Super confused over my family situation.

[eskimobiscuits]

OK- so a bit of background. I'm early 20s, never really had a good relationship with my parents or sibling or really my extended family. I don't know what it is- i'm just so different from them all and i've never, ever gelled with them.

My mother is verbally, and on occasion physically, abusive towards me. It's been this way as long as I can remember- the problem stemming from the fact she only ever wanted one child and then fell pregnant with me. She favours my sibling blatantly- own house, own car, still gets an allowance despite earning a very modest salary in London while i'm practically sat on the bones of my arse looking for a job which is difficult enough at the moment aside from the fact i've been ill for the past 5 years. I don't think she has ever loved me- she puts on a facade in front of other people which makes it difficult for them to believe just how much I struggle at home. She is devious- very devious and apparently because buys me lavish gifts at Christmas (all part of the game) "everything must be OK really". I should probably also add that she drinks a fair amount- 2/3 nights a week she will put a bottle or two away easily.

Other relationships in life haven't been much better either- i'm lucky in that I do have a small handful of friends that I call my family but being bullied throughout school and in general day to day life has really knocked my confidence and left me feeling a bit of a recluse. It's really difficult not having the one person who should be there to support me and hold my hand and tell me everything is going to be OK. I'm terrified to live in my own home somedays- today has been a bad day as I stuck up for myself when she dragged me shopping and started shouting in the middle of the street that I stunk of BO, my hair was greasy and I looked like a "fat trollop" in the dress I was wearing. I was completely humiliated.

It has caused something though- it has made me realise that really, i'm starting to grow indifferent. Her friend died earlier in the year and she told me today that she couldn't cope with it anymore and needs me to be supportive. I just felt....nothing.

Part of me feels completely guilty because I know how hard it is to struggle without support (support she didn't offer me when I was struggling in the depths of depression) but there is a big part of me who just doesn't care about this woman who has fed me poison for so long.

Honestly....does this make me a bad person?

No it doesn't make you a bad person. If anything, I'm surprised you haven't felt like this for a long long time. To be treated so poorly by the person who imo should love you unconditionally is just bloody awful.

You still live with her?

Regarding your thread title: what is that you are confused about?

Are you confused because your mother does not treat you with love and respect? That's not just confusing, it's heartbreaking and maddening. You do not deserve to be treated that way.

Are you confused because you find yourself unwilling to give her the care and concern that she so clearly denies you? That seems like a pretty natural reaction to have. You are not a bad person for having it.

Have you seen the Stately Homes thread on here? I think you might find it helpful.

No choice at the moment Goats- i'm struggling to get a job and have no money so can't move out.

I'm confused because it has hit me today that I obviously don't care for her anymore. I really don't know how to feel about that. I really don't.

My life has changed a lot in the past few months- I am doing some volunteering and I am incredibly lucky to be blessed with an incredibly supportive manager both personally and professionally. It sounds insane but she has shown me more compassion in the 6 months that i've known her than my mother has shown me all my life.

Not seen the stately homes thread- where abouts is it?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/891903-39-But-We-Took-You-to-Stately-Homes-39-a/AllOnOnePage

Thankyou catzpyjamas.

No problem. I'm not great on the advice here but I really do feel for you.

Oh love. You've had such a rough time (((hug)))

I'm not surprised you are indifferent to her. It doesn't make you a bad person AT ALL.

You say you have no choice but to live there but, really, there are ways you don't have to live there. It means benefits but I honestly can't see that would be worse than living there.

I really don't know what i'm entitled to springydaffs? I really don't and what it will mean i'll have to do to get it.

I'm now sat wide awake because she has threatened to shoot herself because she feels so depressed. I guess not so indifferent after all but I still can't find myself wanting to help her.

Confused :(

Good Morning eskimo. I hope you got some sleep.
Your mum's threats sound like emotional blackmail and that's a hard thing to deal with. I think some positive steps about your future would make you feel more in control instead of controlled.
Citizens Advice may be able to help you find out what you're entitled to?
Did you have a read of the Stately Homes threads?

Maybe she should be looking for support from your sibling, on whom she lavished all her love and attention, rather than the one she's treated as an inconvenience all these years, eh? How can you, having never been shown a loving and supportive relationship with your parents, suddenly become a loving and supportive person yourself? Where would you have learned it from?

Most of us, I hope, don't invest in our children for the hope of payback, but nevertheless, if you invest nothing, any kind of payback is kind of unlikely. And your excuse for a mother has paid in as little as she could possibly get away with for the last twenty-odd years. She is being very unreasonable indeed to expect dividends.

Tough situation. From what you wrote you look like you are far from being bad. In fact it looks as if you are a nice and gentle girl. You probably showed a lot of filial devotion and love in the past despite her behavior. You now wonder where these filial emotions disappeared. Well I think that they did not disappear and she does not deserve them. She did nothing to nurture compassion and consideration and honesty in you. IMO you still have these feelings and are using them in your voluntary work. You must be proud of yourself: instead of dwarfing these feelings (following her nasty and unnatural behavior) you and you alone nurtured them and put them to use where they can properly help. You must now focus on getting yourself better. The MN ladies gave you wonderful ideas on how to try to get to live far away from her. As Annie said 'Maybe she (your mum)should be looking for support from your sibling' in whom she invested love and monies. Besides she sounds like she is an alcoholic. Regardless of all the emotional baggage, it is tough to support an alcoholic- it is not your duty.
You said you are sick. What are your health problems? Can you treat them and try to get some professional education to have a better job at finding a decent job? Good Luck nice girl!

www.daughtersofnarcissisticmothers.com/
May help to dispel some of your confusion.

I am happy to hear you are doing volunteer work that you find fulfilling, and where you have found a compassionate manager.

Your mother is, simply put, not a very good mother. This will have been - and continues to be - hugely damaging to you. You can't change her, you can't heal her; that is in her hands only. However, you can work on healing yourself from the effects of being put down, ignored, insulted, pressured and attacked by the one person you were conditioned to turn to for validation and support.

This will take time, and effort. You will probably need to do a lot of reading on what it means to be a child of the self-absorbed (that is why I recommended the Stately Homes thread: it has resources in the opening post, and the thread acts as a support group).

You will need to detach emotionally from your mother.

You may need therapy.

You will need to create some physical distance too, to help your healing.

And you will be able to do this: you clearly are intelligent and articulate, and your posting here shows that you are asking the right questions, and ready to find some answers.

Good luck.

Regarding her suicide threats: it is very likely that she is doing this to place the burden of her emotional well-being on you (not ok).

She may also mean it.

In either case, when someone threatens suicide, the response should be to call professional services (999). You are not qualified to assist her. If she is truly suicidal, she needs professional attention.

If she is saying it for effect, then refusing to deal with it yourself by handing responsibility over to professionals is also the right response. Offer to call 999 and see how she reacts.

Her threats or feelings of suicide are not your responsibility.
She is an adult, and if she is feeling depressed, she can turn to a GP or therapist. If she wants to guilt you into being responsible for her moods, then she has the wrong target: only she is responsible for her own wellbeing. You are therefore right to feel detached in the face of her threats: this is not your responsibility.

Goats recommended daughters of narcissistic mothers. I also recommend the book "Will I Ever Be Good Enough".

OP: It's not you. It's your mother.

Thank you everyone.

Managed to get some sleep last night fortunately as I have volunteering this afternoon. My brother turned up late last night- totally forgot he was coming but at least she is ignoring me now which gives me a break.
Looking at the positives I have work the next 2 days and then she goes away for a week- bad news is i'll be stuck with her for 10 days after that while my Dad is still away

I still feel guilty- i've had depression myself so I know what sort of place it can lead you to. I think i've got to look at the guilt from that perspective and not from the perspective that it's my mum iyswim?

Had a look at the Stately homes threads last night which was helpful and the reason I managed to finally fall asleep. Will look at everything else later.

It's really tough living life at the moment to the full because her belittling just makes me feel self conscious and anxious about everything- love my volunteering, but i'm now doubting that people want me there and if i'm in the way :(

The thing with volunteering is that you don't have any employment rights because you're not employed. If they don't want you there they can quite easily tell you to go away. Instead your manager is being supportive and lovely. Does this perhaps suggest to you that, outside your hyper-critical family, you are actually seen as a worthwhile person? It should.

She is super supportive- she knows me too well if i'm honest. I can't go into work without her knowing something is wrong. She reassures me all the time but I just can't help worrying :(

eskimo kids are programmed to love their parents. It's natural.

It takes an awful lot for a kid not to love their parent - either total neglect or a great deal of emotional mishandling. But it can be done. A parent can mishandle their child so much that there is nothing left, no spark of warmth, no love. it sounds like that's what's happened to you.

On top of that, society is permeated with the idea of loving our mother and it's an incredibly powerful influence. When we don't love our parent, we feel guilty becuase of that society expectation.

But you can't force love. You can't manufacture it when it has been blighted by being stepped on over and over, by cruelty of behaviour (physical or emotional). You can't give love on demand, it grows slowly and freely and it can't be mandated.

If there is no love or caring there, it is almost certainly because you have never been given reason to love or care. It is natural and actually, normal, not to love where there is no reason to. Even where the love should be flowing between mother and child; sometimes it's a barren landscape and it's very rarely the child's fault.

There is no reason to feel guilty if you cannot care. If the point comes that you wish to do some minimum things for her, that's okay. But you can't be guilted into it because your feelings are a direct and normal response to her actions and lack of actions.

I do think that you need to get out there ASAP because right now you're still young and can hopefully blossom if you get into an environment which is neutral rather than hostile. But if you stay, that prickly, unloving environment can influence you and the influence can remain.

I am going to go out on a limb here and I'm speaking from my own too extensive experience here; it's better to live in poverty than to remain in a loveless and hostile environment. Circumstances of real poverty -hunger and cold- can change and there's help out there if it's that bad in practical terms. But no one sees the damage that the sort of environment you're in does. It's extreme advice I'm giving here but if the situation is as bad as I read it, i think it's the best option for your longer term.

ugh, just read on another thread about what sort of 'help' there is. It doesn't sound feasible, it sounds as if it could be deeply damaging in fact. But it might well be worth talking to a housing association to see if any (reasonable) alternative accomodation is possible even if it's lodging with decent family. Did that for years myself in various places around the country.

OP I know you have an illness but are you able to train up for a skill