets and eating at my house I will do my best to accomodate this.

Otherwise I would never hear the end of it!

she lost weight for my wedding and then expressed the view that she hoped I wasn't worried that she'd distracted attention from me as so many people told her how great she looked.

My mum did this. She even said that as she was giving me away that I should expect people to be looking at her as we walked down the aisle and not noticing me.

She wasn't having a joke with me either she genuinely thought this.

Oh, my mother is like this too. I bloody hate the constantly having biscuits and cakes pushed at me, with the "are you slimming?" comment when I refuse them, follwed by the "oh, she'll start shouting at me in a minute" to any poor bastard that will listen if I continue to refuse them. I have only shouted at her once in my life!

She's generally toxic anyway.

Blimey, it looks like there are loads of them out there. Does anyone have any ideas about what made them this way ?

Not my mother but someone I know...said "you look just the same". I had lost four stone.....some people just have ishoos.

Love your name, CunningStunt, and yes, indeedy doo, people do just have ishoos.

YES! Thought it was just mine! I have a sis who's 13yrs older than me and she's like it with both of us, and will say to me "oh I seen your sister and she looks really fat in the face, she's put loads of weight on" and when I see her she looks exactly the same!

She went one of those liquid diets and lost quite a bit of weight so gave me her old jeans as they were to big for her now! She's since started eating all the crap she was b4 and put it back on mind and will complain about her weight and then eat biscuits/cakes etc and ask me if I want the same crap, but in the next breath will say "try not to put to much weight on with this preg mind"

Nearly 10yrs ago now I started a part time job after school and was walking around alot and lost quite a bit of weight, went down to a size 10 and then the comments I had off her went along the lines of "oh look at skinny minnie by there"

I do think it's part of a bigger picture, for example her and my sis have fallen out recently but before this it was as if she could only be 'friends' with one of us at a time. My sister and I have a long standing joke that either one of us is flavour of the month this week

She's quite bitchy generally about other people and will say things if we're out shopping which really embarrasses me and is just not nice!

Oh I could go on and on but I'm not ever eloquent and I don't want to bore!

Rhiana1979 the cheek of it!

OP you've stolen my mum

I find the most effective response is completely ignore, i.e. she makes the comment, I let a moment's silence develop with a completely impassive expression, then change the subject. Hasn't completely stopped her but has definitely cut it down and now I find that sometimes, I actually filter out the comment without feeling anything at all.